making much of Jesus

My prayer this morning has been to ask the Holy Spirit to cultivate in me in greater and greater measure the simple passion to make much of Jesus. My reasoning behind this is if I am seeking to making much of Jesus then it won’t matter who I’m talking with or the situation I’m in because if my greatest passion is to make much of Jesus, this will move me to give grace, to sacrifice for another, to be slow to anger, to forgive, to be patient, kind and gentle towards others and most importantly to love continually. Simply put, making much of Jesus will mean dying to myself in greater and greater measure because making much of Jesus means making less of myself.

As Jesus tells us, “Whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it”. Both Matthew (10:36; 16:25) and Luke (9:24; 17:33) record that Jesus says this twice in His ministry, in three of the four instances Jesus includes the command to “take up your cross and follow Me.” So, if Jesus took the time to repeat Himself, we should pay extra close attention to these words. I believe a good interpretation of “taking up our cross and following Jesus” is taking the time to deal with the barriers that hinder us from following Him. This means asking ourselves: “Where am I trying to preserve my life, when I really should be dying to myself and losing my life?”

If we are to fully accept that the ultimate goal of the inward transformative work of the Holy Spirit is Christlikeness, then this means accepting the reality that life truly is not about us any longer. So we must stop striving to cultivate a righteousness of our own and simply receive in greater and greater measure the gift of Christ’s righteousness imputed to us through the cross. The more we let go of ourselves, the more we will gain Christ. What this looks like walked out is whenever we choose to forgive someone just as Jesus forgave His persecutors while hanging on the cross, He is formed within us. When we choose to give grace to someone just as Jesus extended grace to everyone He met along the way, He is formed within us. When we choose to put others needs before ours just as Jesus did in ministering to the multitudes of people who came to Him for healing, He is formed within us. I could go on, but I think you get the idea.

Making much of Jesus means allowing the Holy Spirit to do what He loves to do, forming Christ within us. The more we grow in Christlikeness, the more the fruit and gifts of the Holy Spirit will flow in and through us and the more we will make much of Jesus. So this is my prayer: Holy Spirit, do what You love to do and make the things of Jesus known to us, but even more than that, we release You to disrupt our comfortable lives in order to form Christ within us. Cultivate more of Your fruit and gifts within us, empowering us to make much of Jesus in every relationship and in every situation. In His Name we ask, Amen.

simple Fruit

Over the last several years, the Lord has been simplifying my life. This has been an inward transformative work by the Holy Spirit that is now bearing outward fruit. This simple, yet lasting fruit is allowing me to be content in the midst of a town called Morogoro, Tanzania. I have been here for the last few days waiting on a translator while my friend David is in Dar es Salaam procuring a car among other goods for our journey. Morogoro is a rural town with not much in terms of modern world amenities. It is a simple life here, where the power can go out at any moment (just the other day, January 17, 2011, it was out for nearly 10 hours). Small street side shops line dusty roads while others sell their wares on sidewalks. The larger shops have generators which are a God send when the power fails.

Now what the Holy Spirit has been highlighting to me is that it is by the grace of God I can be content here (or anywhere for that matter). You maybe saying well of course, but the way this grace has been apportioned to me is two-fold. First, providentially there is the inward transformative work He’s done in freeing me from the stranglehold of materialism which has helped me to gain a greater eternal perspective on life in general. It’s sad how much influence materialism has and consumerism for that matter (because you can’t have materialism without consumerism) in clouding a person’s judgment and perspective. Add to this the many years the Lord has impressed upon me the need to live a fasted lifestyle also helps to keep the world at bay. The fruit of much of this good work has manifested itself in the contentment of living a simple lifestyle.

This is not to say that I don’t need or want things because I do, but these desires no longer control me. Pressing into the Lord is becoming more and more of my first impulse rather than a second, third, even last resort. Case and point, I’ve spent a day fasting and praying alone in my room while here in Morogoro because seeing the Father’s Kingdom agenda happen has become more important than sightseeing or eating out. Again, I give all praise to God for this because it is by His providential grace of transformation through the Holy Spirit that this is now my passion and reality. Secondly, I would add that God is continually lavishing His grace upon all people, but it is His children who have learned to more readily receive and depend on His grace. Compound this with the prayers of my supporters and I truly am blessed. His grace truly is new each and every morning and I feel His grace through their prayers. If this is you, THANK YOU! Together we can by God's grace!

African Time

Integrating into the Tanzanian culture has meant accepting the reality of African time. Simply put, African time is the understanding that life happens, so delay happens. So far, I see two contributing factors to “African time.” Firstly, because the majority (89%) of Tanzanians are living on less than $1.25 a day, this means their access and means to things is limited. Hence, walking everywhere is commonplace which creates delay. Secondly, in my last post, I described the importance of knowing another’s life news. I believe this also feeds into African time. Greeting people is so very important to Tanzanians and spending a few minutes greeting someone is commonplace. Now put these two scenarios together and you have African time. On the one hand, you have people walking everywhere and as they are walking along they are spending a significant amount of time greeting their friends and neighbors.

Currently, I am reading this book called “Soul Guide” by Bruce Demarest. In this book on spiritual direction he makes a fair observation of the current Western culture that people are seen more as obstacle then opportunities. Let me explain, Westerners like to fill their days with appointment after appointment (yes, I am guilty of this) and when we encounter people throughout our day, they become more like obstacles to get over or around, so that we don’t miss our next appointment. Now, the challenge the author puts to us is this: rather than seeing the person before us as a hindrance to our next appointment, see this person as our next “divine” appointment. Maybe a good lesson we can learn from African time is that we need to slow down and take the time to greet one another. Who knows the next person that “gets in your way” maybe the very person in whom you can impact for all eternity with the good news of the Gospel?

Habari Yako?

Over this past week, I had the opportunity to visit some friends who were called by God two years ago to share Jesus with the Zanzibari people. My initial experience of the Zanzibari people was that they see “wazungu” (white people) or “watlii” (tourists) as $$. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been harassed to look at this or to buy that or beckoned to come over here or there. Now I fully understand that from their perspective that’s why the “wazungu” come to Zanzibar, for tourism. I found it interesting to watch the Zanzibaris interact with my friends who are fluent in Swahili. They would walk up to them just as they did me and say a greeting in Swahili, but whenever my friends greeted them back or asked them questions in return in Swahili, they would simply walk away. Hence, I couldn’t help but feel like most of the time, they were simply sizing people up. The saying on the island is that there is the “wazungu” price and then the “Zanzibari” or “real” price. Now, if that’s all the interaction I had with Zanzibaris, my conclusion would be that they are no different than the locals in any other touristy city I’ve ever been too.

But, because my friends have been living on Zanzibar for two years, they have made some “rafiki” (friends) in which they are in genuine fellowship with. It is through seeing their interaction that I’ve come to see the heart and beauty of the Zanzibari people. Relationships are so very important to Zanzibaris and knowing the “news” (habari) of one another’s life is crucial. Whenever I was walking with my friend around their home, it was imperative that she greet everyone and ask of the news of their life. At any given encounter these and many more questions would be asked: “Habari yako? (what’s your news?) Habari nyumbani? (what’s the news of your household?) Habari mama? (what’s the news of your mother?) Habari baba? (what’s the news of your father?) Habari Dar? (what’s the news in Dar?)” and so on and so forth. Granted though the answer to these questions was almost exclusively “nzuri” (good), what stuck me was the importance in asking about the “news” of one another’s lives. So let me ask you: Habari yako?