PURE

This white rose bush is my favorite among the dozen-plus roses growing by our driveway. It's named “Mount Hood” for Oregon's snow-capped inactive volcano. But when my husband chose that variety for our rose garden, he remembered a dark night on Mount Hood several years earlier, when an impaired driver crossed the center line and crashed into us. Our car was destroyed, we had injuries...but we lived.

After that traumatic event, I struggled with bad feelings toward the man who hit us and tried to elude responsibility with lies and denials. Yet I knew God's way was not to nurture enmity against this man. Jesus taught, “Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God” (Matt. 5:8). Even in far-lesser offenses, it's so easy to let bitterness and pride taint the heart. I love this old ditty by an unknown author: To dwell above with the saints we love, Oh, that will be glory!/But to dwell below with the saints we know, well, that's another story!

On our own, without other people to bug us and badger us, we might do quite well. But “purity of heart” isn't a matter of isolation or always having our own way. In Psalm 73, Asaph (one of King David's temple musicians) struggled with trusting God when he saw nonbelievers enjoying prosperity, fame, and good health. Such people even declared faith in God as unnecessary for them: “How can God know? Does the Most High have knowledge?' (73:11).

WHY TRY?

This bothered Asaph, who complained, “In vain have I kept my heart pure, in vain have I washed my hands in innocence” (v. 13). If purity didn't really matter, why try? His attitude adjustment about the rewards of faith came as he returned to worship. He admitted he was looking at other people and not at a holy God.

When my heart was grieved and my spirit embittered,

I was senseless and arrogant; I was a brute beast before you.

Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand.

You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me to glory. (vv.21-24)

I've long appreciated Asaph's psalm. He pulls no punches: life doesn't always favor the godly with bouquets of roses, riches, popularity, health, yada yada. But God never changes. In a song that Asaph's king, David, wrote: “To the faithful you show yourself faithful, to the blameless you show yourself blameless” (2 Samuel 22:26).

My “Mount Hood” roses bloom for a season, then go to a winter's death. How different for humans who trust God: Asaph put it this way in beautiful words I memorized and often recall:

Whom have I in heaven but you? And being with you, I desire nothing on earth. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart, and my portion forever. (Psalm 73:25-26).

So yes, blessed are the pure in heart. And even if, in all honesty, we struggle to feel our hearts are pure enough, God has the “pruning” solution: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).

Oh my, did my rose care lead to a sermon? I confess so. But I'm grateful that even in the ordinary tasks of life, God has a message for me. Maybe for you, too.

Think tank: "just"

One of the most symmetrical of cultivated flowers, the iris seemed
 to me to best represent the balancing scales of justice.

Part of a series on Philippians 4:8.
“Lady Justice” is among classical statues greeting visitors to the Supreme Court building in Washington D.C. She is blindfolded (for blind justice), and holds balanced scales (for fair judgment of good and evil) and a sword (for punishment for evil). She symbolizes the hope of law: that decisions will be balanced and fair, and that wrongdoing will be punished. In other words, that there will be justice.  When Paul wrote to urge believers to think about things that are “just” (Philippians 4:8),  he used a Greek word meaning “righteous toward God and man,” “right by divine or human standards,” and “not dualistic.”

So how do we “think on” things that are “just”?  My first thought is to dwell on God, whose justice is linked with undeserved mercy:

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive our sins and purify us from all righteousness. (1 John 1:9)
What a verse for someone who thinks he or she has “sinned too much”!  One evening I got a phone call from a distraught young woman who had been in our home Bible study group. I rushed to her apartment and found her emotionally out of control after her boyfriend talked her into having sex with him.  Gone was her dream of saving herself for her groom on her wedding night. She was ready to confess and accept God’s forgiveness, but didn’t think she deserved it. Then I shared with her Psalm 103:12, which says God removes that confessed sin as far away as the east is from the west. East and west never end; they just keep encircling the earth. Because she feared God might punish her for this sin for as long as she lived, she found this a freeing hope. She broke up with that man, moved away, grew in her faith, and eventually married a Christian man.

 God is just!  He is also our Justifier through the death of Jesus for our sins. That bedrock of faith, long ignored,  gripped the heart of Martin Luther who helped return the church to Biblical truth in a movement that became known as The Reformation.  Luther’s rally cry--“The just shall live by his faith”—came right out of scripture:  Habakkuk 2:4, Romans 1:17, Galatians 3:11, and Hebrews 10:38. That truth exposed the lies of working for or paying for salvation, which the church had added on to fatten the clerical purse.

A just God is also one who opposes that which is not just. An extreme illustration of that is believed to be at the bottom of the Dead Sea. In the time of the Abraham, a terribly wicked and sexually immoral city, Sodom, existed in that area. God wanted to obliterate it. Enter Abraham, who asked God to spare Sodom for the sake of his nephew Lot and family, who lived there. Appealing to God’s mercy, Abraham said, “Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?” (Genesis 18:25). Finally, God agreed spare Sodom if ten righteous people lived there. Not even ten righteous were found, so God in His blazing holiness extracted justice and punishment in a cataclysmic event. Only Lot and his two daughters survived as they fled; Lot’s wife perished as she looked back in a momentary yearning for the old life. A just God will not wink at sin.  He will “do right” and judge it.

Meditating on “just” is a reminder that God’s holy standards never change. At the end of time, He will fully judge good and evil in absolute fairness.  As I watch the world’s moral decline, the prospect of holy justice gives me hope…and a reason to keep telling about Jesus.

Next: “pure”

Spout and moan

A continuing series inspired by sights in Kauai.
Volcanoes were the contractors for the Hawaiian chain, all now dormant except for those on the “big island” of Hawaii, Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea. Those of Kauai’s volcanic history include Mount Waialeale (elevation 5,080 feet), one of the world’s rainiest spots with an annual precipitation of 460 inches. The beaches continue to witness to the island’s volcanic origins, and one tourist spot is “Spouting Horn” on the southeast shore. Surf channels through a natural lava tube, releasing a spout of water with a big hiss and moan. Depending on tides, the “blow” can go as high as fifty feet.
 

Watching it reminded me of the Bible’s do’s and do-not’s regarding “overflows.” Like the “Spouting Horn” we have blow-holes that originate in our hearts. In two Gospels (Matthew 12:34-37 and Luke 6:45) Jesus observed that we speak and “do” out of the overflow of our hearts. Good people speak and do good things, evil people, evil things. On judgment day it will be rehearsed.  We’re doomed—apart from the blood of Christ covering our confessed sin (1 John 1:9).

But there are hopeful, even joyful, teachings about “overflows”:

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. (Romans 15:13)

We know that the one who raised the Lord Jesus from the dead will also raise us with Jesus and present us with you in his presence.  All this is for your benefit, so that the grace that is reaching more and more people may cause thanksgiving to overflow to the glory of God. (2 Corinthians 4:14-15)

May the Lord make your love increase and overflow for each other and for everyone else, just as ours does for you. (1 Thessalonians 2:12)

 Hope, thanksgiving, and love—they won’t come “moaning out” like “Spouting Horn”!

Name-dropping

Part of a series based on photos taken in Kaua'i

We have a family friend named “Sylvester,” so when we spotted a St. Sylvester’s Church on the northeast shore of Kaua’i, I made sure I took a picture to show him.  The name “Sylvester” means “from the wood,” and it identified four popes of early Catholic church history. They held the posts long ago: in 314-335, 999-1003, two months in 1045, and 1105-111. One was connected with a healing that church leaders deemed miraculous, so later gained “St.” in front of his name.

 

The Bible gives a different criteria for the word “saint.” In writing up “creeds” (statements of Christian belief), early church leaders spoke of the “communion of saints,” referring to any set apart for their belief in Christ. Old Testament writers used three similar Hebrew words for “saints,” all suggesting “set-apart-ness.” They included:

Chasid (19x): kind, pious, as in Psalm 31:23: “O Love the LORD, all ye his saints.”
Qadosh (11x), qaddish (6x), and qodesh (1x): set apart, separate, holy, as in “Fear the LORD, ye his saints” (Psalm 34:9).

The New Testament’s Greek word for “saint,” hagios, is used sixty-two times and frequently means “set apart, separate, holy.”  The apostle Paul addressed his letters to “the saints” of such-and-such location.

One “saints” passage I find especially meaningful comes from Paul’s prayer for the Colossians. It concludes: …giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the kingdom of light. (Colossians 1:12).  We’re not outsiders having to work our ways into God’s favor or into some “respect” list. Out of His generous love, He has conferred the title and responsibility of “saint,” set-apart one.

We bear the name of a God who wants us to bear His image to the world, imperfect as we are. There’s a story sometimes told about Alexander the Great—whether it’s true or not, scholars aren’t sure—that underscores behaving to honor the one you represent. As one version goes, a young, errant soldier (in various versions he’s AWOL, sleeping on duty, or has stolen a horse) was brought to Alexander for discipline. Something softened the great commander’s heart until he asked the lad his name. “Alexander, sir,” the young man said. The great conqueror’s demeanor hardened and he shouted, “Change your name or charge your conduct!” 

Interestingly, “saint” is an anagram of “stain.” Like the soldier, we may stain our testimony with failures. But First John 1:9 gives hope in failure: “If we confess our sins, He is faithful to forgive our sins, and to cleanse us from all iniquity.”

Cast Away

One of the most important pieces of furniture in our kitchen is “Igor.”  Thanks to four hefty batteries, he obediently yawns open whenever we wave his direction with things to throw away. Yes, we have allowed ourselves the charming luxury of a magic-eye trash can, whom we affectionately named for its “eager-ness” (Igor-ness) to open and shut.  He replaced a trusty old plastic trash can that after several decades had terminal hinge fatigue despite attempts to extend its life with duct tape. 

At times I could wish for a spiritual “Igor,” who’d yawn open and swallow all the banana peels and coffee grounds of my spiritual life.  (Yes, I know I should be “green” and composting, but that’s another subject.) My human-condition (read that: sin nature) means I’ve had to deal with a lot of garbage, some of my own, some slopped into my life by others.  I’m talking about stinky attitudes, messy situations, the foulness of anxiety and worry, the sludge of grudges.

I’m often drawn back to The Lists in Galatians 5.  Galatia was no Mayberry which barely kept Andy Griffith and his comic deputy occupied. The list in verses 19-21 make you think “Vegas,” except what happened in Galatia-Vegas didn’t stay there. It stunk enough to bring out Paul’s censure—everything from immorality to fouled relationships and out-of-control behavior. 

Open, Igor.  Here comes the trash life.

I’m grateful Paul didn’t stop at these negatives.  He goes on to name God-pleasing traits that come from a life under Christ’s control: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Nothing trashy here.

“Since we live by the spirit,” Paul said, “let us keep in step with the Spirit.” It’s not a passive thing where God sprinkles “God-goodness” all over me as I waltz through the tulips. Instead, He’s at work conforming me to His image. Making me Christ-like.  Getting rid of the trash-life.  Nudging me to review the Owner’s Manual (the Bible).

Open wide, Igor.  I  have some sin confessions to cast your way.  Yeah, that stinky attitude...that wormy worry....that occasion of putrid pride....   How grateful I am that He clamps down the lid: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).