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Archive for the ‘Intimacy’ Category
A Paradigm of Leadership Motivated By the Beauty of God
by Stefan Miller
Great leaders have an uncompromising, narrow, overshadowing passion that drives everything they do and are about. David was that kind of leader and was dominated by one singular vision.
One thing have I asked of the LORD, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the LORD and to inquire in his temple. (Psalm 27:4)
David truly desired just one thing. Psalm 27:4 wasn’t poetic language to him. Nor hollow lifeless words. The superior pleasure found in fellowship with God is tangible and real and was the longing that dominated the entirety of his life. He knew that the beauty of God alone is what satisfies the human soul to the uttermost (Ps. 37:4). And his unflinching resolve to pursue depth in this reality set his people aflame and ultimately reformed an entire society around this singular devotion. Literally, tens of thousands of his followers were released and funded to give themselves full time to the occupation and ministry of adoration of the beautiful God (1 Chronicles 23-25).
The reason why David’s vision succeeded in leading and impacting generations for the glory of God was that David lived it out himself. Most Christians today accept David’s “one thing” heart cry as good and valid and yet few people actually buy in and live a “one thing” lifestyle. Like the culture around us, our lives are given to a multitude of things. The one thing reality eludes us.
And yet David walked in it and spent himself on pleasure in God’s beauty, with abandonment and without compromise. That’s what made him “a man after God’s own heart” (1 Sam.13:14; Acts 13:22). It was his obsession in adolescence. It was his steady passion through trial and opposition. It was his devotion in adulthood. And at the end of his life it inherited his wealth, resources and time to pass his vision on to future generations (1 Chronicles 23-25). It consumed him constantly and unswervingly. And that is why it consumed those he led.
David was great because his passion was the one thing that matters. David was a great leader because his vision for his followers was his vision for himself.
Hemmed in By Love
God’s love PRECEDES our love for Him (1 John 4:10; Romans 5:8)
God’s love MOTIVATES our love for Him (1 John 4:19; Romans 5:5; John 14:15)
God’s love ACCOMPANIES our love for Him (John 17:26; Ephesians 3:17-19; Philippians 1:9)
God’s love FOLLOWS our love for Him (John 15:10)
The revelation of this first love, motivating love, accompanying love and following love then in turn CREATES more love until Jesus’ prayer is answered:
“That they [the saints] may love Me with the same [quality, strength, fervor and intensity of] love with which You [Father] have loved Me [Your Son].” (John 17:26; with my additions)
“Always remember: You are the Beloved – He is the Lover.” – St. John of the Cross
Self-Denial is ALL About Gaining Christ
Often the most familiar passages are the most misunderstood. So it is with Mark 8:34-36.
“If anyone would come after ME, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow ME. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it. For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?” (Mark 8:34-36)
There are three textual reasons to believe that Jesus meant much more than just “Quit sinning” (as the statement is all too often reduced to meaning).
- The command to “DENY” yourself was logically connected to the statement “follow ME.” He is pointing the fact that HE is the chief end of self-denial. That is, in Him we find pleasures that are superior to the fleeting inferior pleasures of this age (which is the grounds from which God demands all men to repent from). When we understand “denying ourselves” to mean nothing more than “quit sinning” we diminish the glory of Christ and the weight of this gutsy appeal. HE declares HIMSELF to be the sole reason to “lose” anything, “forfeit” anything or “deny yourself” anything because HE declares HIMSELF to be infinitely more valuable than any of those things. In other words, self-denial isn’t for the sake of self-denial but for the sake of “following” Him and “gaining” Him. JESUS makes HIMSELF the center and reward of His own appeal to embrace self-denial.
- He connects “LOSING” something to “GAINING” something. This is the crux of the statement. There is clearly personal gain involved in Jesus’ logic; our gain; gain that stuns our hearts, bends our minds and transforms our behavior; gain that, then as a result, brings HIM gain – for when we ascribe supremacy to Him and not to that which is inferior to Him, He is powerfully and profoundly glorified. Jesus commands us to give up that which is inferior up to gain that which is superior; to gain that which is far more valuable than that which is being lost. He calls us to a sort of “sanctified selfishness” wherein we resist the inferior pleasures of sin (denying ourselves) ON THE BASIS that He promised us the attaining of that which is infinitely and eternally “more fair” (following Him and gaining life).
- He says “What does it PROFIT a man…?” He is appealing to our desire for personal gain. The exhortation is centered around this reality. He’s saying that engaging with the pleasures of sin – even to the most satisfying degree imaginable, like gaining the world – will result in utter loss: death. Thus we must conclude that Jesus’ call to self-denial is deeply rooted in His confidence in His supremacy and thus His confidence in His ability to satisfy our souls; it’s rooted in a call to “PROFIT” by “GAINING” that which is better than that which we are “LOSING;” which is nothing short of HIM.
Let us not reduce the call to self-denial to nothing more than a method of sin management. And let our appeals to self-denial and our attempts at self-denial fall under the liberating shadow the soul satisfying supremacy of Christ.
“That man is no fool to give what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.” – Jim Elliot
Throughout history preachers have called people to holiness in four primary ways:
1. Portraying Sin as Repulsive – This produces shame-based obedience; The assumption here is that people can resist sin if they’re condemned about it without having an alternative to their sin presented.
2. Portraying Joyless-Obedience (‘Legalism’) as Virtuous– This produces obedience that fuels self-righteousness, arrogance and a religious spirit (if we succeed) or despair and depression (if we fail); The assumption here is that people can work their way out of sin by trying harder.
3. Portraying God as Merciless – This produces fear-based obedience; The assumption here is that people can resist sin if they are afraid enough of God’s punishment and hatred of them in their sin.
4. Portraying Desire for Pleasure as Evil – This produces confusion-based obedience; The assumption here is that people can resist sin by repenting of their desire for pleasure.
None of these approaches have produced lasting impact at any point in history when used by themselves or in an inappropriate way.
I believe that the Holy Spirit is emphasizing a call to holiness in these days that is essential to understand. I call it “The Doctrine of Superior Pleasure.” Many through history have used this language (“superior pleasure”) but I want to state it as a doctrine so as to galvanize it in our minds and hearts.
The essence of the doctrine of superior pleasure is this: that without an obtainable alternative to sin, that is objectively superior in quality, our hearts have no ability to withstand the temptation that is stirred by it. At the heart of the doctrine of superior pleasure is the truth that the pleasures of knowing the excellencies of Christ are greater in quality and quantity than the lesser fleeting pleasures of sin.
If we cannot say “Jesus, you taste better” in the face of temptation we will fall prey to it.
We cannot will our way out of sin. Nor can we be shamed or terrified out of. In fact, shame only injures our hearts and further hinders us from holiness even more; for when we feel filthy we live filthy. The only way that we can resist sin and embrace purity in any persistent way is by finding something that is more satisfying than sin and resolving to obtain it.
Let us not deceive ourselves into thinking that humanity’s sin problem isn’t the product of our ravenous hunger for pleasure; a hunger that we cannot repent of; nor should we. The Biblical call to holiness is the call to seek and drink deeply of the pleasures (Ps. 16:11) of experiencing the fascinating depths of God (2 Cor. 2:9-11).
I am convinced that “the unblushing promises of the Gospel” (to quote Lewis) revolve around the fact that God possesses it and confidently and freely offers it. Or, more accurately, I believe that He is it.
“Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.” (Psalm 73:25-26)
Five Reasons to Emulate King David
Here are five reasons why I want to emulate King David in my life:
First, David’s great obsession was to have present tense intimate communion with God. The primary way David pursued this was through studying God’s emotions and attributes. No one in Scripture wrote more about God’s emotions or attributes than David. To the degree that I set my heart to see and understand what God is like and what He feels is the degree that I will live with a satisfied heart. David knew that being King could never meet the great need of his heart: the need for consummate joy. David knew that encountering God’s emotions and attributes was the fountainhead of all authentic joy.
Second, David understood the invincible power of gratitude that flowed from encountering God’s emotions and attributes. The Psalms abound with commands to “give thanks to the Lord.” In Psalm 118 the command is followed by the statement: “for He is good and His mercy/lovingkindness endures forever.” I want to live with the power of gratitude resting on my heart. With so many reasons to embrace bitterness, depression, anxiety and shame David gives me reason to believe that thankfulness is something to seek with all my might. And he tells me that it’s birthed, nurtured and sustained through encounter with God.
Third, David sought to walk in complete obedience before God in every area of his life (dozens of Psalms communicate this zeal). While he fell tragically short of that obedience on a consistent basis, it was clearly the focus of his life; yea even obsession (as many of the Psalms reveal). In an hour when compromise and perversion abounds, David is a signpost of how to live before God.
Fourth, David sought to walk in complete obedience so that he could experience greater depth of personal joy. His pursuit of obedience wasn’t religious externalism. It wasn’t just abstinence. It wasn’t merely behavioural change. David understood that purity of heart made him susceptible to the Holy Spirit which in turn maximized his joy. David’s pursuit of personal holiness was driven by a fierce determination to feel the greatest degree of personal pleasure possible. The reality of the superior pleasures of God to the inferior pleasures of sin took hold of David and consumed him; to the point where everyone from his family to the “drunkards” on the streets mocked him because of his focus and consecration. David understood that his will was no match for the powers of sin and that apart from a greater pleasure to take the place of the sin he was engaging in he’d never get free from it.
Fifth, David’s highest vision for his city and his generation was for the establishing of what he called “a dwelling place;” or, in other passages, “a resting place.” David understood that God was “great” and therefore “greatly to be praised.” And he understood that if God was praised, God would “inhabit the praises of His people” (Ps. 22:3) in great power. So, in order to establish a place where God could dwell with and rest with His people in an inhabiting way, David financially released 4,000 musicians and 288 singers to minister to the Lord incessantly. I want to give my time, my best energy and my money to see men and women established in this same ministry in the cities of the earth that God might dwell in our midst in a manifest way. David presents us with some of the most important truths concerning the historic visitation of God’s manifest presence; that is, how it’s invited, honoured, fostered and stewarded.
When David encountered God’s emotions (‘He is good and His mercy endures’) it filled him with gratitude (‘give thanks to the Lord for’). This gratitude motivated and sustained personal holiness. And the reward of personal holiness was abiding communion with God. To create the optimum context for abiding communion to take place on a corporate level, David fought to establish a dwelling place. This is why he’s one of my greatest heroes; one that I desire earnestly to emulate.
The promise of the presence and power of the Holy Spirit in the lives of believers is a promise of glorious personal interior blessing with manifold external implications.
The first text of many that we’ll look at in this ongoing series to develop a holistic understanding of the ministry of the Holy Spirit is Ephesians 3:14-19 where Paul prays this:
For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
This passage is so precious for a number of reasons. First because it emphatically declares that God’s desire (as displayed through Paul’s intercessory cry) for His people is that they would be mature in love for Him; and secondly, because it explains how we grow into this maturity. These two subjects (i.e. God’s desire for us to be mature in love and the way in which we grow into it) are two of the most important subjects we could ever set our minds upon.
Before we move into the text, here’s an outline of the prayer. The progression of Paul’s prayerful propositions looks like this:
1. He prays that:
- We would be granted divine strength through the Holy Spirit
- In our inner-being/man
- According to the riches of God’s glory
2. So that:
- Christ may dwell in our hearts through faith
3. So that:
- Being rooted and grounded in love
- We would have strength
- To comprehend
- The boundless dimensions of the love of Christ
- That surpasses knowledge
4. So that:
- We would be filled with the fullness of God
The four times the word “that” is mention points to four main points: (1) prayer for our strength, (2) prayer for the indwelling Christ, (3) prayer for comprehension of God’s love and (4) prayer for our being filled with the fullness of God. So the prayer is a passionate cry for us to be strengthened by the Holy Spirit to receive the indwelling Christ so that we’d be able to experience God’s love so that we’d be able to receive the fullness of God in our beings.
The END objective in God’s mind for His people is that we would be filled with His fullness having experienced the infinitely boundless dimensions of the love of God towards us; that we would be strong in the power of the Spirit to feel and know God’s deep affections for us (note the two times Paul prays for “strength”). The MEANS by which this objective is met is the dispensing of the Spirit upon weak believers who lack the ability within themselves to experience this boundless love.
God’s highest vision for our lives is that we would be fervent in love (Matt. 22:37; Jn. 17:26; 1 Cor. 13:1-13; Rev. 2:2-5). And fervency in love is impossible outside of a personal experience of God’s fervent love for us. This was John’s point in 1 John 4:19 when he was explaining how “love is perfected.” He said “We love [God] because [we experience that] He first loved us.”
The baptism of the Holy Spirit that John the Baptist prophesied in Luke 3:16, that power that Jesus promised in Luke 24:49 and the outpouring that the disciples experienced in Acts 2 all were centered primarily around God’s esteem for the First Commandment and secondarily for the Great Commission. The completing of the Great Commission is primarily an issue of quality and secondarily an issue of quantity. And thus the completing of the Great Commission is rooted in the obeying of the First Commandment.
And this is why Paul is praying the way he is in Ephesians 3. He knows that none of us have the ability to conjure up love for God in and of ourselves. We need the power of the Spirit to love God and obey Him to walk in the First Commandment.
Look at how Paul prays: “God strengthen them!” The way we are strengthened is revealed in the next request: “Strengthen them in their inner-man by the Holy Spirit!” The impact of the ministry of the Holy Spirit on our inner-man is revealed in the next statement: “Root them and ground them in love!” The love that Paul is speaking about is the love of God for us. The impact of being rooted and grounded in God’s love for us is revealed in the next statement: “…so that they’d have the ability to comprehend that which they have no ability to comprehend – your boundless affections for them!”
To speak about being “endued with power from on high” or about being “baptized in the Holy Spirit and fire” is to speak about the God-given power that is injected into the human heart that enables it to experience God’s emotions towards us. To limit the baptism of the Holy Spirit to just powerful and effective ministry is to undermine so many breathtaking passages like Ephesians 3:14-19 where the purpose of power is the receiving and reciprocating of love.
God strengthens His people to experience His love and to reciprocate that love by gently breathing upon their hearts with the Holy Spirit (like He breathed upon the disciples in John 20:22) and by powerfully overwhelming their hearts in the life-altering baptism of the Spirit (like when He came like wind and fire in Acts 2). Both are precious and both are to be pursued and contended for. We need to cherish the gentle breath of the Spirit and the strength of the baptism of the Spirit in our pursuit of obedience. Because remember: The height of our obedience is displayed through our fleshing out of the First Commandment; and we can only flesh that out when we possess the divine provision of power upon our hearts to do so.
And here’s how this plays into the completing of the Great Commission and the reason why Jesus yoked ‘the promise of the power of the Spirit’ to ‘the sending of witnesses into the nations.’ Those who have received the ability to experience and reciprocate God’s love are those who will possess the inner inclination, motivation and desire to bear witness to the Gospel in the nations. And therefore I want to make this very clear: our lack of impact in the nations is a product of our lack of intimacy with God.
When we gain intimacy in our hearts through the power of the Spirit we gain impact in the nations through the power of the Spirit. Let’s contend for it and receive it.
The Overwhelming of Mary from Bethany
The family of an ordinary young Jewish girl named Mary – like so many other ordinary Jewish girls at that time – had the sublime privilege of hosting Jesus for an evening. John 12, Mark 14 and Matthew 26 all record the event.
The Overwhelming of Mary from Bethany
At some point during the meeting, this young girl arose with a jar, or a flask full of costly oil in her hand. That little jar of oil was equivalent to a year’s wages. She, being motivated by some overwhelming sense of necessity, proceeded to anoint Jesus’ feet with it. That is, she took this expensive alabaster jar and dispensed the entire thing upon the One in her living room.
This is the equivalent of one of us taking a handful of hundred dollar bills amounting to $40,000 and lighting them on fire at the feet of Jesus as a way of expressing our conviction that nothing compares to the supreme worth of the One in front of us.
As she expressed that conviction, awkwardness settled in the room and tensions began to mount. The family to whom Mary belonged felt compelled to end this display of youthful zeal and religious freakishness. But they were quickly rebuked. The traitor who later sold Jesus to the authorities for 30 shekels felt compelled to point out the financial stupidity of her act informing the witnesses that it was worth a years wage and could be better spend on ministry endeavors. He was quickly rebuked. The other disciples felt compelled to reinforce the traitors conviction saying that this young woman was severely handicapping their ministry by wasting this much money. They too were quickly rebuked.
As the family stood in the corner in horror of what their sister had done, 2 as the traitor sat back plotting how to usurp His dumb leader and as the disciples sat around the living room offended at Jesus’ public condemnation of their ministerial advice, Mary sat with tears in her eyes, oil in her hair and fear in her heart; tears because of the intense burnings that drove her to express her adoration of Jesus, oil because she washed Jesus’ feet in oil with her own hair, and fear because of not knowing what Jesus was going to say and do next. Would He affirm what she did of would He rebuke her also?
Her heart was soon settled as Jesus publicly affirmed her and said these words to all within hearing:
“For in pouring this fragrant oil on My body, she did it for My burial. Assuredly I say to you, wherever this Gospel is preached in the whole world, what this woman has done will also be told as a memorial to her.” (Matthew 26:12-13)
Mary from Bethany was overwhelmed. And it resulted in the sudden liquidation of her financial stability for the years to come. Whatever 300 denarii meant to her, Jesus meant more. Whatever position she enjoyed because of it, she enjoyed the position that Jesus secured for her more. Whatever this inheritance was to her, Jesus was more. And that is the central message of this profound encounter. The central message of this story – as with so many other Gospel testimonies – is the supreme worth of Jesus in the eyes of this ordinary Jewish girl.
In this text from Matthew 26 we read that Jesus – looking the future apostles and church planters in the eyes – gave a command to all who preach the Gospel: “Tell them about what Mary did on that evening that initiated the Passion Week.” He was saying, in effect, “Peter, Philip, John, James, Nathaniel and all the rest of you, wherever I send you in the coming years to declare the Gospel I am commanding you to remember this night and to speak of it with as much esteem in your heart as I have in mine for it.” In other words, “Let this forever define the way you understand what’s about to happen at the end of the week.”
I believe that as the disciples looked back on this grand event after Jesus’ ascension to the Father and their commissioning to the nations they were aware of the indelible impact it made on them. They would always remember the smell of that living room that night in the same way that we remember smells and fragrances of our past. Like the scent of a grandmothers house or a mothers perfume or a high school cafeteria, the scent of that oil remained with these 11 young men until their death when they too ‘broke the alabaster jar’ of their lives at the feet of the One who is forever worthy.
What Mary Understood that the Disciples Did Not
Sadly though, this memory wasn’t forged in their minds and hearts as precious until sometime later. It wasn’t until they understood what would happen later in the week that would understand Mary. There is a very important statement in the verse quoted above:
“For in pouring this fragrant oil on My body, she did it for My burial.” (26:12)
Jesus was interpreting for them and for us what was actually happening. He was saying that the primary reason that she did what she did was because He was to be buried. He was saying that the primary motivation for Mary’s extravagance was Mary’s intimate understanding of the meaning and significance of the death of Christ.
Mary understood something that the disciples did not. She understood that Jesus was going to die. She understood that He was born to die. And she understood the implications of that. She was so impacted by this understanding that she wasted her inheritance and her financial reservoir in a matter of seconds!
But as late as Luke 24, AFTER the resurrection (!), Jesus was rebuking His disciples for still being confused about the crucifixion. In Luke 24:25 Jesus calls His disciples “foolish and slow of heart” for being ignorant of what was happening during those 72 hours between crucifixion, burial and resurrection. That’s a nice way of saying “You’re dull and stupid – Look around boys.”
But for Mary things were very different. Mary was so dramatically wounded by this vision of Jesus’ imminent and necessary death that such an extravagant expression of gratitude and adoration was as easy as breathing. And the disciples became indignant at the sight of it.
Often times Mary of Bethany is spoken about in some generic sense as though she loved Jesus so much that she broke her alabaster jar at His feet. While that is definitely true, it isn’t accurately following what the Gospel writers were getting at. They all associated the pouring of the oil explicitly and specifically with the burial of Jesus. Mary was being driven by a conviction that Jesus’ death was the single greatest event in human history with such implications and achievements that all the oil and all the denarii’s in all the world couldn’t compare to the glory of intimate fellowship with this man. As she wept and poured out that oil she was declaring with her actions what she couldn’t express with words. But if we were to try to identify what she meant in words, we might say she meant something like this:
“I know who You are. And I know what You are about to do. And I know what it will mean; both for You and for me. And I love you for it. You are so much more precious than this precious oil that it offends me to have it in my presence when You are here with Me. You are so much more valuable than all the riches of this evil age that all the silver and all the gold in all the hills and all the mountains of this world couldn’t be enough to persuade me to part from You. I am forever yours and You are forever worthy of all I have to give.”
Jesus heard this prayer as Mary poured that oil on Him. And He would be reminded of it for the next week as the smell stayed with Him and upon Him. As He headed towards Jerusalem He and the other 12 would be reminded every moment of the day of what had happened. The fragrance of Mary’s adoration would have possibly even remained upon Jesus as He hung at Golgotha.
The Emergence of a Young Adult Worship Movement at the End of the Age Gripped with the Meaning and Significance of the Death of Christ
This is a snapshot of what the young adult worship movement at the first coming looked like. This revelation that smote Mary’s heart would soon bleed out impacting many more. Those 11 young adults set out north, south, east and west preaching Christ and Him crucified. By the time Romans was written, the apostle Paul was saying that their witness was so widespread that there wasn’t anywhere he could go without hearing about Jesus and His crucifixion. 5 All of those disciples minus John shed their blood for Jesus and died as martyrs and as faithful witnesses. This was a movement. And it was led primarily by young adults. And it was driven and motivated chiefly by the supreme worth of Christ and His cross. Therefore it was a young adult worship movement that was the sole agent of the proliferation of the Gospel in the first century. The generation that witnessed the first coming also witnessed the emergence of the most extraordinary youth movements in history. But let it be said: Before the second coming we will witness a far greater young adult worship movement.
Before this age ends God is going to so grip a generation of ordinary young adults that nothing in this age will satisfy them or pacify their longings. If He did it for that young girl before His first coming, what is He going to do before His second?!
The book of Revelation gives us the clearest picture of what this worship movement will look like. It will mature to such fervency and ardency that it will actually be the catalyst for Jesus’ taking of the scroll, tearing of the seals and beginning of the great tribulation. 6 As the redeemed in heaven and on earth join together to sing “You are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals for You were slain and redeemed us to God by Your blood,” the transition between this age and the next will take place. In fact, God will not hand the scroll over and the Son will not take it until a generation becomes obsessed with the worth of the only One who is capable of tearing those seals.
Mary’s life is a picture of who we are called to be. And her life is a picture that displays the beauty of Jesus unlike many other stories can.