Predisposed to Prejudice

Merriam-Webster online defines prejudice as, " injury or damage resulting from some judgment or action of another in disregard of one's rights; especially : detriment to one's legal rights or claims."  Another definition we are more apt to quote is "preconceived judgment or opinion."  Sounds rather like something I would like to avoid.

I read a verse in John 8 that impacted me and turned my thoughts to the topic of prejudices.  The Jewish leaders and Jesus were discussing the true identity of Jesus.  After some bold statements by Jesus, the leaders' reply was, "Say we not well that you are a Samaritan, and have a devil?"  Did they just say being a Samaritan was kin to having a devil?!  My guess is that not one of these religious leaders  considered himself to be prejudice.  They were simply working to maintain the purity of a standard that could not be compromised.  That standard indeed was based on their law and the law's validity was supported by the actions of previous generations who had violated that law and turned away from God.  Their goal likely was was not to be prejudice.  Indeed, their goal very well could have been to be uncompromising and pure in their convictions.  That is not wrong.  But, when their convictions gave way to pride and a superior attitude, they completely missed a life-changing opportunity due to their prejudice.

I had the thought that most people I know personally would not consider themselves to be prejudice.  I believe the majority of people in America would fall into that category.  In an article written about the idea of juror impartiality, Melody Finnemore agrees that  "Many Americans who consider themselves of strong moral and ethical standing will shudder at the thought of prejudice, whether it's against a group, a particular religion, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, income bracket or other segment of the population that differs from their own.  And yet, maybe we can't help but feel biased against certain groups and, oftentimes, don't even recognize it."*  Christians would probably relate that they are not  prejudice by saying something like, "I hate the sin but I love the sinner."  Finnemore cites a general finding of the Implicit Association Test, a collaborative project of three well-known universities, which "seems to indicate that people truly can't help but incubate some prejudice or another."  Is that true?  I believe it is.  Are you prejudice?  Am I?  Try taking one or more of the demo tests https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/demo/.  I believe it is humanly impossible to be completely free of prejudice.

This has the makings of an all-too-lengthy blog, so I will attempt to shorten it by getting right to the point.  What do we miss when we allow our inclinations towards prejudice turn us away from people -- whether that turning away be physically, emotionally, intellectually or spiritually?  We miss Jesus.  We miss seeing them as Jesus does.  We miss the richness of their experiences that will show us more clearly who Jesus is.  We miss allowing the richness of our own experiences show them more clearly who Jesus is.  We miss the mark -- all in the name of maintaining a "standard" or "purity" that breeds an attitude of superiority.  Friend, I am not saying throw out all your beliefs and standards.  I am saying, examine them.  Are your convictions accompanied by prejudices that separate you from people?   Do you really, really "love the sinner?"  Do you really understand you are no different than anyone else?  Do I?  Are our efforts to be a "good Christian" blocking our ability to be a "good Christ"?  (Frances Chan has some great thoughts on this topic.)  When you "minister" to people do you believe you are better than they are?  We would never want to utter those words as Christians, but do you?  I know I have had that attitude.  I know I probably still will.  It's not purposeful.  It makes me sick.  Personally, I am praying that God will show me every time I have an attitude born out of pride and prejudice and that he will enable me to overcome those.  While it is humanly impossible to be completely free of prejudice, with God all things are possible and we can overcome this destructive part of our nature.  Recognize prejudice.  Resist it.  Fight it hard.  Proverbs 16:3 says if you will commit your works to God (I don't want to act based on prejudice), your thoughts will be established (I won't be prejudice).  Just do it.

*(A Case of Bias:  Jurors Asked to Maintain Impartiality, but is that Humanly Possible?" http://racism.org/)

Forgiveness....again

I can of my own self do nothing: as I hear, I judge: and my judgment is just; because I seek not my own will, but the will of the Father who has sent me. - Jesus

John 5 nails it - the heart of walking out this Christian life.  From the beginning of his ministry all the way to the garden of Gethsemane, Jesus' walk reflects actions born out of judgments made according to God's will.  That is why His ministry was so radical.  That is why much of what He did was strongly opposed by the religious leaders.  Jesus' spirit was tuned in to God's Spirit.  Religious leaders' spirits were tuned into themselves.  Their way created a righteous-looking, societal-acceptable path that ultimately appealed to man's will -- a highly desirable path by many but completely unattainable for most.  God's will leads down a path may not always look righteous -- on first glance.  God's will leads down a path that may not always -- even rarely -- be societal-acceptable.  God's will leads to a path that will challenge every motive of every judgment we act upon.  God's will leads to a path that may not be desirable by many but it is completely attainable by all.  Therefore, my strongest efforts must be made to know God and to learn to hear His judgments - his will unhindered by my will.

My blog title says this writing is about forgiveness.  It is. In the garden of Gethsemane, Jesus prayed, "Not my will, but thine."  Three times, he expressed his will was not to go to the cross.  Three times he prayed according to God's will.  Then, as he had done many times, he acted upon the Father's will, not his own.  It was because He judged according to the Father's judgment that he asked his Father to forgive them -- "them" being those who had judged him unrighteously; "them" being those who had beaten him unmercifully; "them" being those whose eternal judgment He was suffering; "them" being us...me.  When my spirit is tuned to God's Spirit and my will is submitted to His, I can express His will in every way.  One of the most impactful, radical ways of expressing the Father's will is by forgiving those who would by our own will be impossible to forgive.  With God all things are possible. Be radical.

I Want More

"As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God." Ps 42:1 Over the Christmas and new year's break I had a chance to do a little reading. I picked up a book by A.W. Tozer called The Pursuit of God. I highly recommend it. After I finished that I started reading The Spiritual Man by Watchman Nee. Although I will probably be reading it for the rest of 2012, based on what I have read so far, I highly recommend it as well. I have become aware of the fact that I do not commune with God in the way He designed us to commune with Him. I do okay most mornings when I start my day and have no distractions. But as my day goes on, the demands of work and family life take a front seat and my ability to walk in communion with God is greatly affected. It's not that I am doing wrong things, but that I am not listening to the Spirit of God throughout my day, letting Him drive my day through the Truth He has revealed. I have a "necessary" agenda for the day and my ability to have that interrupted or even interpreted by the Spirit is basically not there.

I heard a man telling the kind of stories all Christian love to hear but few of us experience on a regular basis. The stories were radical and they were real and they were recent. They involved busy people, listening to God, following His instructions, and helping lost souls come to Jesus. This man lives that way consistently. He is a busy, working father of 4 with a life full of potential distractions and he said, "When you learn to do that, it becomes so natural..." That is what I want. I am thirsty for this kind of a continual drink from God. Yes, I love the touches of His Spirit through His word in the mornings. I love when God speaks to me in undeniable ways through other events or circumstances. But what I crave, what I long for more than anything is that daily, moment-by-moment communion of His Spirit with my spirit, directing my thoughts and actions and interactions. I want more! Is that possible? I strongly believe the answer is yes! And I am praying with all my heart that God will move me from where I am now to that point that at this moment seems quite far away!

Ironically, when I was praying about that this morning, my thoughts kept getting distracted by various things. I would pray about something, and then my mind would begin to think on that thing and try to devise solutions or conversations, etc. I became very frustrated that the very thing I was praying for and longing for -- communion with God that is constant in spite of life's distractions -- was becoming quite the battle during that very prayer. I cried out to God for help and suddenly, I had a memory of an event that happened a few summers ago. I think I blogged about it at the time. It happened on a day when Josh was in China and Mikiah was busy with an activity. I decided to take Judson to the swimming pool. He did not know how to swim yet and he had a good, healthy fear of the water, usually stayed pretty close to the edge. While we were there, I received a call from my sister. She was on her way to the hospital because my mom had just been admitted. Mom was pretty sick and as it turns out, this was the beginning of her final stay in the hospital before she passed away. As we were talking, my sister suddenly said she had to get off the phone because the tornado sirens were going off and she was driving -- she needed to find a safe place. She hung up. I was miles from mom or my sister and was completely helpless to assist either one of them. Obviously I was a little upset. I glanced back toward the pool to find Judson and began to panic as I did not immediately see him. Surely, the little boy bobbing up and down in the water was not him. He was, after all, surrounded by other swimmers. The swimmer next to him was just staring at him and the lifeguard was just staring at him, so it must just be a kid playing. If he was in serious trouble, all those people watching would be moving to help him, right? Wrong! That kid was not playing. That kid was my little boy and he was desperately trying to keep from drowning while others just stared at him and while I was distracted by some very serious distractions! It turned out okay but it was a scary moment and a horrible sight I will likely always remember. As that memory flooded my mind this morning, God spoke to my heart. Life will always have distractions and demands that scream for attention. In the midst of those, I must have His eyes to see all the drowning souls around me. I must let Him guide my eyes, my thoughts, my energies. Sure, there are things I have to do as a responsible wife, mother and worker -- things I love to do and want to do. But God must be in the driver's seat every day, even in the midst of those demands. He must be able to interrupt me at any given moment and open my eyes to the needs around me. How many drowning souls have I stood next to, completely unaware of their peril? Or worse, how often have I just assumed someone else would rescue them? God, give me grace to let go of my life and cling to yours! Give me your eyes, ears, hands, feet and heart that your desires are lived out in my life.

What Seek Ye?

In Genesis 37:15, Joseph's father had asked him to go find his brothers and bring him a report as to how they were doing with the flocks. The verse says, "And a certain main found him, and behold, he was wandering in the field: and the man asked him, saying, What seekest thou?" The Hebrew word translated "wandering" in this verse means "to err, go astray, stagger". Joseph thought his brothers were in one field when in reality they had moved to another location. Even though he had gone to the location his father told him, he suddenly found himself in the wrong place to accomplish his stated mission. It took a "certain man" asking a pointed question to get him back to the right field.

We can speculate over the passage, but we don't know Joseph's motives. The fact is, we can get off of the path to accomplish our stated mission for a multitude of reasons. The bottom line is, will we heed the words of a "certain man" in our lives who points us in the direction we need to go? What seekest thou?

Jesus asked this very question of two men who would become his disciples. They had heard about him and began to follow him when he passed by. John 1:38 tells us Jesus' response to their action, "Then Jesus turned, and saw them following, and said to them, What seek ye? They said unto him, Rabbi...where dwellest thou?" They wanted to know where Jesus lived. They wanted a more personal relationship with him.

Pharaoh, a picture of one who has all the "good things" in life, asked Hadad an interesting question in I Kings 11:22, "What have you lacked with me that you seek to go to your own country?" This is a question we may pose in our own minds when God is asking us to seek Him in a different place. Perhaps he wants us in a different field in order to know Him more. Maybe changing fields is uncomfortable. Maybe the current field in which we are wandering is comfortable and offers the opportunity to "lack nothing" physically, but is God there? Are we seeking him in the right place?

So I leave you with this admonition from Jesus in Luke 12:29, 31 "Seek not what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink, neither be ye of doubtful mind...but seek ye first the kingdom of God."

The somewhat cliche Christmas saying is applicable...wise men do still seek him.

A Tribute to the Severely Abused

This is a tribute speech I wrote in honor of the brave souls who have been severely abused. If this is you and you have made, are making, or are considering making the journey to wholeness and healing, I salute you and admire you more than I can express. It is with admittedly limited understanding that I attempt this tribute but my intentions are to honor you and to share with any and all who will hear that God is a God of healing. Only God can turn what Satan meant for evil into a beautiful work of goodness -- a trophy, if you will. This is for you...
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Imagine you discover your most precious possession has been stolen and taken to a distant place.

Imagine you desire to regain what is rightfully yours but learn the journey will be fraught with danger.

Imagine fear greater than any you have ever experienced versus desire beyond your ability to articulate. A battle ensues. Desire wins.

You procure an experienced partner to help guide you on the journey ahead. She prepares you as best she can, warning you it will not be easy but encouraging you that others have successfully made this trip. And so, with tempered reluctance, you begin your journey.

At the outset, you are surprised to learn your precious possession has been traumatically fractured into multiple pieces and fragments have been scattered all along the road to your destination. You decide you must find every piece and carefully reassemble them. But when you attempt to retrieve a part, you discover it is heavily guarded by a host of enemies. Fear freezes you briefly but desire drives you forward. You soon learn that with some effort, the enemies will become allies and join your endeavor to gather and guard the pieces. You find each retrieval more challenging than the previous, each enemy requiring more and more effort to win over. Fear frequently tempts you to turn back, but desire drives you forward. Days turn into weeks and weeks into months. And then one day you arrive. You have only one piece to place before your precious possession is once again complete.

But what if it isn’t what you remember it being? The journey has changed you. What if your desire is disappointed? Fear freezes you again - briefly. Then you breathe deeply and prepare to place the final piece.

It has been said that “courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else is more important than fear.” (Ambrose Redmoon)

You are about to meet the courageous traveler in this story. Her journey represents restoration to wholeness from dissociated identity disorder (formerly known as multiple personality disorder). It resulted from countless episodes of ritualistic abuse from infancy through adolescence by her own father and other family members. Thus, her journey. Her journey, however, did not end at restoration. In fact, in many ways it was just beginning. She then bravely forged ahead with a vision to turn her fearful experiences into a fortress for others traveling a similar road, especially children in crisis. This new direction has also been marked by many obstacles and the all-too-familiar battles between fear and desire. Desire won again! When asked where she found the courage to successfully complete these portions of her life’s journey, this traveler answered that it is her relationship with her Heavenly Father, affectionately called Abba, which has enabled her to conquer the roadblocks in her life and turn her pain into a passion to help others. Today we are gathered to celebrate the realization of her vision with the opening of Abba’s Refuge. Ladies and gentleman, it is my great pleasure to introduce to you the founder of Abba’s Refuge....

If you want to learn more about this subject, I highly recommend the book, "Multiple Identities: Understanding and Supporting the Severely Abused" by Diane Hawkins.

The Thief of Unbelief

Hebrews chapters 3-4 recount the story of the Israelites when the time had finally arrived for them to enter into the land God had promised them. They seemed to have both short-term and long-term memory problems. God had demonstrated time and time again His power and His care for them. However, when an obstacle stood in the road on their journey to inherit God's promise, they had a habit of focusing on the impossible-looking situation rather than the God who had delivered them from such "impossibilities" in the past. Because of their unbelief, most of that original group of Israelites died without ever entering into the land God had promised them. (Heb 4:19)

We see a similar situation in Jesus' time on earth, "And he did not many mighty works there because of their unbelief" (Matt 13:58).

I had a dream not long ago. In the dream I was driving my car in a semi-rural setting, on the edge of a town. As time passed, I found myself no longer driving a car, but sitting in a rocking chair that was being propelled by an unseen force down an unfamiliar road in the "middle of nowhere." The road gradually changed from a paved road, to a gravel road to a path. My response was panic. Where was I? I was going to be late! What am I doing in a rocking chair? Naturally, I climbed out of the rocking chair and proceeded to carry the chair. In front of me loomed a rather difficult-looking hill. I knew it would be very hard to carry my rocking chair up that hill so I chose to walk on the flat ground alongside the road. The flat ground contacted the road again on the other side of the hill. At that point, I got back on the road. I heard a car coming up behind me and I fully anticipated the driver would come to me and offer a ride. But, the car turned off the road in a different direction. Eventually, I was forced to climb a hill, still carrying my rocking chair. At the top of the hill, I was faced with three views representing three options. The first was the road behind me. Should I return? I was sure there was someplace I needed to be at a certain time back there... The path beside the road had given way to a beautiful valley with a breathtaking view. I could sit in that chair and enjoy that view for quite some time! The road in front of me also led to a valley. There was a peaceful looking village in that valley complete with a farmer walking out of his house toward his barn. As my gaze continued past the village, I saw a not-as-peaceful looking city. I thought that perhaps I should go to the village and ask the farmer where I was. At that point my dream ended. What was my choice?

I think the rather odd story in my dream depicts our lives as followers of Jesus. We like to drive and be in control. We enjoy speaking of faith and being involved in activities that proclaim faith but when our Unseen Force desires to drive us in an unfamiliar vehicle through unfamiliar territory, we face a strong temptation to climb out the chair and try to regain control. If we succumb to that temptation, we miss the rest and journey that the chair offers! I am moved to tears at the prospect of the promises of God I have forfeited in my life because of my unbelief!

The good news is, God is a God of second chances -- and third, and more. Jesus often reprimanded his disciples for their unbelief. Yet, after they were empowered by the Holy Spirit to understand, believe and walk in the Truth, they became pillars of faith. They ultimately did get on right road. If we get off of our God-given path, it is not too late to get back on if we will get back in the chair!

I believe in my dream I missed some of the beauty and rewards of the road when I chose the "easy" path. I really had no choice other than to take the flat path because I was carrying my heavy chair! What did I miss on my journey during the time I was not on the road? We want to be careful not to test God in this area or to take advantage of His grace and mercy when we are aware we are off the road. The Israelites tempted Him numerous times in the wilderness until they finally lost all hope of entering into the promises of God in this life.

What obstacles are in your path? Stay in the chair! "Let us labor therefore to enter into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of unbelief (Heb 4:11, referring to the Israelites who missed the promises of God). I pray I will no longer allow unbelief to be a thief in my life!

Den of Thieves

My house shall be called a house of prayer; but you have made it a den of thieves. Matthew 21:13.

A house of prayer is nothing less than a place set aside for the purpose of communing with God. Spiritually, our bodies are the temple of God (I Corinthians 3:16). We commune with God via His Spirit that dwells in us. The evidence of that communion is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance. (Galatians 5:22-23) The question then would be, do I have that evidence? If not, why not?

I find it interesting that it was the religious folks that made God's house a den of thieves, rendering it useless as a house of prayer. I think Christians should take note of this and examine ourselves closely. We need to ask hard questions. Do I have love like Jesus does? Do I have joy, real joy? Do I have peace that passes all understanding? And on down the list. I believe the most frequent thief in our temples is not "obvious sin". Consider. Do thieves operate that way? Rather, I believe the most common thief comes disguised in a cloak of "good" that supports religious practices. Wasn't that the case in the temple? Those money changers were simply trying to make it easier for the folks to make their sacrifices. How thoughtful.

Do you find that you hate mankind rather than love? Perhaps your religion and good intentions are unknowingly creating a judgemental spirit rather than a God-driven passion to love sinners into His kingdom.

When you dig deep into your heart and soul, is there a pool of misery rather than a fountain of living water and joy? Perhaps again, strict adherence to seemingly sound scriptural teachings are clogging up the works. Jesus is freedom and inexplicable joy.

Has peace escaped you? Maybe religion has stolen your hope for the miraculous to impact your life daily.

Do you tend to be impatient? Harsh? Have a hard time doing good for those who don't deserve it? Is your faith limitless? Why not? Are you too proud of and busy practing your high moral standards to experience God's power? Do you have temperance in ALL things?

These are hard, hard questions and I suspect that each and every one of us can stand a clean-up and tune-up in this area. Sometimes it can be painful to take that honest look but just imagine if our "temples" operated the way God intends them to operate? Could people then say of the us that these Christians turned the world upside down? I suspect so. Let's get honest and get to God's business. I want to pray a simple yet challenging prayer asking God to reveal the areas in my temple that steal from his house of prayer. Will you join me?