Preface:
I have had major anxiety over this blog post because I am sure it will step on many toes but I am compelled to share because I have more anxiety over the fall out of the “power of positive thinking with a little Jesus on the side” movement that is taking over our music, literature and pulpits. The most disturbing is that our children are the target and they are taking it ALL in! Please read this in the light of the whole context of scripture, the gospel and the life of our Lord Jesus Christ. I love our children so much that I can’t bear to see them walk off a theological cliff into the despair of self! God help us to raise children that think great thoughts of God rather than great thoughts of self!
Post:
Okay, no funny stuff to open up this a.m.! I am disturbed! I am increasingly disturbed at the culture we are creating for our children in the 21st century church. We are telling them that God is there to be their divine dream weaver and that whatever they want to accomplish all they have to do is believe! Pish posh with the ordinary! Who wants to be ordinary? Who wants to be obscure? My eight year old made a profound statement the other day, “Mom, if everyone is extraordinary than no one is extraordinary. Wouldn’t that just make everyone ordinary?” Smart girl that one! If you will allow my soap box for the next few minutes - and I promise this is a VERY unpopular message! There is something inside me, inside most of us that cringes a little at the thought of suffering, trials and being ordinary. It is difficult to say, “I count it all JOY when I fall into various trials or let the lowly brother boast in his exaltation” (James 1: 2,9). In fact, it is counter to our culture. But make no mistake, if we are not actively working against having ourselves indoctrinated into the world then we ARE being indoctrinated by the world! Satan gets in by what we see and what we hear and although he cannot possess us as believers he can deceive and blind our minds. One of the ways he does this today is the very subject of this post:
Namely, that we are disinterested in what God would have for us and overwhelmingly consumed with our own desires. We aren’t so bold as to come right out and phrase it that way but it is evident in our “God speak”. Did you know that Biblegateway.com posted a listing of the most searched verses for 2010 and in the top 19 verses there was not one that mentioned sin? It was not until number 20 which was Romans 3:23 that sin was even mentioned. How telling of our world today! We are taking scriptures like, “God will give you the desires of your heart” out of Psalm 37:4b and making them walk on all fours with no context! Very rarely do we hear, “The first shall be last and the last shall be first” quoted as our life verse! What we are breeding is a culture of disillusioned people who eventually walk away from the Lord because He didn’t make their dreams come true! So, what do we say to these people? You didn’t believe hard enough? You didn’t have faith enough? You didn’t wait long enough? Could it be that the answer does not come because it is not God’s will? Are we submitting to His purposes or are we forcing God to submit to ours?
My passion for this is so great that my fingers are trembling right now! I can speak from the depths of my heart on this because I have been there! In my early thirties (which hasn’t been that long ago for those who are wondering!) I was praying for VERY specific things to come to fruition and I was certain that if I wanted them bad enough and if I prayed with enough faith and I claimed the right scriptures that my dreams would come to pass. The problem? There was no room for another answer! After several months, the answer came and it was clearly, “No!” Not wait, not maybe but NO! Wow! God, you are so not FOR me! You are sitting on your throne with the power to make this happen and you have chosen not to give me what I want!! How’s that for disillusionment? Many people would say that I need to wait for it but in retrospect it wasn’t HIS will and as believers we would not be happy outside of His will - I wonder do we really believe that? I can choose to look at my “dreams that have not come true” in the light of a life full of disappointments and tragedies, a life not worth living because I matter to no one and I am not good enough OR I can choose to look at them as a blessing because God has had His will and way in my life knowing that what He has for me is best. I don’t understand the why’s and how’s and there are many questions I have but as my husband has said to me more times than I can count, “If you are going to serve God you have to be okay with not having all the answers, with being uncomfortable and joyful over many mysteries!”
To be continued...
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