The Sin of Presumption

It was a legitimate solution, and when you think about it, an understandable mistake. In Genesis 12 and then again in Genesis 15, God promised Abraham many descendants, indeed that the entire earth would be blessed through him. Abraham knew that it was God’s plan for his life to be the father of a great nation. So when Sarah showed up in Genesis 16 with a plan to make it happen, Abraham was on board:

“Abram’s wife Sarai had not borne him children. She owned an Egyptian slave named Hagar. Sarai said to Abram, ‘Since the Lord has prevented me from bearing children, go to my slave; perhaps I can have children by her. And Abram agreed to what Sarai said. So Agram’s wife Sarai took Hagar, her Egyptian slave, and gave her to her husband as a wife for him. This happened after Abram had lived in the land of Canaan for 10 years. he slept with Hagar, and she became pregnant” (Genesis 16:1-4).

You can certainly understand where this came from, right? I mean, it had been over 10 years since God had promised Abraham a kid. And the biological clock was already ticking away at that point. They had waited and waited and waited, and then logic took over.

“God promised us we would have a son.”

“We’ve waited for that to happen. Is it possible we misheard Him?”

“We know what His plan is, we just don’t know the specifics of how to get there.”

“Here’s another option to get to where God wants us to be.”

That’s how Ishmael came to be—an effort to get where God wanted Abraham and Sarah to be. Often we make the same mistake. We have a sense that God has called us to do this or that with our lives, but then the days get long. We get impatient. We start to wonder if we heard Him correctly. And then finally, we take matters into our own hands and presume upon the wisdom, timing, and plan of God.

There is a fine line to walk here between actively waiting for God to fulfill His purposes and promises and becoming a self-promoter. Abraham erred to the latter.

Now interestingly enough, centuries later, Paul commented on the whole Ishmal/Isaac situation in the book of Galatians, saying one child was born according to the flesh and one born according to the promise. In the context of Galatians, you might also say that one child represents a life lived by works and one represents a life lived by faith. When we live according to works, we feel like we have to take matters into our own hands. We have to promote our cause. We have to do something. We have to move, to network, to MAKE IT HAPPEN. That is contrasted to a life of faith.

The life of faith frees you from having to promote your own cause. It frees you from presuming upon the promises of God. It frees you to trust and live and wait for God, trusting in His wisdom and timing.

Weekends Are For Kids

We are in the middle of potty training. Man, it’s frustrating. There’s nothing like asking a kid every 30 minutes, “Do you need to pee-pee?”

Then there’s nothing like doing a celebration “human excrement” dance every time something appears in that little potty.

To further along the process, we have adopted the M&M method of reward. Andi gets an M&M every time she produces – 1 for #1, 2 M&M’s for #2. But that little girl – that precious, little girl, has I believe found a loophole in the system.

Knowing that she gets a candy when she pees, I am convinced she is… um… withholding. That is, she’ll produce a trickle. Then 10 minutes later, she’ll produce another trickle with the hope of getting double M&M’s.

So what do you do? Get out a measuring cup with a 2 year old? 

“I’m sorry, Andi, but you have not produced the required 2 fluid ounces. We’ll save this to combine with your next effort.”

Devious…

Fridays Are For One Question

Newsweek has released a list of “Top 100 Books of All Time.” Now we can debate all day long whether War and Peace or Divine Comedy is the best book ever written, but since I haven’t read either, I’ll take Newsweek’s word for it. What I’m more interested in is YOUR list. So here’s today’s question:

“In your personal list of ‘Best Books Ever,’ what would be number 1?”

(NOTE: You have to have read the book. And let’s agree that we’re all very Christian and we won’t list the Bible as number 1. Although it was number 41 on Newsweek’s list.)

**The goal of “One Question Friday” is simple: To show that everyone has something funny, engaging, creative, and worthwhile to say. So comment away! Be real. Be creative. Think hard. And check back to see how others answered the question.

Jesus is the Older Brother

As you scan through the pages of Scripture, you find an interesting pattern in many biblical families—the older brothers are jerks. Here’s a few to consider:

- Joseph’s older brothers sold him into slavery.

- Cain killed Abel in cold blood.

- Ishmael mocked and ridiculed Isaac.

- David’s brothers made fun of his youth and inexperience.

That’s not to say that the younger brothers had nothing to do with this treatment. Many of them were arrogant, had special treatment from parents, or were deceptive. Nevertheless, there seems to be this pattern set up of brotherly competition and hatred. The issue is no more clear than in Jesus’ story of the prodigal son in Luke 15.

If you’ll recall, this parable is about extreme and audacious grace. A man’s young son asked his father to treat him as he would be treated if the father was dead. Then the boy took his inheritance and squandered it away before he decided that life with his dad was not so bad after all. He was met with a knock-down embrace by a weeping old man when he finally returned home. And then there was a huge party. Everyone was happy; everyone, that is, except the older brother.

The older brother here fits the biblical pattern. He had always done the right thing. He’d always plowed the fields. He’d always been faithful to the father. He’d always been “the good boy.” But when his younger brother returns home, his bitterness comes spilling over to the surface. He wants restitution. He wants punishment. He wants his brother to be ridiculed, for him to be put on probation, and for him to suffer. The father enraged the older brother because of his foolish grace, his willingness to receive home his lost son.

Another in a long line of jerk older brothers.

Maybe there’s so many bad older brothers in the pages of Scripture in order to point us to the true goodness of our real older brother. If God is our Father, then Jesus is our brother. And He’s radically different than any of these brothers, especially the older brother from Luke 15.

Because in our story—the story of the gospel—when all of us played the younger son and were out wasting our lives in trivial sensuality and meaningless excess, our older brother went to the Father and said, “Father, it is obvious to me how much you love your children. And so I will go and get your children back. I will spend my resources, my effort, my energy, and even my life if necessary, and I will go out to the far country. I’ll go and I will bring them back to you.”

That’s what our brother did. He came into the far country of the earth and spent everything He had to bring us back to the Father.

(NOTE: For a better treatment of Christ as the older brother, I recommend you picking up a copy of The Prodigal God by Tim Keller, which I reviewed here.)

What I Learned from the Triathlon

On Saturday, I had the strange experience of paying money to hurt myself. Some would call this “stupidity.” Others call it a “triathlon.” Let’s be clear here – this was no Iron Man. It was a sprint triathlon, though I’m supposing that “sprint” is just an aribitrary term and not really an expectation that you sprint through it. Regardless…

Here’s what it consisted of:

1. 400 meter swim in a lake.

2. 1.6 mile run.

3. 12 mile bike ride.

4. 1.6 mile run.

(I know what you whiz kids are thinking – “tri” mean “three,” and clearly I have 4 things listed there. Evidently the boat ramp wasn’t at the right place for you to start riding your bike, so they run you back over there for “convenience,” splitting the run potion into 2 phases.)

So here’s what I learned from my 1 hr, 47 minute experience:

1. Swimming in a lake is harder than swimming in a pool. This was the first time I hadn’t swam in a pool, and it was very disorienting. And I couldn’t touch the bottom. I ended up back stroking at least a quarter of it.

2. Running a mile and a half is alot harder after you’ve ridden 12 miles on a bike.

3. Bike shorts with padding in certain places are well worth the financial investment.

4. Humility. I learned this in a number of ways, including the woman who passed me on a bike and yelled, “I’ve been trying to catch you all day!” That actually made me feel pretty good about myself; then after the race, I saw her again, and she clarified: “Yeah, I would have tried to catch another girl, but most of them had already finished.”

5. I look dumb in a swim cap.

Cat Ladies

I’m a huge fan of documentaries. So far, my favorites have been about Scrabble, spelling bees, professional bowlers, and Donkey Kong. But this one? I don’t know what to do with it. It’s like a train wreck – I can’t look away.

Friday’s Are For One Question

Maybe you’ve heard – there’s some bad stuff going on with the economy. We’re all trying to be thrifty. So in that spirit of thriftiness, let’s tell some stories. Here’s today’s question phrased in 2 different ways:

Nice Way:

“What’s the most extreme length you have ever gone to in order to save some money?”

Blunt Way:

“How cheap are you?”

**The goal of “One Question Friday” is simple: To show that everyone has something funny, engaging, creative, and worthwhile to say. So comment away! Be real. Be creative. Think hard. And check back to see how others answered the question.

The Highest Goal of Relationships

Paul had a somewhat tenuous relationship with the Galatians. He loved them, but when they abandoned the gospel for a hybrid of Christianity, he had to come down on them. Hard. And through the first three chapters, Paul is angry, irritated, and direct. But in chapter 4, his tone starts to ease up a bit. That’s when you get this verse:

“My children, again I am in the pains of childbirth for you until Christ is formed in you” (Galatians 4:19).

In that statement, we find what should be the end to all our relationships. Our highest goal in any relationship must be the formation of Christ in another to the glory of God. That’s great in theory, but when you start thinking about all the practical implications, it’s staggering. It’s overwhelming to think that the goal in relationship isn’t just companionship, love, shared benefit, or pleasure. Those things are part of it, but the ultimate goal is the formation of Christ in another—to see that person grow into a true follower of Jesus.

Your wife. Your husband. Your kids. Your dad. Your coworker. Your boss.

All to have Christ formed in them. Here are some of my practical reflections along those lines:

1. It means I have to tell the truth. It’s a lot easier to not tell the truth, especially when someone is wandering down an ill-advised or flat out wrong path. But I have to tell them the truth about themselves, the world, and God because my goal is to have Christ formed in them.

2. It means I don’t leave. Relationships are life-long affairs. I can’t just drift in and out of people’s lives, here one day and gone the next. I have to be there for the long haul because Christ isn’t formed in someone overnight.

3. It means I don’t have to tell everyone everything about Jesus at our first meeting. Because Christ-formation is long-term, there are moments when I need to just sit and listen rather than speak.

4. It means I must preach the gospel to myself everyday in order to prepare to be in relationship. If I don’t, I’ll try to use people to meet my own ends and make myself feel better rather than loving them as Jesus has loved me. I’ll be insecure and need their affirmation rather than be able to encourage them in a non-self-seeking kind of way.

5. It means that when I’m committed to the formation of Christ in another, I’m imitating God’s relationship with me. His goal is to have Christ formed in me. I am to love as He loves.

Procrastination Video

Been there.

You might have to comment…later…when you get around to it.

The Church is a String Around Its Own Finger

We are forgetful. Whether it’s a set of keys, an appointment, or, umm…, the occasional child, sometimes we forget things. And our forgetfulness is a great hindrance to our faith.

God seems very concerned to me about that forgetfulness. He doesn’t want us to forget; He wants us to remember. In fact, in a very basic sense, that’s what all the feasts of the Old Testament were about – remembering.

“Remember the way I brought you out of Egypt as slaves.”

“Remember how I gave you the law.”

“Remember your time in the wilderness.”

And then we come to the New Testament, and Jesus continues to pattern:

“Take this bread and this wine and remember. Always remember.”

It’s our circumstances in life that tend to make us forget who God is, what He’s done, and how He has provided for us in the past. When we encounter difficulty in life, our immediate thoughts are ones of abandonment and disapproval: “God can’t really love me. He’s not here with me. If He were, then my husband wouldn’t have left. I wouldn’t have cancer. I still wouldn’t be looking for a job. Our adoption would have gone through. Life wouldn’t hurt so much.”

This is where remembering comes in. When we sit back and reflect for a second, we remember that this circumstance isn’t the first tough one we’ve encountered. And God was faithful in the others. In fact, if we really think about it, we realize that even though the temporary situation was tough, God was working in unseen ways to bring redemptive good out of it. But it’s hard to remember amidst all the pain of the present. But God has given us stuff to help us recall His faithfulness and character.

He’s given us the Bible to remind us of countless generations of His faithfulness. He’s given us His Holy Spirit to remind us we are His children. And He’s given us something else, too – He’s given us each other. The church is a gift of God to help us remember.

This is at least part of what Paul is saying in 2 Corinthians 1:3-4: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort. He comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any kind of affliction, through the comfort we ourselves receive from God.”

God doesn’t just comfort us as individual so we can feel better; He comforts us so that we might comfort another in a similar circumstance. We remember, and then we help someone else remember.

The church is a string around its own finger.