LifeLines Weblog

Hi everybody,

I’ve been blogging more regularly at Holy Minestrone, a new initiative from the 1st of June. The blog at HM is more on the themes of the Gospel, community, and the church. I try to write briefly about a single principle or theme in each post. The reason for this is because most readers (like myself) are d-o-n-e by paragraph 3.

At the bottom of the Holy Minestrone blog, you can also register to have the posts delivered to you by email. OR, you can write me and I’ll add you to the list. About every 5-6 days, a new post will grace your inbox.

Here’s the official address:  minestrone.posterous.com

Read the About and FAQ sections for more information of why I feel the need to write at this new blog and how I’m going about it.

I will occasionally update this blog here at LifeLines on more family and mission matters as well as miscellaneous posts that just don’t fit the theme of HM.

Thank you for following the work and efforts of the Krause family and the ministries of Serenissima.

During our recent trip to the States (Summer 2010), we had the privilege of participating in a Missionary Commissioning Service at a church in New Mexico. Each ministry will perform a commissioning service in a different way. This diversity is a good thing because it makes these kind of services both local (to the Body) and special (creatively unique). This particular service was special because it was the commissioning of the Pastor’s daughter who was headed to Asia.

The range of emotions for the missionary candidate and their families is intense. You really consider what’s at stake for the Gospel, the life you’ve known, and the distance you will be from what’s familiar for a very long time. Tears are completely acceptable. Both the parents and daughter all held-up very well as they crossed this threshold of a new chapter in their lives and the lives of their church friends.

The Pastor invited us to join this special moment at their church so that, “a veteran missionary could share some insights with a new candidate headed to the field.” I never considered myself a veteran AND people in my church are now calling me one of the older guys. One of my guys said a week ago, “I’d like to have an older man in my life to disciple me — you know, like yourself.”  That’s tough to hear. I was younger than they were when I came here! Have some respect, Sonny-boys! I’m pushin’ 40 but I ain’t dead!

Anyway, we were really grateful for the opportunity and so glad to share in the experience. So, I gave my younger sister-to-the-fields a charge in the presence of her church family. My wife, Sandy, was a contributor, and to keep it both succinct and applicable, it was developed into 6 “Do’s” and 6 “Dont’s”.  Here they are:

One-to-one discipleship allows you to have great conversations about what’s helpful and important in your walk with Christ. Yesterday, I had one of those discussions with a young brother as we were walking down the avenue of grace ((we like to call it an avenue of grace more than just a “spiritual discipline.” The reason is because the more that we practice it, the more we come to realize the grace of God within it. For example, walking in the avenue of grace of prayer helps me discover how grace-full the Lord is in communion with him.)) of Bible Reading.

The first thing that I like to help other guys with is the motivation for Bible reading. I love the Hebraic idea that when a person studies the lines of the Word of God, they are really studying the “lines” of the face of God. To the Jews, studying the Word was the highest form of worship a person could do because it required the person to “listen” to God through spiritual ears.

The second practical area of Bible reading is taking the time. We often bemoan the fact that “life gets in the way.” And, as soon as we say that, we realize that the Word of God is life. So, life is getting in the way of Life. It’s crazy, but it shows us how badly we have spiritual A.D.D. You know what I’m talking about if you’ve ever pursued that deep-rich-holy-quiet time with Christ only to receive numerous phone calls, remember 42 important things in the space of 10 minutes, and heard that little pop of another instant message coming from around the world right to your computer.

The distractions are killing us! And we think we can handle them because we’re all “multitaskers.”   uh-huh.

So, the other day, I was reading through some helpful articles on multitasking that caught my attention in relation to reading the Word and prayer (you can read one of the articles here and there are links at the bottom that connect you to more helpful articles on the subject).  And I thought this might help us in our communion with the Lord if we tend to be inconsistent or easily distracted.

The first thing about multitasking is don’t do it. We’re not designed to take on multiple tasks at once. In fact, the more we do it, the worse we become at multitasking. We can simply connect this to Bible reading by saying keep the Word in front of you and keep at it.

The second thing is that we might be shooting ourselves in the foot by checking out too early. Researchers who studied how distracted we become said that we need at least 15 uninterrupted, distraction-free minutes to get into the zone. The “zone” is where we are thinking and reflecting productively on what we’re reading. My guess is that a lot of sincere folks might be getting 15 minutes or less in the Bible on a daily basis. This would mean that many people are checking out, just when their own brains are ready to check-in. So, the simple inspiration is fight your world to press into the zone. You’ll probably start to be overwhelmed with the face of God the more you really start to see it.

During this last week, I just finished another rich, convicting work by Pastor Timothy Keller. This work is called Counterfeit Gods and it’s worth every page. Last year, I recommended his earlier work called The Prodigal God here.

Stating it simply, Pastor Keller is writing one work a year and everything he is printing is excellent. He really is a gift to the Church in our day. So, here is my initial recommendation — just get it.

Here’s Why

Idolatry is all around us and the reader soon discovers idolatry is deeply seeded within us too. The western idea of idolatry is some foreigner bowing down before a statue which means the westerner automatically thinks he/she doesn’t practice idolatry.

Dr. Keller defines and unfolds idolatry from a multitude of angles until we can see it. I will be surprised if you’re not surprised by how much this impacts us. You will see it culturally, emotionally, internally, spiritually, and religiously as the fake gods with false hopes and promises are unmasked one by one.

To catch the initial gist of the book and definition of idolatry, Dr. Keller quotes Alexis de Tocqueville of the 1830′s who made this succinct statement about the sorrow of life that comes from settling for “incomplete joys”:

Subjects & Stories

“We never imagine that getting our heart’s deepest desires might be the worst thing that can ever happen to us.” ((page 1)) This means that anything can be an idol — even the good things. Therefore, the subjects dealt with are money, success, love, power, politics, religion, racism, & discerning your idols both seen and unseen.

How Dr. Keller unveils each of these major life themes is through real stories of biblical characters who each profoundly battled these idols. You wouldn’t think that Zaccheus and Jonah were in combat with their idols. But you’ll also find so were Jacob, Leah, Rachel, Nebuchadnezzar, Abraham, and Naaman. This is a very diverse spectrum of people and the characters all remind us — of us. That is why God is telling us these stories from all different people at different times and places. You will definitely see these stories like you’ve never seen them before.

So Many Blessings — Here’s One | Cosmic Disillusionment

I must have consumed two highlighters on this 177 page blessing. There’s so much that I’d like to quote and share, but you need your own copy and benefit. So, let me give you one that really spoke to me. This quote comes from the story of Jacob and the idol of romantic love, but it deals with all of life:

The little florescent light in my brain blinked on during those pages to help me understand that there is enough brokenness in everything that God put there to cause me to thirst for an ultimate solution. That solution cannot be a would-be savior (incomplete joy) but only the authentic one, Jesus Himself. God drives me through the disillusionment to His unfailing reality. And that’s how idols are displaced.

I hope this book will help you live a life of holy worship. Let me know what you think and discover.

Each year in my Bible reading plan, I’m guided to a verse that brings me great encouragement and a new perspective each time I look at it. Has that happened to you? Each year of age seems to bring out another vibrant color in the Word? Imagine what 1,000 years of Gods presence will do when we look at His Word then!

Psalm 139:17 – to memorize

Here is the verse that struck me again today — Psalm 139:17:

How precious to me are your thoughts, O God!

How vast is the sum of them!

First Thoughts

The first things that stand out to me in this verse are that God is thinking about me constantly, he’s thinking a lot of precious things for my good, he will never forget me, and his thoughts are for my best interests. His thoughts are guiding, watching, caring, & corrective.

What a delight to be a child of God! What a beautiful ocean compared to my creek of a life!

On Second Thought

Now the application comes closer to home and demonstrates the great difference between God as Father and me as son.

• How much do I think about God?
  
• When do I think about him? Constantly? Frequently? Somewhat generally?
  
• Do I have his best interests in my mind?
  
• How much internal sin would be deterred if my focus was Perfection? 
  
• How much more love would I experience in communion thinking through how HE is love?
  
• How much of the gift of thinking power am I wasting because it is undirected and unfocused?

Could any good thought, directed toward God, ever be wasted on Him?

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note: Feel free to share! The comments are now open on the blog and you can respond to this post with your “thoughts” and feedback. If you’re receiving this by email, you can also click to reply directly to this post (although comments on the blog are much more fun).

Idol Demolishing. ((I want to cite and thank Pastor Tim Keller for some of the initial insights into these two articles through various messages that he has delivered.)) It ranks right up there in entertainment value with garden weeding. In the last post about spotting idols in your life, we sought for helps on how to identify these life-leeches. So, now that your list has sufficiently grown to the level of frustration because there are so many you never considered before, let’s use some power tools to take these things out!

Remember the First Commandment

In Exodus 20:3, the first commandment says, “You shall have no other gods before me.” This is pretty straightforward and very hard to misinterpret. The beautiful thing about this command is that the Lord doesn’t leave us with just a “do-this and do-that” command. He gives us the reason for this command so that we’ll look at His character. In verse 5, the Lord tells us that He is a jealous God. This does not mean that He has petty rivals and tries to “one-up” these other powers competing for your attention. Rather, it means that He is so purely zealous for His own glory being evidenced in your life that there is NO ROOM for any other being. He is the wonderfully intolerant King! This means there will be a battle for your heart and mind. One author said, “The biblical faith will not tolerate idols…God does not permit rivals, and the idolatries instinctively recognize this.” ((Schlossberg, Herbert, Idols for Destruction, Crossway., p. 308))

Martin Luther also made an astute point that there is a profound reason why this is the first command. His insight was if you break any of the other 9 commandments, you’ve already broken the first. In other words, if you steal or murder — why did you have to steal or murder? Because another being for worship has come before the Lord. I think the inverse principle is also true. If you seek to obey the first commandment, you will have a much more delightful time with the rest of the commandments.

Call it an I-D-O-L

Idols are little tumors that start small and hide in the walls of the heart. And because they are good things that are taken one-step-too-far at first, our initial reaction is to say, “It’s not that bad, get off my case.” Idols are also lies from the father of lies. And the initial lie is always a falsehood protected by a truth statement. OR, if you want to flip the idea, it’s always a truth that is made to misrepresent a lie to make it look better than or less harmless than it really is.

For example, look at how subtle this one is — “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?”  Followed up by, “You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” Genesis 3:1,4-5

So, the immediate temptation is to misrepresent it so that we can protect it. Take a lesson from primitive pagans if you will. They carve the idol, worship it, and then carry it on their shoulders to save it from the flood destroying their village. They protect it. They think it is greater than it actually is; something they cannot live without. Prophet Jeremiah and Apostle Paul both expose these idols as nothing at all. They’re not gods. They don’t save. And they don’t have power.  Jeremiah 10 & Acts 19:26

Another example of this can be found in Amos 6:10-17. We recently studied this passage in our Church and found that Amos went to prophesy to the northern kingdom about their idolatry and his first stop was in Bethel. This was a city where the wicked king, Jeroboam II, had set up a false center of worship and paid a false priest named Amaziah to run the joint. Amos, the poor shepherd-prophet,  preaches plainly and fearlessly. Amaziah doesn’t like it one bit. So, to protect the whole gig, he sends a letter to King Jero and lies about Amos, God’s truth-telling prophet, and almost has him killed.

The core principle is agree with God and call an idol what it is. You don’t have to misrepresent it to protect it.

Thankfulness

Here’s a deep lesson from Jonah, literally. Just after a swim and during his submarine tour, Jonah prays desperately and humbly to the Lord (ch. 2). At the end of his prayer, he says something fishy, “Those who pay regard to vain idols forsake their hope of steadfast love.  But I with the voice of thanksgiving will sacrifice to you;” (v. 8-9). In this part of the prayer, we get the sense that Jonah brought his idol with him and was dropping it off for the whale to deal with. No wonder the fish had to puke!

This also teaches us something of how thankfulness and giving thanks contrasts and conquests idolatry. When you’re thankful, you’re admitting that there is a greater source beyond the thing you’re thankful for. You’re also agreeing that what could easily be an idol is really a gift — and you’re worshiping the ONE WHO gave it to you. In Jonah’s case he was declaring through thankfulness that idols were empty of hope, continuous love, and salvation. The “I AM” is and remains the only satisfying source of these.

Run Away

1 Cor 10:14 simply says, “flee from idolatry…”

Have you ever noticed that an idol always draws you close — so close until you become one with it? Idols use powerful, attractive words like “love, have, passion, satisfy, deserve, hold, feel, want etc.“  When these words start manifesting or repeating themselves where you find your time, attention, and affections are occupied with the idol, then that is a strong sign you’re turning a good thing into an ultimate thing. ((Keller quote here)) You might be trying to define your self-worth by it. The best solution here is the biblical one – run. Oh, and one way to help you get away from it is to close the door behind you and guard its point of entry into your heart. Jesus said in John 10:9, “I AM the door…” There is so much to be said for allowing Christ to stand between you and the destroyers.

This has been some idol-chat; not idle-chat. Hope you’ve been blessed and helped.

Minor Prophets with Major Messages

At Serenissima, we’ve been taking a look at one minor prophet of the Old Testament each week. This last week was the shepherd-prophet, Amos. One of the prevalent themes of Amos is his clarion call against idolatry (other loves and loyalties — Amos 5:25-27). Idolatry is all around us and many times found within us. Anything can be made an idol and it doesn’t have to be an image or physical material either. Therefore, idolatry is a major problem for modern man, and it’s made worse by our modern idea that it’s an antique and out-dated practice of ignorant and primitive people.

After teaching this lesson on idolatry and the righteous anger of the Lord against it in His people, one of the young wives in the Church said, “My sincere prayer was, Lord, please show me my idols.” This was an excellent prayer, and with some practice and humble soul-searching, idols aren’t too hard to spot; just difficult to destroy.

Define Idol

First, start with a couple working definitions of what idols are and then utilize some of the questions below for reflection.

An idol is anything that you believe will fulfill and satisfy the deep need of your heart for security, acceptance, forgiveness, and the complete love that only God can give. An idol takes a good thing in the creation (ie. relationships, recreation, money, performance, work etc.) and turns it into “an ultimate source // ultimate hope” of providing for the inner aches and needs of the heart. An idol is anything that you feel you must have to be “better”, to be satisfied, or to be somebody. Idols always start small and only end up as statues and the other yada after they’ve grown. They will always lead you to destruction. They will always fail you or cause you to fail them. And one final thought, if you have to find ways to protect it, then it isn’t sovereign and it’s probably a good-ole’, garden-variety i-d-o-l.

Investigating the “I” word

Second, here are 10 questions that might help us start to spot these wicked warts:

1) Do I “have” to have this?

2) Do I have to have this to be somebody or feel significant or secure?

3) What is it that I consider more important that it would keep me from God’s Word, my time in prayer, and serving His people?

4) Do I find myself regularly resentful, complaining, or angry? About what?

5) Is my practice of religion a delightful means of worship or more of a way to build up “credits” and “get ahead” with God?

6) What am I buying?

7) Who do I think is great?

8 ) Am I satisfied with my culture so that I’m indifferent to other peoples?

9) What’s the one thing in my life that if it were taken away from me, I would consider my life ruined, wasted, destroyed, worthless, or stolen from me?

10) What pet thing do I keep going back to and nurturing at every little turn?

 

You can share your comments and thoughts about this on the LifeLines blog or discuss this in a similar post that can be found on our Discussions Tab of the Serenissima Ministries Facebook Page.

In the last couple weeks, I’ve been asked a very similar question (or two) on four separate occasions. Among Italians and Americans ((I mention the two cultural groups because it seems to be a common “human” question regardless of cultural background.)) the question has been Where did Cain get his wife? Who was there for Cain to marry? Did the world start in incest and isn’t that wrong?

This topic wasn’t new to me, but it was a surprise to get asked numerous times in one week after relative silence on the topic for years.

So, the Answers in Genesis website has a very decent article on the subject. And, if you’ve never contemplated the questions or researched for some answers — now’s the time.

You can find the article here — and if you would ever need it in Italian, it can be trovato qui.

There are two kinds of people who are both rare to find
and delightful to be around.

1) The poor person who is happy.

They don’t always have to get.

They’re content.

2) The rich person who is generous.

They don’t always have to have.

They’re humble.

Yesterday,  while teaching on the doctrine of rest from Matthew 11:25-30, it escaped my mind (and I knew I was forgetting something) to share a little more of the Hebrew background to Jesus’ use of the words yoke and burden.

Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
~ Matthew 11:28-30

Sharp Contrast

It is unavoidable in the context of Matthew 11 to notice that Jesus wanted to present Himself as the total contrast to the heavy, restless burdens of the religious leaders of His day. Jesus presented Himself as rest.