A Mother's Wisdom

Dear Faith Family, 

For those that might have forgotten (us dads and sons!), Mother's Day is this coming Sunday. So, in honor of this special day, I thought it appropriate timing to share with you words of wisdom from one mother to her son,

"Let this be a mother's gift; find yourself a faith, it helps. No, not helps. It is everything." 

Deedra and I have been watching the latest season of The Crown during the quarantine. It is a fictional, loosely historical account of various moments in the British royal family. If you didn't know, we have Anglophile tendencies! Anyway, one fo the episodes this season focused on the Duke of Edinburgh--Prince Philp, the Queen's husband--and his princess turned nun mother. Princess Alice is her official title. Having suffered from the best treatments of modern-psychology and survived the worst disintegrations of societal expectations and political unrest, she became a nun in the Greek Orthodox Church. Her personal traumas distanced her son from her for most of his life, but at the end of her life, they find themselves unintentionally reunited. In a long-overdue inquiry, she asks Prince Philip, "How is your faith?" The duke's reply is diffident, implying that faith is not a critical component in his life. To this, Princess Alice speaks the wisdom quoted above.

While this exchange between this mother and her son may or may not have happened as described, the powerful truth of the statement is undiminished. Faith is more than a help, a supplement to aid in our survival; it is as vital to life as air. Paul has been speaking the same words to you and me in chapters 2-3 of Galatians, "find yourself a faith in Jesus crucified," Paul would say to his family in Christ, "it helps. No, not helps. It is everything. The life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me." 

The trust that God is here and shares his life with us is everything: the foundation on which we can endure the storms and rudder by which we navigate the seas of life. A few episodes later, Prince Philip discovers the truth of his mother's wisdom as the things he holds on to for stability and direction prove frail. Might we too heed the words of a mother to her child, and find a faith to hold us fast.

Love you faith family. God bless.  

A Second Shot

Dear Faith Family, 

Have you ever felt like you missed? Missed the opportunity to say something to a friend or family member which would have made a difference? Missed nailing that presentation at work? Missed out on saying clearly and simply what was on your heart?

Sunday’s sermon felt like a miss for me. Now before those of you in kindness and pitty email me to say it hit somewhere on the board, misses are a part of life, so I am not overly upset. Like anyone, I would prefer not to miss, but misses are not the end of the world. So thank you in advance for your compassion, but no need to console!

Nevertheless, this week’s note is an effort to say more plainly what I had hoped to say on Sunday: because of the cross, we are meant to view the world through faith, not sin—because of the cross of Christ.

Sin shrinks our view of ourselves, one another, and God by creating distance. The more mired we are in sin, the further divided we are from the fullness of life in “righteous” or whole relationships.  Ironically, our well-intentioned and religiously approved attempts to overcome sin only perpetuate the ever-widening gap, tearing apart and distorting details. Yet, when the image of Jesus Christ dying and dead upon the cross (the story we looked at in Matthew 27:45-54) sinks deep into our consciousness, becoming the lens by which we view our everyday world, our vision expands—the depth and details of life become vivid. We see ourselves and one another and even God, not through the blurring fractals of sin but with the clarity of faith in the moment of most powerful grace.

Malcolm Guite says contends that,  

“One key to the mystery of the Gospels is the truth that everything that happened ‘out there and back then’ also happens ‘in here and right now.’ Christ is the second Adam [I Cor. 15:21-22], the second human being in whom we are all gathered up [Heb. 2:14-18]. What he does for us, he also does in us. Just as hidden in us somewhere is the Eden we once inhabited and have lost, so also somewhere in us is Golgatha.”[1]

 
We were both born for more than the world as it is, and at the same time, born into the world as it is. We cannot escape the midden that humanity produces nor the polluted heart. No matter how desperate we are to wash off the refuse, we are soiled at the cellular level. But what is both surprising and powerful at the moment of Jesus dying and dead upon the cross, is that he met us in the filth, the worst gunge of society’s oppression and the worst grime of our hearts’ rebellion; so that we might be made clean. “For our sake he made him to be sin, who knew no sin, so that we might become the righteousness [the pure, the holy] of God.” (II Cor. 5:21) Counted righteous, made clean, because we have been crucified with Christ, and live today by faith that what was polluted has been purified.

To live freely and lightly, unbound by the shrinking nature of sin, we must let the image and story of Jesus’ end be our beginning and future. The trash heap of Golgatha is the place where the world started anew—the curtain forever removed and the sleeping saints alive again. We must, as the poet, John Heath-Stubbs[2] describes, cry out as “first Adams,” ‘Create me.’ and hear the second Adam upon the cross,  
            

From lips cracked with thirst, the voice
              That sounded once over the billows of chaos
              When the royal banners advanced,
              [reply] through the smother of dark:
              ‘All is accomplished, all is made new, and look –
              All things, once more, are good.’

When this story seeps its way into our bones and the depths of our souls, when this image becomes the lens through which we view the world—God, neighbor, ourselves—then the world is opened to us, becoming the “land of the living,” rather than the garbage heap of the dying or the survival of the purest. And then, as we prayed on Sunday, we can, together, “cross our broken land/And make each other bridges back to heaven.”

Love you, faith family. God bless! 

A Snacking Problem

Dear Faith Family, 

I don't know about you, but I find myself snacking more in these days of confinement than I usually do. Now, I am a snacker even when not restricted, which is one reason I patronize certain coffee shops to help me avoid the temptations awaiting in my pantry and fridge. But in these days of sheltering, working, and doing everything else at home, the trips to the kitchen (which is just a few steps to my right as I type) are, well...frequent!

While modest snacking is acceptable, and perhaps even beneficial, the truth is that the more I snack, popping into the kitchen for an apple here and a piece of chocolate there and there and there again (!), the less inclined I am to desire, enjoy, or benefit from the filling and more nutritious meals Deedra provides for our family.  In an extended period of indulging in this habit,  my body, mind, and soul feel undernourished and a bit sluggish. Do you know what I mean?  

Well, here is the thing I have noticed: my prayer life is reflecting my dietary habits, and sharing the unfortunate ramifications as well. I am "snacking" more in my conversations with our Father, popping off a little prayer for something here, asking him for favor or relief there, speaking at him more than speaking with him, and finding that I am less inclined to desire, enjoy, or benefit from the filling and nutritious banquet laid out before me by Jesus. Do you know what I mean? 

"...the Church's banquet," that's how George Herbert described prayer. Not an insalubrious snack, but a smorgasbord so abundant that one leaves unsatisfied only by choosing to snack or diet rather than dine. Maybe the confinement with its lack of solitude and rarity of quiet and abundance of distractions has exacerbated my 'snacklet' prayers, or maybe there is something deeper (or perhaps even a shallowness) that keeps me stepping to the pantry for something to snatch for momentary satisfaction? Regardless, what I want--no, what I need--is to moderate my snacking, not by praying "more" but rather engaging in prayer like it is indeed a banquet. Intentionally setting my mind and heart on the reality that answering God, conversing with him, listening to him, is an abundance rather than a quick bite. 

I know it sounds a little silly, perhaps even oversimplified, to suggest that the solution is a change of perspective. Still, our scriptures seem to be pretty adamant that it is our perspectives that keep us from experiencing the full benefits of what we have been given in Jesus (see Lk. 19:11-27). So, to help myself...and you if you need it(!)...pray while under our curtailment, I want to encourage some meditation on prayer being our banquet. To aid our imagination, I offer you another believer's (Malcome Guite) mediation on "The Church's Banquet":

Not some strict modicum, exact allowance,
Precise prescription, rigid regimen,
But beauty and gratuitous abundance,
Capacious grace, beyond comparison.
Not something hasty, always snatched alone;
Junkets of junk food, fueling our dis-ease,
Not little snacklets eaten on the run,
But peace and plenty, taken at our ease.
Not to be worked for, not another task,
But love that's lavished on us, full and free,
Course after course of hospitality,
And rich wine flowing from an unstopped flask.
He paid the price before we reached the inn,
And all he asks of us is to begin.

Think long on this reflection. And know that I will be praying that your prayers, and mine, might be feasts in these days of restriction! Love you, God bless! 

Where Does Our Help Come From?

Dear Faith Family, 

We humans have a habit of projecting our feelings onto our environment, "so that the outward becomes expressive of the inward." And, there are also times when the outward circumstances of existence cast a mirrored image of our inward journey, conditions that strip away our securities, widdle down our strength, and overwhelm us like a dense forest in "the valley of deep darkness."

The realities of our moment--those uncertainties of what tomorrow brings, the loss of connection, finances, experiences, health, opportunities, and the clarity of our lack of control--have left many of us feeling as though we have been tossed overboard from a sinking ship into a tempest wrecked sea struggling to keep from falling beneath the waves. I am not trying to be dramatic. I have prayed with many these last few weeks who, because of these outward circumstances, have come to their end, "the shadow of death," cast over the things they depend upon for life.

I have been thinking about this a lot, especially in light of all that we commemorated and celebrated this past weekend. Remembering Jesus' experience of sinking beneath the physical and relational agony until it took his life, his outward circumstances mirroring his inward anguish helps us in our similar moments. His suffering means that no matter whether we project our internal spiral onto outer circumstances or are drug down into internal affliction through outward events, there is one who has gone down before us, who has sunk further than we will have to fall.

It is the "loyalty and solidarity" of our Good Shepherd that comforts us as we descend into the valleys that must be traversed towards our "surely" ascents (Ps. 23), and it is Jesus' going further than we will ever have to which compelled me to write this for us: 

When falling we look for a rope from above
to catch us as we sink;
but what if help is underneath?
What if rescue were to come
from descending
into the arms of sightly defeat.

There is one who sank further.
He plummeted so that we would know,
He plunged further than we will ever go.

He descended upon the devil's gate,
freeing them from their hinges. 
He descended so that our fate, 
is to rise with his ascending. 
'And though you cannot see, or speak, or breath,
the everlasting arms are underneath.'

Praying that you would find comfort in your falling, as you discover that help grips you from underneath. Love you. God bless.  

Pitiful Prayers

Dear Faith Family, 

I shared this with my Gospel Community earlier this week and thought it might encourage others as well. Now, halfway through another week continuing to hope for an end to our troubles, our inconveniences, and our wavering moods with little end in sight, we might find that our prayers are more pitiful than powerful. Maybe you can identify, as I can, with the psalmist in Psalm 77, whose prayer starts as a pity-party directed towards God, and a dramatic one at that! 
 

I yell out to my God, I yell with all my might, 
I yell at the top of my lungs. He listens.  I found myself in trouble and went looking for my Lord; 
my life was an open wound that wouldn't heal. 
When friends said, 'Everything will turn out all right,' 
I didn't believe a word they said. 
I remember God--and shake my head. 
I bow my head--then wring my hands. 
I'm awake all night--not a wink of sleep; 
I can't even say what's bothering me. 
I go over the days one by one, 
I ponder the years gone by. 
I strum my lute all through the night, 
wondering how to get my life together.  Will the Lord walk off and leave us for good? 
Will he ever smile again? 
Is his love worn threadbare? 
Has his salvation promise burned out? 
Has God forgotten his manners? 
Has he angrily stalked off and left us? 
'Just my luck,' I said, 'The High God goes out of business 
just the moment I need him.' 

The last line is my favorite! I have thought those words, though hardly had the courage to pray them! Have your prayers sounded like any or all of the psalmist's? Or maybe your feelings and thoughts, whether you prayed them or not?  

Well, if you are like me, you probably feel bad about praying such things. You don't like self-pity and think it is both useless and even wrong to dwell in this crippling, distorting activity. And you'd be right. Self-pity is a dead-end, and yet our psalms don't forbid self-pity, at least in the presence of our Father. 

Reread the second line, "I yell at the top of my lungs. He listens." The psalmist's pity-party is directed in the right direction; it's directed towards God, who is listening. And you know what happens to the psalmist, and what happens more often than not in my own prayed pity-parties, the prayer ends far from where it started. Here is the rest of Psalm 77, 
 

Once again I'll go over what God has done, 
lay out on the table the ancient wonders; 
I'll ponder all the things you've accomplished, 
and give a long, loving look at your acts.  O God! Your way is holy! 
No god is great like God! 
You're the God who makes things happen; 
you showed everyone what you can do--
You pulled your people out of the worst kind of trouble, 
rescued the children of Jacob and Joseph.  Ocean saw you in action, God, 
saw you and trembled with fear; 
Deep Ocean was scared to death. 
Clouds belched buckets of rain, Sky exploded with thunder, your arrows flashing this way and that. 
From Whirlwind came your thundering voice, 
Lighting exposed the world, 
Earth reeled and rocked. 
You strode right through Ocean, 
walked straight through roaring Ocean, 
but nobody saw your footprints, saw you come and go. You led your people like a flock of sheep, 
by the hand of Moses and Aaron. 

Something happened to the psalmist in the middle of his pity-party with God; his focused changed. But the amazing thing to me, the thing that keeps me praying through my self-pity, is that there is nothing other than the listening God's presence that seemed to reorient the psalmist. He didn't will his change of attitude. He didn't argue himself into a different focus. He didn't even respond to a self or Spirit rebuke. The prayer simply turns on a dime. One minute he is wallowing in his self-pity (vs.10), and the next (vs. 11) he is worshiping. There is nothing to account for such a change but that his prayer was truly prayer: a response to the living, intimate God who listens. 

Eugene Peterson once said, "Any place is the right place to begin to pray. But we mustn't be afraid of ending up someplace quite different from where we start." So, my encouragement for us this week is to keep praying. And, if your prayer starts like Psalm 77, keep praying to our Father who listens, until your prayer turns too. 

A Gift For This Moment

Dear Faith Family, 

I pray that you are well in body, mind, and soul as you read this note. I have been praying for each of you even more and with greater desperation than usual these last few weeks.  I guess that is one blessing amid the uncertainties of this moment; it compels us to pray like we need it.

One of the things I have begun praying for you as we prepare for at least another month of distancing is that you would press through the mourning of what is lost and into the resolve needed to live well.

I do not mean that you should not mourn, though I would encourage you not to moan. There is real loss in all of this. What I am praying for you and us, however, is that we would not remain in mourning, withdrawn into our feelings of loss and fear, but would accept the reality of this moment and embrace God's gift to us.

Perhaps the apostle Paul's dearest companion, Timothy, was a man whose faith Paul knew to be sincere and grounded. Nevertheless, Timothy found himself with difficulty living up to his faith.  And so, Paul writes him saying, 
 

"For this reason, I [Paul] remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you...for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and sound mind."
(2 Timothy 1:6-7) 

It is normal to grieve and worry, and it is human to complain and fret, but we have something in us, given us, that allows us to continue through the trial, ready for whatever is needed of us. My prayer for you, for us, and myself is that we would "fan into flame," not "hide under a basket," this God gift, a spirit with the power to persevere and overcome,  able to love as we have been loved, and do so with steadiness often absent in times like this.

The headmaster of our twin's school emailed the parents a trending quote on social media, though I wouldn't know (ha!). The exchange is between two of the primary characters of Tolkien's Lord of The Rings, and is certainly appropriate to our prayer. Even if you haven't read the books, you'll recognize the line from the first movie. 
 

'I wish it need not have happened in my time,' said Frodo. 'So do I,' said Gandalf, 'and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.'  

None of us are glad to be in the time we are in right now, but that is not for us to decide. It has been decided for us (Acts 17:26). What we are able and free to determine is how we will live during our allotted day, in a spirit of fear or radiating  with "the good deposit entrusted to you." 

Savoring Faith

Dear Faith Family, 

I am writing to you today, my friends, to ask you to do something that does not come easily for most: slow down and savor words.

In 'normal' times, we are commonly overrun with words and information, but these last few weeks have intensified the onslaught of opinions, instructions, and even encouragements. I expect then, with empathy rather than judgment, that you are more than likely going to skim through my addition to the verbiage. But, I ask you to resist your inclination to scan and continue reading only at a leisurely pace. I ask it for your good, so when you are ready and able to slow down and savor, please continue. 

There is an underlying anxiousness in most of us right now, for obvious reasons. An anxiousness that creeps up and overwhelms, perhaps only in passing moments or manifesting in unsettled stomachs and uneasy sleep. For some, the anxiousness is not so hidden. Regardless, we know we can and ought not to fret as we do, at least that is what our faith tells us. We try not to worry, yet we are unable it seems but to wander in the wilderness of the present, brooding on what lies beyond our vision, the unknown surrounding us like darkness. We are unsure where the sounds behind the veil of night originate and to whom or what they belong. Anything and everything imaginable could be on the other side of the night so thick yet pale.  

We wonder if our faith is lacking and what confession needs to be made. We think our faith is weak, our faith mistakenly abased by our overconsumption of the news, constant distracting, and 'selfish solicitude.' And now, when we need it most, and it’s night and hard to see, it seems fleeting as a match's flame.  

What are we to do at these times? It would be easy enough to offer a quick reminder of the truth--and those are certainly helpful--or a list of useful tips for mental health in stressful times, or a treatise on "being anxious for nothing." Instead, I offer you an opportunity to slow down and savor, to "taste and see that the Lord is good," not through information, but a meditation on words about the Word.

The instructions are simple: read the poem below slowly, then read the section after meant to help you connect some of the dots in the poem, then re-read the poem slowly two to three more times, allowing yourself be drawn into the images, emotions, and the echos, stopping to hang on the words that jut out to you until the reason for their protruding is satisfied. 

STATION ISLAND XI | Seamus Heaney and St. John of the Cross 

As if the prisms of the kaleidoscope
I plunged once in a butt of muddied water
Surfaced like a marvellous lightship

And out of its silted crystals a monk's face
That had spoken years ago from behind a grille
Spoke again about the need and chance 

To salvage everything, to re-envisage 
The zenith and glimpsed jewels of any gift
Mistakenly abased...

What came to nothing could always be replenished. 

'Read poems as prayers,' he said, 'and for your penance
Translate me something by Juan de la Cruz.' 

Returned from Spain to our chapped wilderness, 
His consonants aspirate, his forehead shining, 
He had made me feel there was nothing to confess. 

Now his sandalled passage stirred me to do this:

How well I  know that fountain, filling, running,
Although it is the night. 

That eternal fountain, hidden away
I know its haven and its secrecy
Although it is the night

But not its source because it does not have one,
Which is all sources' source and origin? 
Although it is the night. 

No other thing can be so beautiful. 
Here the earth and heaven drink their fill
Although it is the night. 

So pellucid it never can be muddied, 
And I know that all light radiates from it
Although it is the night. 

I know no sounding-line can find its bottom,
Nobody ford or plumb its deepest fathom
Although it is the night. 

And its current so in flood it overspills
To water hell and heaven and all peoples
Although it is the night. 

And the current that is generated there,
As far as it wills to, it can flow that far
Although it is the night. 

And from these two a third current proceeds
Which neither of these two, I know, proceeds
Although it is the night. 

This eternal fountain hides and splashes
Within this living bread that is life to us
Although it is the night. 

Hear it calling out to every creature. 
And they drink these waters, although it is dark here
Because it is the night. 

I am repining for this living fountain. 
Within this bread of life I see it plain
Although it is the night. 

The poem begins with the author recounting a kaleidoscope he ruined in his desire to see into the dark of 'muddied water." This gift meant to allow him to see the refracted and beautiful glories of God's light seems to him lost and wonders if it can be salvaged. Feeling the seeming loss of such a gift, he remembers a conversation with a monk in a confessional ('behind a grille'), through which he came to realize that "What came to nothing could always be replenished." 

Like you and I, the author has struggled to see through the dark, feeling that he has lost his apprentice for viewing God's glory and beauty through the unknown of the "chapped wilderness." And like the author, we are invited to "Read poems as prayer," specifically a poem by St. John of the Cross ("Juan de la Cruz."), which are the final twelve stanzas. 

God, speaking through the prophet Jeremiah, addresses himself as "the fountain of living waters" (Jeremiah 2:13, 17:13). And St. John of the cross ruminates on the magnificent features of this fountain and its water in the first several stanzas. 

Jesus would say that if we asked him for a drink, he would give us ever quenching access to the same "living water" (John 4:10). Jesus' access granting comes because he is the "bread of life" and "living bread" (John 6:35, 51). Jesus makes this declaration in the context of him explaining that consuming his body and blood is the only way to life now and forever. His words and actions, making an easy connection for you and me to the bread and wine of communion. In both instances, Jesus offers access to the fountain of living waters through his body and his blood to people at the moment of their need, "Because it is the night."

Now that you have a little bit of connection to the parts of the poem, re-read the poem slowly two to three more times, allowing yourself be drawn into the images, emotions, and the echos, stopping to hang on the words that jut out to you until the reason for their protruding is satisfied. 

Minding Our Own Business

Dear Faith Family, 

It seems timely that our conversation over the last few weeks has centered around Paul's admonishment to the Thessalonian faithful to "aspire to live quietly, and to mind your own affairs" (1 Thess. 4:11). Circumstantially we find our selves with little choice but to focus on the ordinary routines and relationships necessary to get by each day. Similarly, we are encouraged to quiet our activities and keep to ourselves, all of which is wise caution for both our health and our neighbors.  

I don't know about you, but I hear the warnings of leaders and experts, and couple those with Paul saying "mind your own affairs," and I am tempted to check-out. Check-out of responsibilities and relationships that would get me too mixed up in other people's "affairs" and germs. 

I'll all to easily avoid you and busy myself with me even when I am not being encouraged to do so! So, while social distancing is prudent and neighborly at this moment, as those "taught by God to love one another" (1 Thess. 4:9), we must, however, not let this moment justify our self-absorbed tendencies. 

In fact, "mind your own affairs," actually encourages me away from self-absorption, and into prudent living. Remember that Paul's counsel is given in the context of "more and more...brotherly love" (1 Thess. 4:10) or what we can call familial friendship. In this context, minding our own affairs means taking proper and proportionate responsibility for what we have specifically been given to do, care for, and cultivate.

Each of us has everyday roles and relationships within our home, community, faith family, and society for which we have been uniquely created, divinely commissioned, and are graciously accompanied in helping to flourish. That is your business, "your own affairs," which Paul says pay attention! 

While there are similarities and overlaps in these everyday roles and relationships, they are also distinct, specifically special, for each of us. Expect in this way: to avoid them or to attempt them in any other means, then what we have been "taught by God" always leads to less life, not more. We are neither couch-potatoes nor messiahs in everyday living but have a proper and proportionate place somewhere in between. 

If we don't take proper and proportionate responsibility for the relationships which make up our existence, we end up judging but not loving, meddling but not serving, helping but in ways that harm, comparing and contrasting, seeing others weaknesses while ignoring our own, and using the word arrogantly or ignorantly but not being "doers of the word," just to name a few examples. Yet, if in the 'more and more' of familial affection we can mind our own affairs, not in self-absorbed avoidance of others or self-centered serving, but properly and in proportion, we can wisely share the burdens of each other in this and any moment, even as we each carry our own load (Gal. 6:2,5). 

So, may we "mind our own affairs," to the momentary and eternal health of one another, and in so doing, fulfill the law of Christ. 

Not Quiet Like We Think

Dear Faith Family, 

I need to admit that I have a proclivity for the quiet. I don't always feel a need to talk, but I do feel a need to be alone at times. I don't get antsy when boredom sets in, but I do when there is too much commotion. Maybe that's why Paul's admonishment in I Thessalonians 4:11-12 to "aspire to live quietly," sticks out to me. At first glance, it seems to resonate with my natural disposition. But is Paul encouraging us to develop a particular personality bent? I don't think so, though I do believe many of us dismiss Paul's words because our personality is not inclined to whatever image of a "quiet life" pops into our minds. 

While it has been my experience that the majority of us long for a simpler, less chaotic life, we still want to make a difference, yearning to be a part of something bigger, recognizable, and exciting. And, a quiet life seems the opposite of such aspirations, but only if we miss the context of Paul's charge. Just a few verses before, Pauls says this, 

"Now concerning brotherly love (familial friendship), you have no need for anyone to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love one another, for that indeed is what you are doing to all the brothers and sisters throughout Macedonia. But we urge you, faith family, to do this more and more..." (I Thess. 4:9-10)

You see, the Thessalonians were already involved in something bigger, recognizable, and exciting; their relationships.  They were already making a noticeable difference (in their entire region, i.e., "Macedonia") through the way they loved one another, in the way they sought the good for one another. And that's the point Paul is trying to make, that the yearning within us for a fuller life finds its satisfaction in the relationships in which we are enmeshed.  

God rescues people. God redeems people. God transforms people. And, he does so continuously and persistently day-in and day-out, you know, in the middle of that stuff, we call living. So, to be involved with people then is to be involved in God's fantastic activity. And, to love people is to participate in God's activity in the most impactful way possible. What could be more interesting, more influential, or more satisfying than that! 

A quiet life does not exclude us from having an impact, or keep us locked away from the interesting; instead, it keeps us from missing out on what is most impactful and most interesting. "Aspire to live quietly," is an admonition to strive against the distraction of the grandiose which pulls us out of the personal, and to strive for a life of greatest satisfaction which is found only through loving relationships. 

It's not easy living quietly. Like Jesus (Matt. 4:1-11), we are tempted to gratify our natural craving for satisfaction, tempted to seek out that which makes the most impact for the kingdom, and do that which demonstrates the extensiveness of God's power; but all that is a temptation, but not from God, for God does not tempt (James 1:13-15).  Which is why Paul uses the word "aspire." We don't live quietly by temperament but by choice, as we direct our hopes toward achieving, a life in which we experience and participate in the incredible, but in the context and way, our Father has given us. 

Aspiring to Freedom

Dear Faith Family, 

Over the years, we have attempted to make a big deal about the ordinariness of our faith. The ordinary places where faith takes root and bears fruit. The ordinary routines and relationships where we learn to live by faith and share that faith with others. The ordinary expressions of faith that fill a day, a week, a life.

Now, the ordinary is not an ideal our culture esteems, instead, we seemingly are always on the lookout for the extraordinary. And yet, our valuing of what we think of as normal life—life as employees, friends, neighbors, parents, children, spouses, roommates, church members, etc.—isn't something we just made up or have natural proclivities towards. Rather, it stems from Paul’s admonition to a faith family in Thessalonica whose life of faith “became an example to all the believers.” (I Thes. 1:7).

Having followed Jesus in the Holy Spirit to love one another well (I Thes. 4:9), Paul says to these faithful,

“But we urge you, brothers and sisters, to do this [loving one another well] more and more, and to aspire to live quietly, and to mind your own affairs, and to work with your hands, as we instructed you, so that you may walk properly before outsiders and be dependent on no one.” (I Thess. 4:10-12)

 
Let your love for one another multiple as you aspire--letting what you hope for be--to live quietly, not splashy or busy or frantic or clamorous, but calm, at peace in your daily doings, your normal labors, your common relationships for the sake of those around you and your freedom. This is Paul's admonition to a family of faith two millennia ago, and one which we have taken to be essential still today.

This coming Sunday, we began a dive into the depths and details of the freedom of an ordinary life in Jesus together to which we aspire. In preparation, I encourage you to do two things. First, consider your own aspirations, especially in regards to a life of faith. What are your ambitions? How does Paul's exhortation to ordinariness sit with you? 

Second, read Galatians. It should only take about 20 minutes to get through the entire letter. After reading Paul's letter, spend some time meditating on the relation of the message to the Galatians, and Paul's encouragement to the Thessalonians. If it helps, re-read The Orthodox Jewish Bible translation of I Thessalonians 4:10-11 which provides  bit more vividness to this shaping exhortation: 
 

"And have as your ambition to lead a quiet life of peace in the home of God, and mind your own business, and have an income, a job, working with your own hands, according to the commandments we gave you. The purpose is that the way you conduct yourself in respectful rhythm with creation, be conducted properly toward outsiders and that you might not be needy, dependent on the way of the world.”

May our ambition for a quiet life bear the fruit of freedom in Jesus!