"All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because, 'God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.'  Humble yourselves, therefore, under God's mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time.  Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you."         1 Peter 5:5b-7

I guess there is a reason that pride has been around from before the creation of humanity - it just never seems to go away.  At just about every turn in my life personally, there it is - in all its ugliness - staring me down and singing the siren's song that says acts born in pride will be satisfying.  They aren't - at least, not in the long run.  Sure, you will get applause in the now.  But, at the end of the day when the applause tapers, the true follower of Christ knows something that all of the hand clappers don't - that the thing for which they were applauding was driven by a sense of "me" rather than a sense of "Him."

I hope that I am honest enough to admit that it happens to me.  It does.  More than I care to cop to.  It is an ongoing battle that every follower of Christ must wage, and is at the core of most of our decision making.  Is it going to be about me or is it going to be about Christ?  It's a no-brainer to answer - but it seems it takes 45 brains, hearts and legs to actually get it done.

Humility, in it's pure form (not the distorted false humility which is nothing short of a parody of the reality), is a powerful weapon for good and for God.  It keeps us close to Christ (speaking pragmatically).  It allows us to have a perspective of life and self that is based in reality and is healthy.  And it keeps us from getting smacked in the head.

The phrase "God opposes the proud" is filled with pictures.  The one that most comes to my mind is that of the "stiff arm" in football (ladies or non-football watchers:  this means that someone with the ball sticks their arm out straight [stiff], placed squarely on the opponent's face, to fend off the defensive player coming to tackle them).  That is the idea of this phrase.  If you walk in pride, God keeps you at arm's length.  Humility is the door through which we gain our relational access to God (again, speaking pragmatically).

Though it seems tough to hear that God will stiff-arm us at times, it is a gracious stiff-arm.  In the passage above, Peter makes it clear that God cares for us - He is not looking to necessarily scar our foreheads with His knuckled imprint.  This, in itself, was humbling for me.

Just this morning I was sensing God correcting my heart for a number of things that had to do with pride.  They weren't obvious, they were simply known to me and God.  But all the while He was correcting me, I was thinking about how I deal with people when they have made a mistake.  I was thinking that I am pretty gracious and loving - and for the most part I think that may be relatively accurate.  And then I was actually stupid enough to think that I wish I were dealing with me and my heart errors rather than God.  For a moment, I actually imagined that I might be more gracious than God to myself.

About then, God reminded me that there is nobody more gracious and loving than He.  Not me.  Not anybody.  And, to state it again, most surely not me.  When he corrects us, it is in love and grace and truth.  Does it cut?  Yep.  Does it sting?  Yes.  But is right and good and holy?  Absolutely.

Had I humbled myself before I got to that point, maybe I would not have had to been corrected.  But I am glad I was.  I needed it, and God did it masterfully, graciously, and lovingly - without ever yieding truth and righteousness.  I hope I do the same the next time around, and that I realize that walking in humility is better than being humbled.

"What a wretched man I am!  Who will rescue me from this body of death?  Thanks be to God - through Jesus Christ our Lord!"  Romans 7:24-25

Unchecked competence can be fatal.

For those that are competent in what they do, that competence is the default position when faced with any circumstance.  Truth be told, that is not necessarily a bad thing in and of itself.   We need the competencies that we have to do what we do.  God gives us gifts, abilities, and resources to accomplish many things - and our desire to amp up our competency level in what we do is perfectly acceptable.  In fact, in many job or school environments, it is expected and/or required.  Fair enough.

The problem that emerges with this, however, is that we lose sight of our own weakness and need for God as we up the ante on our skill sets and competencies.  This is where the danger lurks for the believer - we take a big bite out of the same forbidden fruit as did our earliest forbears.  We buy what the serpent is selling - "You can do this without God" - you've got the skills, the abilities, the resources, the relational capital, the competence to do it.

Good thing for us, then, that we have a clear-headed, highly competent guy to show us the way through this.  If anyone would have been considered competent in the time of the Bible, I think that Paul would rank pretty high on the list.  He was a Class-1 Pharisee who studied under one of the great names in Pharisaism, Gamaliel.  He could maneuver intellectually with the philosophers of Greece, or debate the law with the scholars of Judaism.  He was multi-lingual, and even knew how to use his hands to build tents if necessary.  Certainly, Paul was a picture of competence.

But...................this was a guy that was relatively comfortable with his weakness.  He notes in the large part of Romans 7 how he ends up often doing what he wishes he wouldn't do, and can't seem to get done the good he wishes he could do.  He notes that he is living in a body of death - the idea being that he would never really "arrive" in this life because something was broken.  It was, in fact, not something that was broken, but someone.  Paul discovered that people don't have problems - they are the problem.  So, a guy this competent, this intelligent - what does he do when faced with the circumstances of life?

He falls face first in dependence on Jesus.  He notes that the only rescue from the incomplete body of death is in Jesus.  While this has huge implications for the bodily resurrection on which the Christian sets his/her hope (which, as an aside, IS the hope of the believer....."heaven" was not the great hope of the believers of antiquity - it was the bodily resurrection........with heaven being the location where that is realized and played out), I won't run that track right now.  For now, the reminder is simply this - don't fall back on your competence first......fall into Christ.  That is not an encouragement to short change your abilities or skills - simply, it is a reminder to us all that we are broken and no amount of skill or ability is going to fix it.......we must have Jesus.

Here's hoping that we never graduate from dependence on Jesus.........no matter how talented you are.

"The LORD called Samuel a third time, and Samuel got up and went to Eli and said, 'Here I am; you called me.'  Then Eli realized that the LORD was calling the boy.  So Eli told Samuel, 'Go and lie down, and if he calls you, say, 'Speak, LORD, for your servant is listening'."  1 Samuel 3:8-9

I am a stinky counselor.

I've tried to do it.  Really I have.  I just stink at it.  I can't come up with the "Four tiered process to find hope in grief" or "Six irreducible minimums for breaking addictive behaviors" or anything even remotely close.  Usually my counsel is something like, "Read the Bible.  Do what it says."  That's really about all I have to give (except some love, prayers, and a listening ear which is worth plenty I realize).  We have some good counselors on our team at The Chapel at CrossPoint - good thing - because if we didn't and I was responsible for all the counseling it would be big trouble.

What is hard to square with this issue of counseling is that it seems to be a part of what the "Pastor package" is supposed to contain.  Professional pastor-type people like me are assumed to be able to counsel very well.  But what about those of us who can't?  Do we need more schooling (like 14 years of it post high school is not enough already?) or more seminars?  Worse yet, do we need to pack it up and go find another vocation? 

I hope not, and I am at least encouraged to hold onto that because of Eli. 

Eli was a poor parent.  Just one look at his boys, of whom it was reported that they had no regard for the LORD, would tell you that.  Eli might have been a decent priest, but with his house in disarray it was hard to see it very clearly.  And Eli wasn't a particularly astute counselor either.  For that I am grateful.

Samuel, Eli's young protege, kept coming in and telling Eli that he was showing up because Eli was calling for him.  Eli knew he wasn't calling for Samuel, but it took him three times to realize that maybe it was God (I am also glad there are other thick headed people in the Bible).  So, with incredible insight and a counselor's acumen, Eli gave Samuel this advice - "Uh, it must be God, so go back and listen for Him."  Brilliant.

The reason I like this so much is that it was exactly what was needed.  No lectures.  No diagrams.  No explanation on how the voice of the LORD was supposed to come.  Just go listen for God and do what He says.  This gives me hope, really, because I think I can handle the ministry of Eli.  He simply gave Samuel some instructions that would find Samuel backing into God.

That's really all I want to do in ministry.  Find ways to help people stumble onto God.  Back into Him.  Run headfirst into Him.  Whatever.  Just get people to Him.  So, for all of us non-counselor type people, I think we can figure that out.

Go listen to Him.  And do what He says.

"And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved."  Acts 2:47b

It's just crazy to think about what happened to the early church.  They had insane numbers of people coming to faith in Jesus on day one of their existence.  Why?  Because the power of the Spirit of God had invaded time, space, and the human soul,  and now the dwelling place of God (or temple if you will) was not a stationary place in Jerusalem only, but a mobile, living, active dwelling in the soul of every believer and follower of Jesus.

In fact, in the early stages and days of the church, there were people being added to the church daily.  Every day.  Like Tuesday, some lady gives her life to Jesus.  Then, on Wednesday, this young teenage boy falls on his face in reverence to the Living Messiah, Jesus.  On and on these stories were seen in the early stages of the church.

So what was so compelling?  What was the formula?  Well, there was no formula, that is for sure.  It seems in the early stages there was no strategy....at least on the human side.  Simply, the believers decided that they would be radically obedient to the teaching of the apostles (which is preserved for us in what we call The Bible), that they would devote themselves to prayer in the faith that Jesus was listening, that they would "do life" together and eat together and meet each other's needs if there were any.

Again, what about this was so compelling?  I think it was the love they had for Christ that yielded a deep love for one another, and a deep compassion for those that did not know Christ.  They loved each other daily.  They encouraged each other daily.  They engaged a world in need of Jesus daily.  And daily, people were coming to faith in Christ.

Man would that be cool to see today.  The Church loving radically, living sacrificially, and showing a witness consistently.  What might happen?  Maybe the stories of life change would be stories that would affect your life.  Maybe on a Tuesday, the lady that gives her life to Christ is your sister, or mom, or wife, or daughter.  Maybe the boy on Wednesday that comes to faith in Christ is your son, or brother, or best friend, or neighbor.  Maybe.

The question this drives me to is "How consistently do you love, pray, follow Christ, share, reach out?"  How consistently do I?

Maybe the better question is "How consistently have I/we done these things..............daily?"

Daily is going to be where it is at.  The romanticized ideal of spirituality that we read about and dream about and long for is really just a series of "daily" combined with another "daily" and then another.  Deepening spirituality is really, in the words of Eugene Peterson, "a long obedience in the same direction." 

Let's start that process.  Loving, sharing, obeying, caring, reaching, protecting.  Let's start................today, because daily is where it will happen.