When Barak Refused to Step Up

Suggested Reading: Judges 4:1-10

There's a great scene in the football movie Remember the Titans, a movie about the struggle of a Virginia town to successfully integrate it's black and white schools into a single unit. Petey, the de-facto leader of the black football players argues with Gerry Burtier, an all-American and the leader of the white players, about why no one is playing as a team. Gerry accuses Petey of playing selfish, show-off football at the expense of his teammates and Petey accuses Gerry of not leading, of not stepping up and getting his white teammates to block for the black quarterback. They both get angry with each other and then the story moves on. You think that is the end of it. Until, in the middle of practice, Gerry lays into one of his white teammates for not blocking. Petey responds on the next play by doing some non-selfish, team-oriented blocking of his own. The scene culminates in the first true bonding experience for a team which goes on to win the state championship. All because the leaders stepped up and led.

There's a story in the book of judges that reminds me of that scene. In Judges 4-5, we see what should be the story of Barak. Apparently, God has called Barak to step up and deliver the Israelites from King Sisera who is oppressing them. But Barak hasn't done it. Deborah, the only female judge that we know of, calls him on it. "Hasn't the Lord commanded you to go?" she asks him. Barak, apparently uncertain of himself and unwilling to lead, tells Deborah that he will only go if she goes with him. As a result, we know the passage as the story of Deborah and Jael, another woman who kills the oppressive king by driving a stake through his head. Barak is almost an afterthought. Deborah sings a song when the battle is over and the first line of the song is telling, "When the leaders lead…praise the Lord."

The story puts me in mind of all the times we miss out on the blessings God has for us because we refuse to step up when we know we should. How many times do we yield glory that God intended for us or for our churches because we refuse to step up and lead? How often does ministry simply go undone because we are too uncertain of ourselves or too insecure to step out on a limb, take a risk, and put ourselves out there? God calls each of us to lead in different ways at different times. Sometimes, it is in the church. At other times, we are called to lead in the workplace or in our families or among our friends. Sometimes, God calls us to step out and lead our communities or our states or nations. Are we missing out on the blessings God has for us? Are the people around us missing out on God's blessing because we refuse to step up?

"When the Leaders lead in Israel,
When the people volunteer,
Praise the Lord!" (Judges 5:2, HCSB)

Boycotting Star Trek

Suggested Reading: 1 Corinthians 5:1-13

I became a Star Trek fan in junior high and high school. I loved Star Trek. I even wrote a Star Trek novel during my sophomore year in high school (and then William Shatner wrote his own novel that was similar enough mine would never get published! But I'm not bitter or anything….ahem). I loved the science fiction and the vision of a future where humanity had overcome many of the evils of its past. But at one point, I became disillusioned with it, even deciding to boycott Star Trek. In several of the novels and television episodes a thread developed which ridiculed and mocked religious belief in general and which seemed to attack Christianity in particular. But after a while I realized something. Star Trek had always had those elements within it. Star Trek had never hidden those elements and never pretended to be anything other than what it was - a secular science fiction show. So, I ended my boycott of Star Trek and came back to it with a healthier understanding of both it and myself.

Many of us have experienced similar situations in life, where we decide to stay away from a particular group or product because of the things they support, the ideas they promote, or the lifestyles they live. And while there are certainly times when such "boycotts" are warranted, we often level them at the wrong people.  In 1 Corinthians 5:9-11, Paul wrote, "When I wrote to you before, I told you not to associate with people who indulge in sexual sin. But I wasn't talking about unbelievers...What I meant was that you are not to associate with anyone who claims to be a Christian yet indulges in sexual sin, or is greedy, or worships idols, or is abusive, or a drunkard, or a swindler. Don't even eat with such people." (NLT)

See, both to protect the integrity of the faith and to help straying believers understand the severity of their sinful behavior, we are to avoid people who claim to be Christians but consistently live like they are not. But nowhere are we told to treat unbelievers badly because they act like unbelievers. How else would we expect unbelievers to behave? 

Rather than targeting secular or religiously-other people and organizations for their behavior, we should be more concerned about those who claim to be Christians while presenting an absolutely horrendous witness to the world. But notice, Paul did not say to avoid people whose theology is different than ours or who disagree with us about portions of the faith. He said to avoid those Christians whose behavior is poor. In another example, in 2 Thessalonians 3, Paul warns against associating with Christians who are irresponsible and make themselves a burden for everyone else. 

One of the reasons so many people are turning away from Christianity today is that we allow sin to fester in the Church. We tolerate people who are abusive and greedy and are swindlers. Even outsiders understand that the Church is filled with imperfect people, but they rightly expect us to take a stand when people within our own ranks behave in despicable ways.

We cannot expect people to take our claims of the transforming power of Christ seriously when we tolerate consistent sin from those who claim to follow Christ.  Don't stay away from the sinners. Stay away from the people who claim to follow Christ but don't live like it. 

Having the Right Credentials

Suggested Reading: Acts 4:8-18

Several years ago, I graduated with a Master of Divinity degree and am currently finishing a PhD. I have spent more than a decade in higher education classrooms and I know lots of people with multiple degrees. Some of my best friends hold a PhD.  So I have both a great appreciation for and a healthy skepticism of higher learning. I appreciate the education one can gain, especially in biblical studies, but I am also keenly aware, because of so much time spent with so many people who now have higher education degrees, that academic credentials don't change who you are. In fact, academic learning and credentials typically make you much more of the kind of person you already are. With education, people are simply better at justifying what they already believe and more practiced in defending it.

Recently, however, I was reading through Acts 4 and I was reminded of an entirely different and yet more pertinent kind of credential. Peter and John had been arrested due to the public upheaval they created by healing a lame man. They had been brought before the Sanhedrin and called to account for preaching in the name of Jesus. When Peter and John responded cleverly and with conviction, the Sanhedrin's reaction to them is recorded with these words:  "When they observed the boldness of Peter and John and realized that they were uneducated and untrained men, they were amazed and recognized that they had been with Jesus" (Acts 4:13 HCSB). Neither Peter nor John had any legitimate training or education in the eyes of the most educated Jews of the day yet they were able to make a solid case for preaching the gospel before the very people who were trying to intimidate them into stopping. The only explanation the Sanhedrin could come up with was that these men had been with Jesus.

In another example, but at the opposite extreme, we can see the Apostle Paul. Paul was a very highly educated man. He had studied under Gamaliel, a man whose counsel the Sanhedrin grudgingly yielded to just a few chapters later in Acts. Paul had all of the educational credentials that a Christian minister could hope for in the first century. Yet, at the beginning of each of his letters, when he lists his credentials for his readers, he never once mentions his education or training. Instead, he only ever mentions that he had been called by Jesus, that he was a slave of Jesus.  As far as Paul was concerned, the only legitimate credentials were those related directly to his relationship with Christ.

Now, don't get me wrong. I believe in being as educated as possible, especially for the ministry. I believe in having all of the tools available to help one rightly divide the Word of Truth. But the only credential that really matters is whether or not we have been with Jesus, whether or not we are following his call in our lives. What credentials do you tend to flash for people? Are you more impressed than you should be by other people's credentials? Or do you rely too heavily on the wrong credentials yourself? There's ultimately only one credential that matters.

When God Begins Pulling Out Weeds

Suggested Reading: Luke 8:4-15

“Roger” was a man who was brought up in the church. He committed his life to Christ and was even planning on being a minister. But somewhere along the way, other concerns began crowding out his walk with Christ. Eventually, he ended up doing drugs, surviving multiple divorces, taking advantage of his elderly grandparents, and losing the only Bible he’d managed to hold onto. Roger spent more than two decades wandering out on his own, his relationship with God all but forgotten amidst the pleasures, worries and concerns that crowded out the word of God in his life.

Roger epitomized the third kind of soil that Jesus described in the Parable of the Sower.  As the farmer scattered the word of God, some seeds fell along the path and were picked up and carried off by birds. Other seeds fell on rocky places and sprung up quickly but never really grew roots and died in the heat of the sun. But the third place where seeds fell was among the thorns, which choked them and kept them from growing like the seeds which fell on good soil. When Jesus explained the parable to his disciples, he explained, The seeds that fell among the thorns represent those who hear the message, but all too quickly the message is crowded out by the cares and riches and pleasures of this life. And so they never grow into maturity (Luke 8:14, NLT).

The seeds that fell among the thorns have always fascinated me because they didn’t die like the seeds that fell on the first two types of ground and because, as I look at my own life, I see how easily I am distracted by the worries and pleasures of this life. I have often wondered what it would look like to do a little weeding, to begin pulling out those weeds and thorns that distract us from our walk with God and keep us from growing like we should.

According to Roger, he knows what that weeding process is like. You see, Roger was in an accident where nearly every part of his body was injured or damaged in some way. Roger was in a hospital bed undergoing multiple surgeries and, for months, was even unable to talk. I went by several times to see him and pray with him, but the first time he could speak he described how God had used his time in the hospital to remove all of the distractions of his life and put his focus back where it belonged. His first request of me was that I get him a Bible so he could make good use of the weeks in bed he still had to endure. Roger had months of recovery and rehabilitation ahead of him, but he felt certain that God had been engaged in a weeding process, pulling out the things in his life that had choked off his spiritual growth.

When I left that visit with Roger, I experienced a sense of urgency to do a little weeding in my own life so that God wouldn’t have to do it in a more painful fashion down the road. Ever since then, I have been seeing things that keep me distracted from my walk with Christ and I am taking the first steps to begin pulling them out of my life.

What are the weeds and thorns in your own life? What specific things hinder your spiritual growth and prevent you from reaching maturity in Christ? Wouldn’t it be easier to do the weeding yourself than to wait until God has to do it in a more dramatic and, possibly, painful fashion? 

Treating the Word of God Like Over-Priced Gelatto

Suggested Reading: Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23

When we lived closer, my wife and I had a particular restaurant we frequented on date nights, an Italian wood-fire grill. The first time we went, we shared a gourmet pizza and an incredible appetizer and when we were done, we ordered dessert. Normally we share dessert, but this time we each decided to get our own thing. My wife ordered a banana crumble type thing and I simply ordered a cup of gelatto. The gelatto, according to the menu was going to cost me $5, which was a little high, but I figured I could try it once and see whether or not it was worth it. But when they finally brought it out, it was in this itty-bitty cup and didn't have much to it. Don't get me wrong, the gelatto was absolutely delicious. But as I sat there looking at the size of the dessert I simply kept thinking, This is really good, but I'm not going to pay $5 again to get so little gelatto. As good as it was, I just didn't think it was worth the price I had to pay.

As Jesus continued his parable about the reasons the Word of God doesn't always produce results in people's lives, he described the second type of soil/person this way: "[Other seeds] fell on rocky ground, where there wasn’t much soil, and they sprang up quickly since the soil wasn’t deep. But when the sun came up they were scorched, and since they had no root, they withered"(Matthew 13:5-6, HCSB). He then explained the illustration by saying, "And the one sown on rocky ground — this is one who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy. Yet he has no root in himself, but is short- lived. When pressure or persecution comes because of the word, immediately he stumbles" (Matthew 13:20-21). Essentially, Jesus was saying, sometimes we don't experience the power of the Word of God in our lives because we don't think it is worth it. When trouble comes, we simply don't believe the power of the Word of God is worth the price we will have to pay and so we allow the work God is doing in us to whither and die.

I've seen numerous examples of this. The couple called to the mission field stops Bible school and goes back to a regular 9 to 5 job because they are scared about finances. The high schooler who has always been a leader in his church youth group stops attending church because his girlfriend thinks the Bible is stupid and he doesn't want to lose her. That lady who is up for a promotion stops talking about her faith at work because she thinks it might cost her the position and the raise. The college student includes untruths in his paper because the truth would offend his professor and he needs the grade to keep up his GPA. Over and over again, we decide that the power of the Word of God simply isn't worth the price we will have to pay and we let the work it is doing in our lives whither and die.

But it doesn't have to be that way. I am convinced that, much of the time, we behave this way because we simply aren't thinking about what we are doing, because we haven't thought about it in terms of the work of God in our lives being worth the price we are paying. We delude ourselves into thinking we can have it both ways, that we can experience the full power of God in our lives and still compromise in certain areas so that it doesn't cost us as much. But when we say it aloud, most of us know that simply isn't true. King Jesus requires all our loyalty all the time, no matter the price. Just as he said to the rich man, Jesus says to us, "Sell all you have to benefit someone else. Then come follow me" (Luke 8:22, my paraphrase).

If we haven't experienced the power of the Word of God recently, maybe it's because we have unconsciously decided that it simply wasn't worth the price. Jesus requires everything of us, but he seemed to think it was worth it. Will we believe him or not?

Impressive Frisbee Scars and Unnecessary Distractions

Suggested Reading: Mark 4:1-9, 13-20

The largest scar on my body sits on my right elbow and I got it in a frisbee accident. I was in junior high and several of my friends had come over and we were playing frisbee in the street in front of my house. We had been throwing it back and forth for quite a while and I was probably being cocky about being able to catch anything my friends could throw at me. So one of my friends really launched it. The frisbee zipped over my head and I took off after it. My focus was intense, so intense that I didn't notice the curb that I tripped over until a split-second after snagging the frisbee from the air. The curb had been there all along and it was my street which I had lived on for a dozen years at that point, but I was so focused on the frisbee that I simply didn't see it. Somehow, I managed to hold onto the frisbee as I skidded across the sidewalk, scraping off a section of skin the size of a U.S. quarter. The scab was so big that I was constantly catching it on something and, eventually, it turned into quite an impressive scar.

As Jesus continued explaining why people don't experience results from the Word of God in their lives through the parable of the Sower and the Soil, he described a third type of person/soil, saying, "Other seed fell among thorns, and the thorns came up and choked it, and it didn’t produce a crop" (Mark 4:7, HCSB). He then explained that that kind of person "like seed sown among thorns, hears the word; but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things come in and choke the word, making it unfruitful" (Mark 4:18-19, HCSB). If Jesus were explaining it today, I believe he might rephrase this explanation, "These people hear the word and accept it but their lives are so filled with the distractions of daily activities and the pursuit of pleasure and comfort that they have no room left for the Word of God to grow within them."

I firmly believe that one of the biggest problems in our churches today is not that people don't believe the Gospel message is important or urgent but that we are so distracted with work and school and sports and television and books and games that there is simply no room left for the word of God to grow. We fill up our time with so many hobbies, and activities, and creature comforts that we simply don't have any time to hear the Spirit when he speaks to us or to meditate on the scriptures so that they can soak into our souls and fill us up with Godly insight. After all, how many times do we simply think, I would do that if I had a little more time, without thinking about the fact that many of the things we do are not necessary. They may be good. They may be helpful. They might take the stress off or help us forget our worries for a few minutes. But they aren't necessary, at least, not as necessary as leaving room for the Word of God to grow in our lives.

What things are distracting you from God's voice as it speaks into your life? What things have you used to fill up your time until there is no time left for God to speak to you and stretch you, until you are too busy to spend time meditating on God's word? What weeds will you have to remove from your own life so that there is room for God to do what God wants to do in you? What time-killing activities do you need to give up? What television shows or entertainment programs do you need to move down on your priority list so that God's Word shaping your life can move up.

Mandarin Bibles and Bird Seed

Suggested Reading: Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23

I love languages. I speak a couple different languages and can read a couple more. But one of the languages I don't speak is Mandarin. I can read a couple symbols (the numbers 1-3 and "turkey") but that's about it. So a few years ago when I was given a Mandarin Bible, I was excited to have a foreign language Bible to add to my collection, but not as excited as I would have been if I could read it. I placed the Mandarin Bible on my foreign language Bible shelf, admired how it looked next to the others and then moved on with the rest of my day. It's nice to look at but my Mandarin Bible doesn't really do me any good because I don't understand it. In order for it to do me any good, I either need to learn Mandarin or have someone else translate it for me.

In Matthew 13, Jesus told the famous Parable of the Sower, a story which illustrates through several different types of soil the different ways in which people receive God's word. The first type of soil Jesus described was a path, maybe gravel, but essentially like a sidewalk, upon which seed was sown only to be picked up and carried off by the birds. Jesus then explained, "When anyone hears the word about the kingdom and doesn’t understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is the one sown along the path" (Matthew 13:19, HCSB).

According to the parable, one of the reasons that the Word of God doesn't grow and produce fruit in us is that sometimes we simply don't understand it. Sometimes, that initial reception of the Gospel is thwarted by a lack of understanding. But sometimes after we have received the Gospel, our growth plateaus because we simply don't understand the deeper things in God's Word. We get stuck and grow bored because nothing about our walk with God challenges us. Eventually, at that point, we begin to regress and move backward.

Fortunately for us, a failure to understand is not the end of the road. We can learn from the example of the Ethiopian eunuch in Acts chapter 8 who admitted his lack of understanding to Philip so that Philip could explain the scriptures to him. We can ponder and struggle with those things that we don't understand and seek the council of those who are wiser than we are. We can spend time in prayer asking the Holy Spirit for insight and wisdom. We don't have to be content with our lack of understanding or simply skip over those places in scripture which don't make sense to us.

If we don't understand God's Word, we don't have to admit defeat. We just have to ask for help. Growing in our walk with God is too important to be stalled by something we can overcome.