Being Wounded for Jesus

Since the beginning of this year, I've been reading this daily devotional by Adolf Schlatter called Do We Know Jesus? Today on July 23rd, I was confronted with this question: "How often does love bring pain because people we would like to help do no permit themselves to be loved?" Schlatter continues on to say that "In Jesus' service one receives wounds."

If you're like me, when I think of being wounded for Jesus, I often think of being physically hurt or thoroughly slandered and belittled by someone for the name of Jesus. But, to think about being wounded for Jesus by someone who refuses to be loved has made me rethink what it truly means to love my neighbor as myself (Mark 12:31).

When I reflect back on the past five years, I can see how the Lord has been teaching and showing me what it means to truly love someone as myself. It has been a process, but I can see how the Lord has been softening my heart towards others. The more the Lord has simplified my life, the more I've been able to look past my own circumstance and see the needs of others. The less complicated my life has become, the more I've been able to make room for others by beginning new relationships and deepening others. An interesting observation in the midst of all this is that, not only has the Lord simplified and uncomplicated my life, but He has also simplified and uncomplicated my heart. There is now a spaciousness in my heart for more of the Spirit of God and His passions.

One thing that I've learned on this faith walk is that Jesus is passionate about loving people by bringing them into salvation and redeeming everything in their lives to the glory of God. So, when Jesus encounters someone who refuses to be loved, this grieves and pains Him because He knows that sin has hardened this person's heart and now holds them in bondage against receiving the love and care that they need. We have to remember that loving others is a gift from God (1 John 4:19) and that to be able to serve another is a privilege that deserves a willingness to self-sacrifice.

When someone allows you to love on them by inviting you into their lives, take a risk and love them by sharing eternity with them. There is no greater expression of love than to lay down our lives for another in order to share eternity with them (John 15:13). And when someone refuses this kind of love our hearts should be wounded and we should be deeply grieved, not because they have refused our love and our pride is hurt or because we feel insecure about our own lovableness, but because in that moment we feel what Jesus felt as He hung from the cross.

Sacred Companions

"If I am to have a place of stillness at the core of my being, it will only be because I have learned to offer hospitality to the Spirit (47)."

We live in a world that glorifies the defiled image of God in people. The more outrageous, obscene, even offensive you are, the more attention you receive, both good and bad. This world thrives on lewdness, sex sells. We live in a pornographic world where porn stars are icons and pimps and gangsters are emulated. You may think these examples are extremes, but the truthness of this reality has impact a whole generation. This world operates from a use or be used mentality, in order to get anywhere in life you have to either climb over someone or step on them. Where is the redemption in that?

If we like it or not, this defiled image is at the core of who we are, that is reality. Jesus describes this perverted core when He talks about what makes a person 'clean or unclean:" "For from within, out of men's hearts, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly (Mark 7:21-22)." But, it is exactly in this place, our sinful hearts, that we can offer hospitality to the Spirit of the living God. When a person gives their life to Jesus, the Holy Spirit takes up residence in that person's heart and begins to transform them by restoring and redeeming our defiled image. He becomes a new creation (2 Cor 5:17).

The Holy Spirit is the guarantee of our inheritance of eternal life (Eph 1:14), a deposit of what's to come (2 Cor 1:22) which is to one day be in Heaven with Jesus. The more time we spend in showing hospitality to the Holy Spirit, the more of eternity we will experience in our day to day lives. Now, in order to show hospitality to someone we need to be present with them and in order to be present with them we need to be attentive to them. So, this practice of hospitality towards the Spirit means our spirit is actively present with the Spirit's presence in our everyday lives which means we are taking the time to be attentive to Him. Because it's only when we are paying attention to the Spirit are we then able to respond to the Spirit.

Acceptance vs. Tolerance

I've just finished the book ChurchNEXT by Eddie Gibbs (IVP, 2000). In the scope of the whole emergent/missional church movement, it was published in the beginning stages and was groundbreaking in addressing some of the ecclesial models that were in transition at the time. What was of main interest to me was his treatment of the need for apostolic leaders. Being an apostolic leaders means being missionally-minded by living and keeping in step with the Spirit (Gal 5:25), who reminds believers of Jesus' teachings (John 14:26) and leads them into all truth (John 16:13) while empowering believers (2 Tim 1:7) to continue the ongoing mission that Jesus began 2000 years ago.

"Apostolic leaders must have a profound understanding of the nature of their mission and be concerned to pursue that mission using all their God-given faculties. Yet at the same time they must remain open to the leading of the Holy Spirit, responding to course corrections and to unexpected, seemingly insurmountable obstacles - which are not always sent by Satan to frustrate progress but may be part of God's overall scheme, the complexity of which we humans cannot hope to fully understand, much less resolve (111)."

Now this mission that all believers are on needs to be confrontational, yet filled with grace and truth while focused on transformation. Living in a postmodern, even post-Christian world where truth is viewed as relative, where personal values supersede objective truth and where tolerance has seized the day, the reality of the matter is that conflict is inevitable. Now, while in the midst of this conflict, we are commanded to be lovingly accepting (Rom 14:9-13), but "The goal of acceptance is to work towards transformation, not that people should feel more comfortable about their sins (200)." This includes not only persons, but whole cultures becuase "The gospel judges each culture according to its compatibility with the focus, values and goals of the kingdom of God....There will be unfulfilled cultural aspirations that the gospel will bring to fruition. There will be demonic elements in every culture on which the gospel passes judgment (221)."

Soul Suffocation

When I read books like "Invisible Girls: The truth about sexual abuse," by Dr. Patti Feuereisen and read quotes like these, my heart pauses, it's like time hiccups and it feels like my soul can't breath.

"heart jumping

body shivering

fingers clutching

zippers unzipping

sanity escaping

good-bye little girl..." - a 16 year old sibling abuse survivor

"While my father was molesting me, I would look at the wallpaper with all the little fairies. I would pretend they were my friends, and that they were sprinkling fairy dust on me. I made up names for all the fairies, and I was the queen fairy, and I could protect every little girl in my world." - a 17 year old incest survivor.

"quick, call the cops

I've just been cocked blocked

Knocked out by a rock

My body was in shock

a flock of guys left me alone

coughing up a bloody song

how could I whimper without a fight

I was weak and the cuffs were too tight." - a 20 year old gang-rape survivor

"I wanted so many times to simply have faith, to give my soul over to the care of something else, someone else, because there were times when it felt too filthy for me to hold anymore. But then there was always some rule, like 'turn the other cheek' or 'forgive and forget.' Some concept of forgiveness that I couldn't even wrap my brain around. It seemed so incomprehensible. How do you 'forgive' someone for taking away your childhood, your wonder and your innocence and your 'first time' and your chance to discover yourself without dark pits and chasms opening up underneath you on the path? - a 22 year old incest survivor

It's question like these that makes me all the more grateful that because of Jesus' death, resurrection and ascension that true healing can happen; "by His wounds we are healed" (Is 53:5d).

New Beginnings

One of the books that I'm currently reading is called "Beyond Tolerance: child pornography on the internet," by Philip Jenkins. It's both arresting and alarming. Not only am I appalled at the depth of darkness that surrounds this sexual sin, but I'm dumbfounded at the brazen arrogance that Jenkins quotes from individuals within existing message boards and chat rooms, some of whom have been actively participants in this subculture for over 20 years.

You know just reading and thinking about child abuse makes my heart ache. Now, I'm not talking figuratively here, it seriously makes my heart ache. When I read about atrocities that happen to weak and helpless people, especially children, I will literally do all I can to just let the tragedy of the news change me. I want it to change me because when it does, I know that in that moment God has shared part of His heart with mine. When I start to weep I know that it is God who has revealed to me just how much He loves and cares for them and He has given me the priveldge to love and care for them, too. When I get infuriated at the injustice I know that it is God who has revealed to me just how much He is angered by each violating act committed against each individual person and that my anger is a reflection of His anger.

God to me is always the first cause. It is in Him that new beginnings can happen. He moves and we can either react in obedience or rebellion. We can either sumbit to the reality that He is God and that He does know what's best or we can rebellion against this reality thinking that we know what's best. Where do you fit?

Only God can truly make new beginnings happen for all child abuse victims. I want those three words to sink in: child abuse victims. Think about it, these three words should never be used in the same sentence, let alone in combination to describe a group. If you ever doubt the total depravity of human beings, just think about child abuse. Not only in the sense that these child molesters are completely depraved, but that most people (including me and you) do nothing to help stop it from happening. This my friends is also evidence of total depravity: when we could care more about our own comfort while children are being sexually violated and exploited

Now I'm not saying that we all need to quit our jobs and start campaigning full-time to end child abuse and exploitation (though that would be pretty sweet). What I am saying is that instead of buying that next latte at Starbucks, maybe you could forgo a latte a week and start donating that $5 to an organization that does. If you believe that God answers prayers than pray for change. Prayer should be a no brainer when it comes to child abuse and exploitation.

Pray that God would close down child trafficking rings or child pornography websites. Pray that child predators would be put in jail. Most of all pray that all the child abuse victims (please internalize these words and let them change you) would be set free and healed. My prayer is that if you're reading this, you will begin to pray for change and new beginnings.