Tag: faith

Posted in Adoption Journey, Different Scriptures

Child Sacrifice

Posted on by Wick

“Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, whom you love—Isaac—and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on a mountain I will show you.” – Genesis 22:2

This was in our family reading yesterday.  As I was reading it out loud for my kids to hear, I wondered what sort of thoughts might go through their mind.  A daddy was asked by God to sacrifice his son?  And he DID it?  Well, not completely, but still.  He tied up his son, whom he loved, and offered him to God as a sacrifice?

I quickly connected it to something easier to swallow.  I asked the kids, “What is something you love a whole lot, that God might ask you to let go of in order to follow Him?”  I wondered what might be going through their minds, as they tried to imagine God asking something large in their life to be sacrificed in order to be a part of what God wanted to accomplish.

I remember reading this passage in college.  Studying it with my theology friends.  Talking about Kierkegaard’s thoughts over coffee, and feeling like we grasped just how audacious these passages of scripture were.  Then life took me out of the coffee shop and into the mini-van.  It’s so hard to understand Abraham’s response in this passage.  It’d be easier if we had a chapter, or at least several verses after verse 2 here.  A conversation, or at least open complaint to God from Abraham, of how unjust and difficult it was for him to swallow what God was asking him to do.  Instead, the very next verse is about Abraham getting up , saddling his donkey, and telling his son “Let’s go”.kids on the bus

As I was reading the story this week, a thought struck me.  Even though I’m not tying my kids up, laying them on an altar, and raising a knife above them….I am still offering my children to God as a sacrifice.  As is any family that takes steps in faith toward a path God is calling them to.  We spend time in prayer, as parents.  We ask God to be with us. We ask God to bless us. We ask God to bless our family, and our home.  We ask for Him to bless our children as they grow.  But even more than “blessing”, we ask God to use our family for the purposes of His Kingdom.  That has nothing to do with how successful our kids might be someday, or what college/career they head toward.

Although that’s definitely a tempting approach to praying for our children.  In the popular TV show, “Once Upon a Time”, Snow White and her Beau save their infant from a cursed Kingdom by shoving the baby wrapped in swaddling clothes through a magic portal.  This assures their child will escape the current cursed situation, and have a decent chance at a normal and successful life.  Every parent faces this temptation.  To shield our children from anything God might ask from us in this broken world, and prepare them for “someday” when they’ll be launched into life, ready and strengthened by years of protected existence.

Instead, God calls us to lift our children, and our family/home up onto the stone altar.  To faithfully respond to whatever He’s calling us toward, even knowing it will impact them.  It may cause suffering.  It may mean large amounts of sacrifice.  It might mean that after years of praying for God to help us with our adoption, our 8 year old will interrupt prayer time to say, “Dad, why doesn’t God just…you know….DO something?”

In those moments, I feel a little like Abraham carrying his son up the mountain.  His son looks at everything they’re carrying, and in a confused moment he asks his father, “..but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?” (v.7)  Abraham responds that God will provide.  In this similar moment, my daughter needs me to speak with faith into her life as well.  It’s hard for me to do, just as I imagine it would’ve (should’ve) been for Abraham.  Yet I look into her eyes and say the words, “God will provide.”

He will.  He has.  He is.  Our family is being formed in a crucible of prayer that will and already is, influencing the direction of their lives.  These little hearts who are called on every day to think about God’s heart for a broken world that needs healing.  These young people who are reminded that just like God wants to use our family – God wants to use them for the sake of the world, also.

But just being honest here?  I’m scanning those bushes like crazy, even as I’m tying up my children…

Posted in Adoption Journey, Different Thoughts, Uncategorized

Insanity of God…

Posted on by Wick

“I held tight to the psalmist David’s conviction that the weeping and tears might linger for the night, but that joy would come in the morning.  Sadly, after six years in Somalia, each morning brought only more tears.  For perhaps the first time in my life, I was dealing with something that I could not fix. Prayer and obedience and hard work and good training and Godly intentions and sacrifice – none of it seemed to make a difference.” – Nik Ripken, The Insanity of Godinsanityofgod

We are being reminded lately, that when you connect your life with the broken heart of God, it’s often heart-breaking.  It’s not a great sales pitch, and it’s not a great advertisement to convince a world that doesn’t know Jesus that we’ve made a good decision.  It’s not even a great testimony to convince other Christians we are, indeed, following God’s call on our life.  Heck, it’s not even a great assurance to ourselves as we lay our heads on pillows each night…wondering where God is.

The truth is, God’s people are suffering globally.  They are suffering in horrible and unjust ways. They are sold into slavery, trampled underfoot in the name of progress, cast aside for more important things.  They are thrown in prisons, beheaded, shot at, and sometimes – even made fun of in high school cafeterias.  Does this mean God has turned a blind eye to their needs?  Is God deaf to the cries of the suffering followers of Christ?  Why doesn’t He do something?  Lord of all creation, quiet in places that severely need His Words of healing and life.

I imagine the scene between Elijah and Ba’al, only this time it’s our God who is scoffed at, “Shout louder….Surely he is a god! Perhaps he is deep in thought, or busy, or traveling.  Maybe he is sleeping and must be awakened.” 1 Kings 18:27

These are some of the same thoughts we have, now over 2 years into an adoption process.  2 years, and still we feel very close to where we began.  Those who know about adoption in the DRC might be quick to say something like, “What’d you expect?”  Certainly when we began the process, we knew not much about our path was certain.  But we stepped out on faith that we were responding in a way that revealed the heart of God.  Even though at times, if feels we’ve nothing to show for it….I still believe these years have been growing fruit for the Kingdom.  Not that I’d choose the same road, if I could go back in time.

Nik Ripken found himself in a similar spot, after years of suffering in Somalia.  Crying out to God, and returning to the US to see what needed to change, he set out on a new mission: to find out what good God was in places of intense suffering.  What he discovered is enough to fill many books, and encourage the heart of any broken follower.  God, and the belief in God is accomplishing great amounts of light in the midst of a darkened world.  Stories that don’t make sense, but reveal the heart and life of a God I’d give my life and the life of my family to serve.

“..before we can grasp the full meaning of the Resurrection, we first have to witness or experience crucifixion.  If we spend our lives so afraid of suffering, so averse to sacrifice, that we avoid even the risk of persecution or crucifixion, then we might never discover the true wonder, joy and power of a resurrection faith.  Ironically, avoiding suffering could be the very thing that prevents us from partnering deeply with the Risen Jesus.” – Nik Ripken

There appear to be forks in the road, very near, as we continue responding to God’s call on our family to reveal His love to a broken world.  We’re not yet sure what it will look like, but we know what it will feel like.  Heart-breaking.  As much as we have many confirmations, that we’re right in the midst of where the heart of God is…..it’s still hard.  Even as I can smile at my family, knowing we’re laying foundations for a home God can, and is using to change the world….I hold them before God, continuing to believe that He’s able to do what He has not yet done here…bring redemption to this story.

Posted in Uncategorized

re-tweeted theology.

Posted on by Wick

2 Timothy 4:3 “For the time is coming when people will not put up with sound doctrine, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own desires.”tweet

I’m sure most of what I say here could be found on some witty list of “Things Christians should stop saying.”  I’ve seen links to those posts all over the place, but haven’t really read them.  So just in case any of you have a similar experience, I really wanted to share a few things today.  I could probably post another one entitled “Gospel Quartet Music Theology“, but I won’t go there for now.  The point is, I think so many of us settle for a thin, re-tweeted, “click share”d, un-inspected theology these days.   We hear a rallying cry (or meme) of someone we have liked in the past, and assume whatever it says should be taken to heart, and passed along.

To write/say something against them can easily be dis-regarded as the common “cynicism” of young adults today.  That’s why I almost didn’t say anything.   But just in case it helps someone to rethink something they’ve heard and grow in their relationship with God…here goes nothing.

1. “Don’t pray for a lighter load, pray for a stronger back!” – It sounds good.  Certainly there are many of us, especially in the US, who need to stop complaining about small inconveniences as if we’re really suffering.  But this phrase was posted publicly on a church sign, in a city where many broken and suffering people drive by.  For a church to basically say to anyone driving by, “Suck it up!” , doesn’t seem like the love of Christ we find in Matthew 11:28, “Come to me all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.”  So go ahead…pray for a lighter load.  Jesus knows the load you’re already carrying, and offers to hold it for you.

2. “Judge not, lest you be judged” – It was written to a friend who’s trying to clean up his life, and asked people to be more thoughtful about what they post on his wall.  Obviously he was killing a vibe, and the friends who noticed didn’t like it.  I’m reminded here of Matthew 10:34, “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.”  Beginning to follow Christ means you’ll probably have people who don’t want to change, who are unwilling to be close to you as you change.  That’s okay.   Show them love, and keep doors of relationship open.  But don’t fall to the “God’s Word says not to judge” routine.  Because actually, the Bible says quite a bit about holding each other accountable.  Yes, in Matthew 7 and Luke 6, Jesus does talk to his followers and tell them not to judge.  He’s pointing out that we cannot have the same expectations of people who don’t know God, as we do for those who do.  It’s also a reminder that we don’t “think of ourselves as above” others, because we are all sinners.  God alone does the judging of worth (we’ve all been declared valuable enough to receive his mercy), and eternity.  But there are so many scriptures about the transformation Jesus wants to bring to our lives, the Love of God that changes our mind and behaviors, and the sin we are called to both be set free from, and proclaim the freedom for others from. )(1 Corinthians 5:12-13, John 7:24, 1 Timothy 4:2, 1 Corinthians 6:2-3)   So go ahead…live a transformed life, and proclaim the freedom from sin God has made available to others…in love.

3. “God will not give you more than you can handle.” – This one’s hard to confess, because I’d love so much for it to be true.  Unfortunately, it’s a false teaching.  One that should be easy for us to realize, as God’s own son was given a death sentence on the cross.  Not to mention it makes it sound like these horrible things are given “by” God, instead of simply allowed as the freedom to sin spreads brokenness throughout our world.  Thousands upon thousands have died for Christ over the years, and it wasn’t because they really wanted to die.  It was because they were willing to follow Christ, even when it WAS more than they could handle.  There is a scripture, 1 Corinthians 10:13, that tells us God will not allow us to be TEMPTED beyond what we can bear.  But that’s a different topic.  Jesus told his followers, “See, I am sending you out like sheep into the midst of wolves…” (Matt. 10:16)  Not like superheroes, and not like people who can handle any burden easily because of the supernatural abilities given us by the Holy Spirit.  So if the tears are falling lately, as you’re suffering under what seems to be an unbearable burden, take heart.  It doesn’t mean you’re not a good Christian if you feel like things are horrible right now.  It means you live in a broken world where sin and evil are being revealed as the horrible things they are.  There IS hope, and Christ has proclaimed that justice is coming; that redemption is on it’s way; that all the current sufferings are not worth comparing to the glory that will be revealed in us (Romans 8:18).  But don’t feel pressure to pretend everything is okay…it’s not.  So go ahead, lean on your brothers and sisters…allow yourself to be held by Christ as you suffer…and be there for those who are suffering.  We need Christ to come fully…and until then He is coming to the world even now, through you.

There are quite a few more on this list….but there are plenty of places already calling ’em out.  These are just a few that’ve been on my heart this week. 🙂