wretched, blind and naked

Some scriptures are so familiar that they’ve become a part of the language we use. Sometimes when I read them in context I’m surprised at the part we don’t necessarily know.

Take, for example, the warning to the church in Laodicea, when Jesus in this vision called them lukewarm. Look at the passage from Revelation 3: 14-18: “I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth. You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see.”

What makes these Christians lukewarm? They think their wealth is enough to meet their needs. They believe because they’re living a good life here on earth their eternal future will be as comfortable. They live without urgency because there isn’t anything they want that they can’t buy.

That’s really sad, because most of the best things in life can’t be bought. Certainly, nothing that will avail against our sin, nothing that will free us from our chains, can be acquired with money. In fact, we can be rich as Croesus and still be wretched, blind and naked in a spiritual sense.

The sweet lure of affluence is it feeds our pride and supports our indulgences at the same time that it numbs our true need. That was the snare that entrapped the church in Laodicea. It seems a legitimate risk for me as well. 

where Satan lives

I live in a small midwestern town, but we’re not as sheltered as we used to be. We still don’t have much crime, but you can find pretty much any sin you go looking for. Maybe what still makes small towns different these days is you have to go looking for sin.

It wasn’t that way in Pergamum. In that Ancient Greek city, there was a church, and this is how Jesus commended that church in Revelation 2:13: “I know where you live—where Satan has his throne. Yet you remain true to my name. You did not renounce your faith in me, not even in the days of Antipas, my faithful witness, who was put to death in your city—where Satan lives.”

Imagine trying to be a church in the city where Satan lives. Historians tell us that Pergamum was full of pagan temples, include no less than three to the Roman emperor, and separate ones for the Roman gods Zeus and Athena, and  one to Asklepios the Greek snake god. As a result, the city abounded with religious rites that involved sex and drugs and drunkenness and all kinds of excess.

Still, there were other cities like that. Pergamum must have been pretty awful for Satan to have made it his home. Unlike God, Satan isn’t omnipresent; he has to be someplace and, according to John’s vision, for a while at least that place was Pergamum.

Even in this wicked place, though, there were faithful disciples of Jesus who stayed true even to the point of death.

I think this is an encouraging word for the American church. Sometimes it seems like my brothers and sisters are falling at an alarming rate. Prominent evangelical leaders seem to succumb to the lure of power, dear brothers and sisters give up their marriages for sex that looks more exciting, and young people explore the darker sides of so-called pleasure made readily available on sites like Craigslist. Hardly a week goes by without news of another banner-carrier for Christ compromising their witness with an unfaithful lifestyle.

Yet in the most evil of places in the ancient world, God preserved for himself a remnant, strong men and women whose staunchness in the face of Satan himself earned a word of commendation from Jesus. He’s doing the same thing here and now.

It makes me remember that there isn’t any temptation I’ll face that can’t be resisted, and that all evil and the Father of Evil himself are powerless against Jesus. The church in Pergamum didn’t conquer that wicked city, but they didn’t give in either. And that was good enough.

There’s a lot of compromise in our churches these days, a lot of going along with bad things that for various reasons look good. But there are still those faithful ones who don’t give in, and we need to find each other. There’s strength in numbers.

word and testimony

I wonder, do I really dare to ask God for an important mission? Do I really want what might come if I make myself fully and freely available for him to use?

The Apostle John wrote Revelation as a testimony; in fact, he starts it this way, in Revelation 1:1-2: “The revelation from Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, who testifies to everything he saw—that is, the word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ.”

That’s pretty standard stuff for the New Testament. But, remembering that John was exiled as punishment for evangelizing, I was struck later on, in verse 9, by a repeated phrase: “I, John, your brother and companion in the suffering and kingdom and patient endurance that are ours in Jesus, was on the island of Patmos because of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus.”

The word of God and the testimony of Jesus were at once the reason for John’s hope and the passion that drove him, but they were also the cause of his persecution. Following Jesus had gained him, in his words, suffering and patient endurance. What’s more, his readers were living the same things.

Is that what it means to be a Jesus-follower? When I live for the word of God and the testimony of Jesus, do I have to be ready to suffer for it too? The answer is, of course. That’s something I learned in catechism classes and from sermons ever since. Jesus said his followers would be persecuted.

So why, after all these decades of faithful following, do I still hope it never happens to me?

And, if I’m a true disciple of Jesus, why hasn’t it yet?

all glory

Jude is one of those books I hardly ever read. It’s a hard letter, very negative, all about sin. This morning I was drawn to the the final lines, in verses 24 and 25: “To him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy— to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and forevermore! Amen.”

I was attracted to the idea that Jesus would keep me from stumbling and present me to God one day. That’s comforting. But as I re-read those verses, I realized that they pointed me to my own sin.

Here’s my problem: I want glory and power and authority for myself. I wonder this morning, as often as I’ve read or prayed or sung words giving these things to God, how often I’ve meant it completely.

How do I reconcile giving all glory to God with my thirst for praise from other people? And if I really want him to have the power and authority, why do I so often resent his leadership?

This morning these words seem a direct challenge to my desire to control my own life. They’re a call to humility and servanthood when I want to be the hotshot business executive who made it to the top of the ladder. 

“To the only God our savior be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and forevermore! Amen.” Today I’m praying for strength to live as though I really mean those words.

examples

Often as I read the Bible, there’s casual mention of people I wish I knew more about. For various reasons they seem interesting, or sometimes they just seem so normal that they’re very relatable.

John’s third letter has several of these people. He addresses the letter to Gaius, who must have been a pretty good guy. Gaius, unlike many of us, had no fear of strangers and aliens. Here’s what John wrote about him, in verses 1: “To my dear friend Gaius, whom I love in the truth. . . . It gave me great joy when some believers came and testified about your faithfulness to the truth, telling how you continue to walk in it. I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.

“Dear friend, you are faithful in what you are doing for the brothers and sisters, even though they are strangers to you. They have told the church about your love. Please send them on their way in a manner that honors God.” 

Gaius wasn’t the only good person in that church. In verses 11 and 12, John wrote about another man, Demetrius, who everyone liked, and the context is interesting here: “Dear friend, do not imitate what is evil but what is good. Anyone who does what is good is from God. Anyone who does what is evil has not seen God. Demetrius is well spoken of by everyone —and even by the truth itself. We also speak well of him, and you know that our testimony is true.”

John, in effect, is saying, “Be like Demetrius. He’s a guy who does good and not evil; everyone says so, even God.”

But this is a normal church, and not everyone is commendable. In fact, it looks like in this church the leadership might be problematic. In verse 9 here’s what John had to say: “I wrote to the church, but Diotrephes, who loves to be first, will not welcome us.” Here’s a person who sees John as a threat; he likes being the biggest fish in this little pond, and fears that if an actual apostle shows up people won’t treat him that way anymore. 

I think John offers us some examples here. We can be self-centered like Diotrephes, but notice that even though he’s clawed his way to the top, he still doesn’t seem secure. He sees others as threats. That can’t be much fun.

Or we can be like Demetrius, who just plain does the right thing almost all the time. Demetrius the good. Another great example would be Gaius, who shows hospitality to people that other people shun. Either way, two men who are trying to live like Jesus.

Interesting, isn’t it, that the man who wants all the attention has, in the end, earned only negative remarks, while the other two are praised. I think that tells us a lot about how Jesus sees his church.

fellowship

Happy Thanksgiving! Today should be a day of church and fellowship; that’s what John would have said, anyway.

Reading 2 John this morning I was struck by how John ended this letter, in verse 12: “I have much to write to you, but I do not want to use paper and ink. Instead, I hope to visit you and talk with you face to face, so that our joy may be complete.”

For John, face to face was best. Physical presence was necessary if you wanted complete joy. John was a great letter writer, and I assume he got letters as well, but that couldn’t begin to substitute for the happiness of getting back together. And he addresses this letter to “the lady chosen by God and her children” – the bride of Christ, the church, and it’s members – and signs it “the children of your sister, chosen by God” – a sister church. To him, complete joy came from fellowship with the family of God.

That’s a great reminder for today. We could choose to stay home and watch the parade on TV. We could choose to hole up and watch TV. We could hook up with friends and family on Facebook, safely separated by distance and a tiny screen, able to disconnect any time we want.

But the joy of Thanksgiving comes from everything we share with each other. Our fellow brothers and sisters and cousins, all the children of Christ’s dear ladies, know the same gratitude we do, thankfulness that can only come from finally being free, or at least in the process of becoming free, of all the bad outcomes of our bad choices. Our families know our history, almost every detail of it, and have been there through it all. We need to be together today; we have so much to share, so much to say to each other, and we need to do it face to face.

So I hope your worship is wonderful, and the food is plentiful, and you get to be with people you like and there are lots of laughs and maybe some tears. I hope the people you spend your day with are people you can pray with. If not, you’re probably doing a good thing but it won’t be fellowship the way God meant it to be.

not heavy

You know the biggest mistake people who don’t know Jesus make about Jesus? That’s he’s a hard Lord to follow. That he’s all about demands and sacrifice and just wants to forbid anything fun. That ultimately he judges and condemns.

John knew better. Look what he wrote in 1 John 5:2-5: “This is how we know that we love the children of God: by loving God and carrying out his commands. In fact, this is love for God: to keep his commands. And his commands are not burdensome, for everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world? Only the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.”

Anyone who has lived with Jesus for any amount of time knows better. We know, as John knew, that even though obedience is hard sometimes, obeying never makes life harder. Life always gets easier and better when we follow God’s commands.

There’s a good reason for that, an obvious one. God made this world and he made me. He knows how life works. He is very aware of what will make things go smoothly and what will bring pain. And so he gives us, the ones he loves, instructions in how to life a joyful, productive, meaningful life.

There are a lot of liars in this world, people who repeat the propaganda of the Father of Lies. They tell us that God has it wrong, that casual and variable sex is more fun than marriage, and drunkenness is necessary to have a good time, and cheating is an advantage as long as you don’t get caught. But that kind of disobedience is, unlike obedience, extremely burdensome. That life brings addictions and diseases and loneliness and broken relationships and guilt. That’s a heavy load.

God’s commands aren’t burdensome. Someone once said, “God only tells us to do what we would do anyway if we knew everything God knows.” Obeying God gives us clear consciences and wonderful relationships and true joy. Where Satan would hand us a backpack full of bricks, God picks up the load for us, and let’s us walk through life unburdened. 

What John is telling us is Jesus makes us winners at life. Over-comers. His requirements aren’t heavy at all.