Faith in 4D

Driving past a pond yesterday, I saw a couple Canada Geese swimming around, doing what Geese do. What marvelously annoying creature they are.  Where I grew up, a huge flock would hang out in the harbour for a while every year before making their expedition south for the winter.  Most mornings they would wake me up at dawn with their incessant honking; remarkably loud when there's 500 of the buggers. Anyway, these two were just minding their business swimming around. When I saw them I remembered this line from a cheesy football movie. Coach McGinty (Gene Hackman) says to Shane Falco (Keanu Reeves), quarterbacks are "Like a duck on the pond. On the surface everything looks calm, but beneath the water those little feet are churning a mile a minute." Imagine God being able to speak to people through cheesy football movies and honking geese; but he does, and he did.  

I really love this verse in Ephesians where Paul writes to his friends and says, I want you to experience how long and wide and high and deep Jesus love is for them.  Sometimes, if I'm honest, I feel like a duck.  My faith has a two dimensional quality.  Things on the surface look fine, all the while, I'm paddling like a mad duck to try to get anywhere.  I know Jesus didn't intend for my faith to be played out that way, he's got way more for me that that.  Lot's of Jesus followers get trapped in this idea, they get trapped part way into really experiencing God.  Somehow, the idea that being a Christian means you've got it all together, or at least have to make it look that way on the surface.  That idea doesn't come from scripture and it certainly doesn't get us anywhere with our Father in heaven.  But there we are, paddling around on the pond, all the while having no clue that the pond is deeper that we can possibly imagine.  

Lot's of folks can get trapped in flat, square surface faith.  Maybe they know scripture well.  The words on the page are important and meaningful but that's where they stay.  Stories in a book.  Rules and regulations to govern life.  Codes and laws to keep us with in the bounds.  Flat and square, defined edges you can't see past, right angles to keep you from getting crooked.  

But Paul says they're more.

Sometimes our faith makes it to three dimensions.  Boxes.  A place where faith can be contained.  Some semblance of structure and usefulness.  Somewhere to hide if the world gets too scary.  Somewhere to store things in case you need them later.  Building blocks in monuments to remind of a past time when things seemed alive.  

But Paul says they're more.

Paul wants his friends to experience another dimension of their faith, another dimension of Jesus.  Depth is something much harder to define, much harder to nail down.  Depth seems something much more vast and mysterious than Length and Width and Height.  Finding depth seems to take an endless life long exploration, especially to Paul's friends in Ephesus.  Ephesus was a coastal city where people knew what it meant to plumb the depths of the Sea.  Paul knew what it was like be shipwrecked in the deep bottomlessness with only God to cling to for life.  He knew the utter depths of joy in the midst of pain and trouble.  He knew there was something well beyond the faith he once had; of rules and laws and ceremonies and knowledge which he then counted as something but now as trash compared to the love and grace and mercy of Jesus.

Paul made no allusions to having it all together.  If you saw Paul, you wouldn't likely think that dudes got this "Christian walk thing" figured out - at least by our North American, reformed, respectable, sanitized version of Christian walking.  Paul was put in jail, beaten up,  run out of town, abandoned by his friends and arguing with other Christians.  He was a drifter who talked too much, didn't have a suit and tie, no Christian fish decal on his donkey, bad at small talk, and said really politically incorrect things about other peoples religion... but he was real - kind of like Jesus.  He talked about his faith, he lived his faith, he experienced his faith. AND he really wanted everyone to do the same with their's.


Paul also knew that this ability to grasp all the dimensions of the love of Christ comes not from us, from our ability or willingness or capacity to figure it out, but by the power of God, through the Holy Spirit.  These dimensions aren't something we ascertain by our goodness, they aren't earned by our obedience, they aren't won by our efforts.  They're part of the free gift of Grace because of what Jesus did in his life, death and resurrection.  They're part of the deal.  They're what God wants us to see, know and experience in our life with him and he's given us his own Spirit so that we can have the power to understand what is incomprehensible on our own.  But it is possible with Him.  And it's His great desire that we take him up on the offer.  

So, like Paul, I "pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with powerthrough his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18 may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19 and to know this love that surpasses knowledge--that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.


Be Blessed.

Soul Rest

Jesus says, "hey tired people, all you guys and girls who've been running around try to get better, be better, look better, think better, speak better - stop it.  It's not going to work.  The world has put something heavy on you that just won't work.  But I've got a new thing, I've got a new way, it won't be easy, but it will be rest for your soul" (Matthew 11:28-30, sort of...)

Jesus isn't at all concerned, though you may have been told different, in you getting better.  In fact, when he looks at you, you're perfect because he sees what he's already done on your behalf at the Cross.  So let me rephrase that; Jesus is so concerned with you being perfect that he did everything that needs to be done to make you perfect, in his Fathers eyes anyway, so stop trying so hard to do what he's already done.  Don't get me wrong, you're going to get better if you hang around with Jesus, it's just the natural reaction to being in the presence of someone who loves you perfectly, you start to be more like them.  Of course the opposite reaction is also true, if you hang around with someone who thinks they're perfect but really isn't - every human in the the history of humans - you tend to get jaded and cynical and angry. (see Pharisees for more info).  Jesus came to make you free, and you are indeed free from all the worldly nonsense and religious gobbledygook, if you want to take up his way and find rest for your soul from all the world is throwing at you.  So attach yourself to him and see what happens.

If you're attached to Jesus you'll love better, because he loved us first. And all he's really called us to do is love others with that same love.  Fortunately, you don't have to muster up that love, he gives it to you in endless supply through the Holy Spirit that he joins to you're spirit when he makes you a  new creation.  Don't worry, when you need to love someone, he'll give you what you need to love them.  

If you're attached to Jesus you'll think better.  He gives us freedom from the ridiculousness of sin that traps our minds in all kinds of foolishness.  Right now you may be thinking, I have to manage this thing that I struggle with, I have to try harder not to sin, I have to do some things to make up for all the mistake I've made, I have to be careful not to let anyone find out what I'm really like, I don't want to live anymore, I don't deserve to be happy, I want that person to die, I hate... (add any lies you currently believe to this short list).  Now, turn around, walk away from those lies, and think about Jesus, who he is, what he's done, what he's offered you free of charge, what he promises for you now and for eternity.  (perfect son of God who gave up his life on the cross in order to set you free from the wages of sin, making you holy, spotless, blameless, righteous in your Fathers eyes, because he loves you so much and want to hang out with you and the Father and the Holy Spirit permanently).

If you're attached to Jesus you'll see better.  Ok, he might or might not heal your physical vision, that's up to him, but you'll get spiritual vision.  You'll start to see that he's in everything, all the time, even the stuff that is crappy.  Even in the trials.  He'll start to show you how the pieces of the puzzle fit together.  He'll start to reveal the truth about your Father in heaven who loves you and is not angry at you because all his wrath was poured out on Jesus instead of you, he's wrath-less toward you.  You'll see light in darkness, you'll see hope in despair, you'll see faith in action, you'll see joy in  hardship.  

If you're attached to Jesus you'll live better.  No prosperity gospel here, that's no gospel at all.  He's not promising a fat bank account and a nice house in the burbs.  He's also not promising you'll have to go live in poverty with an unreached tribe in the Amazon.  He could be offering either of those and anything in between.  Really what he's offering is an abundant life in Him.  He's offering you the chance to be so enamored with Him that you won't really care what you're bank account looks like or that you might get eaten by a giant anaconda in the jungle.  He'll give you thankfulness and gratitude and satisfaction and assurance.  Faith, Hope and Love.

Just a few things (there's lot's more) that will be better if you're around Jesus.  The more you get to know him, the more it becomes true.  Here's the amazing part.  He does it all.  ALL.  He's given His spirit, his mind, his vision, his life, what more could we ask for.  All the striving and penance in the world won't get you any further in what God has done completely on your behalf at the cross.  The hard part is to accept this reality, that his 'yoke really is easy and his burden really is light.'  His rule book really is easy, the law is fulfilled, the ransom has been payed, now love Him (don't worry he'll give you the ability to do this) and love others (don't worry he'll give you the ability to do this), and you will find rest for your soul.