None of This is Wasted

There's a song I love that gets to me every time it comes through my speakers. (Okay, there are a few that fall into this category, but bear with me.) It's not only the music, which is lyrical and lovely. It's also not only the words, though I find them to be thoughtful and powerful. The emotional trigger of the song comes down to one line, which I am convinced captures a truth at once so fundamental and so easy to forget: "I am with you."

It is a promise that appears repeatedly throughout the Old Testament, as Yahweh reminds His people again and again of His covenant faithfulness. And it is a promise that reappears in the New Testament, most notably as a part of what we call the "Great Commission" in Matthew 28. In a moment we return to as significant for understanding what it means to be "sent" as His disciples into the world, Jesus offers a promise and a word of comfort: "Surely, I am with you always, to the very end of the age." It's as if, in these final instructions, He knew that as the disciples obeyed His call to make disciples "as you go," they would need this continual assurance of His steady presence.

We aren't much different. And this is why that song hits such a deep place inside of my heart. I need to be reminded of God's faithful presence with me, in my mundane, everyday life. I need the assurance that He sees. In the light of this promise, everything can shimmer with His glory and goodness. In the words of the song, "I am with you . . . your labor is not in vain." Every act, every word, every thought becomes a holy space in the presence of Jesus. In His redeeming presence, nothing is wasted. Nothing is truly done in vain. This is a hope I need to be reminded of often.

It's easy to believe my labor is not wasted when things go wonderfully and success comes my way. In those moments, when the promotions or the accolades come, or when I win the favor of coworkers and peers, it is easy to believe God is with me in my work. But when I find myself discouraged and disillusioned, when I feel misunderstood or rejected, when I seem surrounded by failures, I need to hear these words again: "I am with you. Your labor is not in vain. None of this is wasted."

I believe that somehow, in God's grand economy, nothing done in faithful service to God is done in vain. None of it is invisible. None of it is wasted. Every conversation that plants seeds we never get to see sprout. Every act of generosity that goes unthanked. Every moment of diligent work that goes unnoticed. Every minute we give to someone in need of a listening ear or an act of kindness. Every effort we make to welcome peace and justice and goodness, even when we don't see systemic change. Every cup of cold water. Every dignifying act. None of it is wasted. None of it is in vain. None of it passes under His sight—for He is with us.

So, friends, we can go out in confidence and hope into all the nooks and crannies of the world our God calls us to. We can keep our eyes and hearts open to where He leads us to be a part of His work in the world. And we can breathe deeply with each step, secure in this promise: "I am with you. None of this is in vain."

Thanks be to God.

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If you want to give the song that inspired this post a listen for yourself, you can find it here.

This post originally appeared at the Vere Institute.

My Savior Isn't An Insurrectionist

This is not the post I’d planned to write today. I’d planned to muse on how the the reset of the New Year, though in many ways arbitrary, kindles in us fresh hope that maybe this year will be different. Then, we woke up on New Year’s Day to a car that wouldn’t start. Our dryer broke this week. And now, making them seem childish in comparison, yesterday we saw a disgraceful attack on the U.S. Capitol and the democracy it represents. Gone are those thoughts on naive optimism. We’re back in the land of the living.

As I started to see the events in Washington D.C. unfold, I sat watching live updates on Twitter with tears streaming down my face. It was a day, sadly, I was not shocked to see, but it was one I had hoped and prayed would not come. Look at what has happened to us, I texted my dad. Look at what we’ve become. For all of the calls for “law and order” over the last months, “law” transferred to the whims of a mob, and order descended into chaos. And I grieved.

Above it all, one picture set me over the edge, sent the tears flowing, and made me beg, “Lord, have mercy.” Amidst the mob pushing up the Capitol Building steps, entangled with the Trump flags and the American flags, there it was in florescent yellow: JESUS SAVES. I saw others later, including a small wooden cross, with the words emblazoned in white.

And this is why I’m writing today. Because what we saw yesterday is not the way of the Jesus I follow, and yet violence has been baptized in His Name. This is not the first time this has happened in the history of the church or the history of our nation. The events of yesterday were not an unforeseen or unpreventable anomaly, but rather the natural overflow of the language and actions of both political and religious leaders. In this case, we are well past the point of holding space for different political applications of our theology. We have passed the point for finding unifying common ground in the midst of diverse views. (I do believe, for the record, these things are of incredible value.) We, in the American church (specifically the white, evangelical, American church that raised me), once again must take a good look and a prayerful reflection on the way of Jesus and of His Kingdom.

I’ve been thinking today of two moments in the last day of Jesus’ life. The first is the moment when, as Jesus is being arrested, Peter draws his sword and cuts off a man’s ear. It’s not a violent moment in a vacuum, just as yesterday was not a moment in a vacuum. It was the culmination of a misunderstanding, even among the disciples, about the type of Kingdom Jesus brought and the type of King He would be.

The Jews who longed for Messiah to come expected someone to come powerful, strong, victorious, and defeat their enemies. They expected a King on a war horse, bearing the sword, bringing Rome to her knees. But instead Jesus came asking them to love their enemies and pray for their persecutors. He exalted those who were lowly and overlooked—and even those who were hated. As we just rehearsed throughout the Christmas season, He came in a humble way, in a quiet way, setting aside His power to become a servant.

Jesus wasn’t interested in political power then. I don’t think He’s much interested in political power now. But Peter, bless him, didn’t understand this. And so he drew his sword, as if Jesus needed defending. Jesus chastised him and told him to put his sword away, and then he healed the man who had come along to take him to what would become a brutal end.

“My kingdom is not of this world,” Jesus would tell Pilate in the hours to come. “If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews” (John 18:36). Jesus’ Kingdom and power were not the type the Jews expected nor the form Pilate could recognize. It was not a kingdom of strongmen or brash shows of strength. It was not a power held by destroying or dehumanizing his enemies or by the size of an army. It was—and is—a kingdom where the lowly and weak are called blessed. It was a kingdom of peace and of service.

But this is not the sort of kingdom the Jews were looking for—and based on the events of yesterday, it’s not the sort of kingdom some who claim the name of Jesus want today. This leads me to the second episode I’ve been reflecting on—and I have the Bible Project to thank for that, as I heard them discussing it recently in a very unrelated podcast episode.

When Pilate found no cause to kill Jesus, he offered the Jews a choice for prisoner release: Jesus or Barabbas. Barabbas, which literally means “son of the father,” was an insurrectionist. According to the Gospel accounts, he had committed multiple crimes including robbery, insurrection, and murder. He was a freedom fighter, one dedicated (we can presume) to freeing Israel from her foreign oppressors. He fought in the way the Jews longed for the Messiah to fight—with the sword, with violence, to gain power. And on that day, when God’s people were offered a choice between these two “sons of the father,” they chose not the Son who spoke peace but the one who bore the sword. The true Son of the Father, who offered the way into the Kingdom of God, was sent to His death.

So, we come back to the current events at hand. If the mob yesterday had been faced with the same choice, which “son of the father” would they have chosen? In spite of their signs, there is no doubt in my mind. Though many of them, I am sure, would profess to be Christians, as would some who, though not present, cheered them on from afar, they show by their actions that they would rather follow the way of Barabbas, and not the Jesus they claim to follow. They want political power and expediency—at all costs. They think violence will bring about peace. And they do it in the name of God.

Thus we come face to face with the ugly, natural end of our failure in discipleship. This failure extends beyond the events of yesterday and the people who participated in them. We have sold ourselves out to the violence committed yesterday with a thousand tiny steps and silences, quietly supporting or ignoring the ideology that has allowed it to blossom. It has appeared time and time again throughout the history of the church, when we have lost sight of the suspicion Jesus teaches his followers to have towards earthly power.*

The church has failed these men and women, who see no incongruence with erecting a cross and a noose on the same lawn. She has failed her people when they pledge allegiance to a political party or a human leader above the Savior they claim to follow. We have failed when Christians cheer for a man who dehumanizes his enemies, who mocks those made in God’s image, who refuses to bend from arrogance, who incites violence, and who has the blasphemous audacity to suggest God needs his protection. We have failed in our discipleship when people do not have the ability to discern truth from lies or conspiracy theories from reality, no matter how many voices join in telling the same tale. We have failed when disciples of Jesus lose sight of a Kingdom that is infinitely larger and more precious than any nation or people group.

The answer for this will not come in trading one political party over another. It will not be remedied with a new administration or even with the prosecution of wrongdoers. The answer comes by taking a long look at our blind spots and graciously listening to our brothers and sisters who are trying to point them out. (For example, the white evangelical church in America can learn a lot from the Black church and the church in the Majority World. I have benefited greatly from diversifying the voices I listen to and developing friendships with people from different traditions and perspectives than my own.) It comes as we lament and repent over the ways we have played a part in this discipleship failure. And it comes as we humbly ask Jesus to show us the way of His Kingdom.

Today, many of us are grieving, and it feels appropriate to do so. But then we need to get back up—because we’ve got a lot of work to do.

*This is a longer conversation for another time, but as a student of church history, it becomes clear that increased earthly power and “influence” in culture is dangerous to the faithful witness of the church. This does not mean that Christians must alway forgo traditional power and influence, but it does mean they should always be held extremely suspect. We would do well to be aware of the dangers they have posed in the past and of the negative things that have resulted. The church is not the empire, and we would do well to remember this.

Politics and Discipleship: Practices to Engage Christianly with This Cultural Moment

I dislike politics. I always have. Some people, I know, love debating and studying policy, have minds that are fascinated by implications of precedent or economics, and find great delight in watching CSPAN. I am not one of them. There are topics I will talk about and engage with opposing views on long into the night. But politics is not one of them.

But even with those feelings—I have been wrestling for the last several years with something that, sadly, has become increasingly political: how we engage the world, our culture, and our government as Christians. And this is where the political world collides with one of those things I do deeply care about, think about, and talk about: discipleship.

In the Bible, we are given an all-inclusive, whole-of-life picture of discipleship. Jesus does not want a segment of your heart, mind, soul, and life. He wants to be Lord of all of it. So, we must continually revisit and prayerfully examine what faithful, discipleship-oriented engagement with our world looks like. We need to make sure we are thinking Christianly above, beyond, and before we think as a member of a particular political party. To do this, I believe we need to continually develop a Jesus-vision of the world and seek to adopt ever-more-clearly the biblical imagination for the Kingdom of God.

A quick note here. We’d have to dive a bit deeper to explore the various views Christians have and have had about the relationship between Christianity and culture, but we’ll save that for another time. To be brief, I would just say that it’s important to note that there is a diversity of views on this question based on time, place, and theological tradition, so I urge humility and careful consideration. Don’t assume your understanding is the only Christian view.

I do not want to discuss specific policies or candidates in this place or time. If you’re ever in my neck of the woods, I’d be happy to sit down and chat with you sometime. But I would like to provide what I think are some helpful practices to make sure we’re thinking Christianly first and foremost as we engage in this current social and political moment.

• Read your Bible. If you care about how God thinks about these issues, you need to read his Word. Spend time in the Gospels, carefully reading what Jesus taught and how He modeled the Kingdom of God. Spend time with other New Testament writers, carefully studying how they understood and applied these teachings of Jesus in their context. Another great place to study is the prophets—we get a strong picture of the character of God and the things He cares about.

As you read, do not cherry pick. Do not look for “proof texts” to back up what you already think. This is not a responsible or respectful way to read the Bible. Try to come to the Scripture humbly, praying for God to teach you, and spend time deeply and systematically studying the Bible. The Bible wasn’t written in the context of the 21st century, but it is still applicable to our time and place. Focus first on understanding the character of God, the picture of the Kingdom, etc., and then use those truths and principles and that biblical imagination of the world to consider how they apply to today.

• Do your study and thinking in community. There is incredible value in studying the Bible on your own—please do this. But this cannot be done in isolation, and it should not be done in an echo chamber. We do ourselves a grave disservice if we only read and listen to voices much like our own. Pay attention to who you are listening to. Do they come from your tradition, do they share all of your views, do they have a similar life experience? Similarity is not bad. But only listening to or building relationships with people like us allows us to lose sight of the bigger picture, makes us even blinder to our blindspots, and, frankly, undermines the beautiful diversity we find within God’s Kingdom.

  As you think through the biblical picture for how Christians are to engage with the world, make sure you take time to read, study, and think with people who are in some way unlike yourself. Read and listen to writers, theologians, and pastors who are from a different time, place, culture, socio-economic status, race, gender, political party, or theological tradition than you. You don’t have to agree with everything they say. But engage with them humbly and honestly. I guarantee they will have something to teach you, some way to expand your understanding of God, and some way to challenge a blindspot you didn’t know existed.

• Pay attention to what you consume. Here, again, we need to talk about echo chambers. There is great strength in hearing from a diversity of voices. It provides a broader view of an issue, helps you truly understand someone else’s opinion, and (again) helps you to avoid your own blindspots. Read, listen to, and watch media sources that come from a different perspective than you typically hold.
  
  Pay attention to your sources—is this source reputable, what sort of authority or expertise do these people bring to this issue, is this source peer-reviewed, what sort of evidence or logic is being presented, how do they engage with alternate opinions?
  
  Also, pay attention to the effects of what you consume. Does this person or media source encourage me to think critically, engage with others, and approach other views with calmness or kindness? Do do they stoke up anger and fear? Does this help to cultivate the fruit of the spirit in my life? Does this challenge my thinking or add to my perspective on the world, or does it encourage me to dig my heels deeper into my own particular corner? Does this help as I seek to love God and love my neighbor?

• Build relationships with and have conversations with people in real life. Social media can be a valuable tool. But I have yet to be convinced it is the best medium for having difficult, honest, humble, constructive conversations with people of different views. (If you have seen this work out positively, please, I’d love to hear your story.) Instead, I typically see lots of snark and sarcasm, unfair representations of opposing viewpoints, and words much more harsh and cruel than most would ever speak face-to-face.
  
  Learn to have these conversations in person. Learn to listen carefully. Learn to treat and speak of those who see the world differently than you with kindness and charity. Try to genuinely understand where someone is coming from, and learn to represent their perspective well, even if you don’t agree with it. Build real relationships with people who think differently than you, and learn from them.

• Practice and develop good, empathetic critical thinking skills. Critical thinking is something I increasingly see as a skill that needs to be developed. It takes practice. With this in mind, it could be worth practicing with an issue or disagreement that is simpler and less emotionally charged, to get this approach into your mental muscle memory.
  
  I’m sure there are people who have done much more work with this than I have, so at the risk of oversimplifying things, here are a few good starting points. Take time and care to understand the various viewpoints on an issue, to the extent that you could articulate a view different from your own in a way someone who holds that view would consider accurate and fair. Understand why that person holds the belief they do—most people have reasonable or at least understandable justifications of their opinions.
  
  Only once you have a clear understanding of the view at hand, consider it from your own perspective. How does it align with your beliefs and the way you see the world? Is there anything (even if small) you can agree with or empathize with? Then consider what you disagree with—and why? Learn to articulate this using a clear-headed explanation and explain why you disagree based on your worldview.
  
  Too often we approach diverging views fueled by emotions or more eager to make our “opponent” appear evil or less intelligent. This is not helpful critical thinking, and I do not believe it embodies Christian character. We don’t need to live in fear of different opinions, as if hearing someone out will corrupt us. And we do ourselves no good to respond to different opinions with defensiveness or personal attacks.
  
  Approaching complex issues in the way I’ve described will help you to see the complex facets of an issue, practice empathy even if you don’t agree with someone, and will help you to better understand and articulate your own opinions. It also gives you a continual opportunity to reexamine and rearticulate your understanding of how to approach various issues as a faithful disciple of Jesus.

Friends, hear me. I know that this is hard, and I know this process can make us uncomfortable. I’m on this journey with you, trying day by day to faithfully reflect and follow Jesus. We are living in a divisive world. And, in America, the fray will only become more vicious as we enter another political cycle. Be prepared. Be self-reflective. Be prayerful. My deepest desire for all of us who claim the name of Christ is that we could represent our Lord Jesus well before a watching world.

What Kind of Disciples Are We Making?

My elbows were propped on the dark wood of their table as I listened. They were friends we didn’t see often, and there was much to catch up on. I settled back in my chair, and the rungs nestled into my back. My full belly and the thick warmth of the summer evening were soothing after a busy week.

They were sharing about the challenge of finding a new church. The perplexity was familiar. The questions from those who didn’t understand why they were leaving. The sudden lack of community, lack of friends, the starting from scratch. The uncertainty of how to decide—the criteria of how to make a good decision.

I asked, “Why did you decide to leave your old church?”

This question serves up such a variety of responses.

They looked at each other, their chins tilting as if to say, “Do you want to take this one?” Finally one of them spoke up. “We saw the type of Christian that church was making, and it wasn’t the sort of disciple we wanted to become.”

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When we become Christians, we respond to Jesus’ invitation to “come follow Me.” Follow me into your work and your play. Follow me into your relationships, your dreams, your financial decisions. Let me transform the way you see the world and other people, the way you see yourself.

Obviously, there is a personal component to our discipleship. We spend time reading the Bible, in prayer, and engaged in other spiritual disciplines. We seek the guidance and molding of the Holy Spirit, to weed out our sin and to allow Christlikeness and obedience to flourish.

But discipleship is also inherently communal. Our Christian life is as a part of a Body, in which all the parts work together and encourage or discourage our health. This is obviously true in our friendships. I think we’ve all seen how the people close to us shape our thinking, words, and attitudes. We see this in our family life. Hopefully we get to experience this in a discipling relationship, in which a mentor invites us to follow them following Jesus and shapes our growth with their hard-bought wisdom.

The church community as a whole fosters our discipleship. We are taught about the highest good and the ideal picture of the Christian life. We learn about how we should engage the culture and the vast world outside of the church walls. We are taught about right belief and right practice—and perhaps taught which of those beliefs and practices are more important than the others. We are given a model for faithful living.

Ideally, this discipleship is occurring explicitly (more on that another time), but discipleship is happening in the church, whether we intentionally engage in it or not. These lessons are communicated implicitly in what we celebrate and teach, what we model and how we teach people to think. The question is not whether it’s happening, but rather what sort of disciples we are making.

Are we making disciples whose lives are marked by the fruit of the Spirit (Gal. 5)? Do we see people who are compassionate and kind, humble, slow to anger, quick with self-sacrificing love? Are we teaching them to idolize marriage and children, to think their work is only meaningful if it’s explicitly “spiritual”? What are we teaching about pain or how to support others when it strikes? Are we cultivating a love for God’s Word, a desire to obey it, and equipping people with tools to study and apply it themselves? Are we making disciples who are grace-obsessed and grace-dependent, or ones who still think they have something to prove in order to earn God’s favor?

The litmus test could be long. Ultimately, though, we must ask: are we making disciples that look like and abide by our particular brand of Christianity? Or are we making disciples that love Jesus, submit to His Lordship, and look like Him?

Everyday Disciple: The Unsung Stories

It is rare for the churches I’ve attended to invite others to the front to share. It’s typically reserved for progress reports of church ministries and events, visiting ministry partners, and people leaving to go on missions trips. 

She fell into that last category. They called her forward one Sunday, gave her time to share, prayed over and commissioned her. She was nervous but passionate, her pale cheeks flushing as she shared her desire to serve God and be willing to take risks for Him. 

I had once been her—a graduating senior, about to embark on an international ministry adventure. Freshly out of school for the first time since age five. Leaving behind the security of family, friends, culture, schedule. It was exhilarating and terrifying—like plunging from a cliff. 

She was praised by the pastor. I remember him saying, “I want to thank you and commend you for taking this step of faith. You could have done anything with this next year, but you’ve decided to entrust it to the Lord. You’re going to the true frontline of mission.”

I thought of the other students, clustered throughout the sanctuary, those entering traditional, not explicitly Christian jobs, those who would never be called to the front. What was being communicated to them as they watched their classmate at the front of the sanctuary?

The girl with the long flowing hair and quick smile, about to enter a grueling MFA program.

The boy with the auburn beard and flannel carefully tucked into belted jeans, who had already secured an engineering job.

The girl with the cropped dark hair and thick framed glasses, working the late night shift at the hospital. 

Were they not on mission’s frontline? Were they not faithfully entrusting their lives to God? Was their decision to enter the workforce a lesser calling? 

Even if church leaders would balk at such a suggestion, it’s sadly what gets implicitly (or explicitly) communicated by how we talk and what we celebrate. 

Sometimes obedience and faith lead us to seminary or to a foreign nation. Sometimes obedience and faith lead us to cultivating a small business or working a traditional nine to five. There is no divide between them—they are simply different callings, with their own joys, challenges, and temptations. 

Both invite us into the thrilling adventure of watching and participating in God’s work in the world. Both uniquely position us to live faithfully as disciples of Christ. Both are on the frontline of mission.

I can see them now—face after face of Christians I know who work “normal” jobs each day, who faithfully go about their work, as disciples of Christ. Their stories go unheard, uncelebrated. They do not scatter out into their workplaces with the sense that the Church is commissioning and supporting them in their work. 

But we can begin to change that through the stories we tell. We can pause to celebrate stories of everyday faithfulness. These everyday saints in our midst have stories to tell. They are stories of how God is working in our ordinary lives, of how He uses our work to shape us as His disciples. They are stories of how He enters our simple human existence and touches it with His glory. These stories are all around us, if only we take the time to listen.

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If you would like to be a part of the Everyday Disciple project, I would love to hear your story. Contact me for more information.