Do you have something in your life that you’re just not good at, but you know you should probably be better? You can’t explain why you’re so bad, you just know that it probably shouldn’t be that way? That feeling is almost universally shared by Christians when it comes to the topic of prayer. Why aren’t we better at something that is so amazing? Why aren’t we experts at this incredible gift we’ve been given? Why isn’t something so extraordinary a higher priority for us? That’s true of many Christians, and unfortunately, that’s true of the church too.
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Sometimes the church world can overcomplicate things. We create theories, argue about semantics, and obsess over the wrong things. I think that this is especially true when we talk about the idea of spiritual gifts. We approach the idea of spiritual gifts around a central idea- what “thing” do I have that God has given me? But when Paul talks about spiritual gifts, his question is what “thing” can you do to serve others? It’s more about what we give than what we have. It’s about ministry, not talent. It’s about asking a very simple question, “How can I help?”
Note: There is a regrettable gap in the audio of about 3 minutes due to a technical difficulty.
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Christians have long made bold statements about God. Perhaps the most audacious claim Christians make is not only that there IS a God, but that we can know him. Through the person of Jesus Christ, the testimony of Scripture, and revelation from the Holy Spirit we believe that we can know God. Not only that we can know him, but we can have a personal, intimate relationship with him. That is indeed a bold claim, but it’s at the heart of all we do at Providence.
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Flour. Water. Juice. Ordinary objects found all over the world throughout all of history. How is it that these simple, ordinary objects come to share an extraordinary story? In God’s economy, this is how he works. It’s how he’s always worked. He takes the simple, ordinary things- like us- and uses them to put His grace and glory on display.
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It seems strange to make people do something when they want to be a part of the church. Why require something that is so foreign to our culture’s way of doing things? While baptism may be an “odd” practice to many outside observers. It’s a powerful reminder to those of us that have placed our faith in Christ- we were once in grave danger, buried and without hope, until Christ rescued us. It is that story that we rehearse every time someone gets baptized.
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Why do we have church anyway? What are we doing gathering together on a Sunday morning for a church service in the first place? If we’re going to explore the “why” behind what we do, the answer to this question is fundamental to everything else that follows. Why “have church?” Or is that even the right way to ask that question?
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Church is a funny thing. What we do when we gather is an odd thing to those unfamiliar or uninitiated. Even though our practices may be unfamiliar to an outside world, that doesn’t mean they aren’t right, necessary, and helpful. Unfortunately, many Christians, even those that have grown up in the church, don’t really understand why we do the things we do. As we launch a new series, we seek to ask the question: “What are the roots of the practices of the church?” As we answer those questions, we will become even more “rooted” in our faith. As we begin, we discuss the root of all that we do- the why behind all of it- Jesus Christ.
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We all love a good story. We especially love the story of the underdog, the triumph of the human spirit, and the satisfaction of overcoming odds stacked against the hero. Nehemiah is set up to tell just that story. However, the story doesn’t end at the moment of triumph and celebration. It keeps going one more chapter and that chapter is a remarkable collapse from the heights of the nation’s return from exile. Why not stop at the high point? Why keep telling the story? It’s because the story was never about Israel or Nehemiah. It’s a story about God, His faithfulness, and our need for something that is better than our failures.
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Our culture is built for distraction. The more effective you are at distraction, the more successful your business will be. Yet the pattern set forward by Nehemiah and Jesus is one of laser focus on the task at hand. How does Nehemiah fight against distraction? What does it look like for us to pick our “wall” and then determine that we are doing “a great work and cannot come down?”
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Sometimes things we take for granted to be true aren’t quite what we were led to believe. We can repeat things we’ve always assumed or that our culture has deemed to be true, but that doesn’t mean the Bible agrees with those assumptions. Leadership is one of those things. Authority, power, money, position, title- these are all things we associate with leadership, but if we are to follow the Biblical model, we must reset our assumptions. According to the Bible, leadership looks more like death than power, suffering than ruling, and serving than authority.
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At some point, we will all deal with it. Some feel the weight of it daily. For some it comes from others, for some it comes from themselves. How do we respond when we feel the weight of discouragement and hear the mockery of our enemies? What do we do when we feel overwhelmed and overmatched? When we are tempted to believe that the task is too big or our abilities to meager, we can look at Nehemiah’s response as a pattern to follow. What does Nehemiah do? He prays, commits it all to God, and then simply gets back to work.
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Has God ever called you out of your comfort zone to do something “crazy?” Nehemiah would say so. And what we do in those moments says a lot about our trust in God. Often it feels like the gap between calling and going can be a million miles wide. Are we being unfaithful if we don’t immediately jump into action? Maybe. Maybe not. There’s often more behind obeying God’s call than just the first steps.
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Part of being a Christian is to notice when things “aren’t how they’re supposed to be.” We look around and we see the brokenness that this world has been subjected to. Sometimes that’s personal, sometimes it’s distant, but it’s always there. But then what? What do we do with that feeling and that reality? The tendency of most of us is to distract ourselves and get our minds on something else. But Nehemiah couldn’t do that. His recognition that things weren’t how they should be, turned into a burden- and that burden would become his calling.
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“You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you.”- Augustine
Since our first exile from the Garden of Eden, we have been looking for home. All of humanity works from this fundamental base desire. Everyone may try different roads to get back home, but apart from Christ we are doomed to be a people that are always traveling, but never make it home. Which is what makes the final chapters of the Bible such a relief and our grand hope, because there we finally make it home. The garden destroyed in Genesis becomes the garden restored in Revelation. The end of the story is the promise that, through Jesus, we can finally make it home.
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Jesus knows. Those two words are packed full of meaning and comfort for us today. He knows what it’s like to live in this world and all of its false promises. He knows what it’s like to long for home, only to be stuck in a place where nothing is at should be. He knows what it’s like to deal with suffering, pain, and betrayal. Jesus knows. He knows because he entered into our reality broken by the fall in the Garden of Eden. And it is his faithfulness in the Garden of Gethsemane that gives us hope that all of those things broken by the first garden, will be made right in the second.
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