Day 163: God's Control

When Jesus heard that, He said, "This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, that the Son of God may be glorified through it."  John 11:4

Here's a message that we need to hear in every struggle in our lives.

One thing about illness is that it always brings about the prospect of death.  As soon as we hear about any ailment, be it cancer or a boil, we start to think about death and what it means to us.  We might start to think about what will happen to our family and friends when we depart.  We might think about our own faith, is there life after death?  Does death hurt?  Now, John is not explicit about the illness that Lazarus had, but it definitely was something that assured his family and friends that his death was eminent.  As a way to reassure Martha and Mary, Jesus tells them the above quote.

For me, death is a rude idea because it means that everything comes to an end, whether things are finished or not.  Taking this into consideration, I can think about how to apply Jesus' reassurance to other aspects of my life.  As I grow up, I see that things start to settle into routines.  I have observed different people among my family and friends who have jobs that they stick with for so long, doing the same things every day.  I find people doing the exact same exercises, never gaining or losing weight.  I see people playing instruments but never seeming to get better or worse.  I find many people looking at things that must have been their dreams at first and finding those same great feats to become mundane and even annoying or boring.

Anytime that I read through the Gospels, I quickly realize that Jesus was not one for stagnant routines.  Jesus calls us to take up our things and continue to work preaching the Gospel.  Jesus demonstrated this by being on the move, never settling in one place, and working constantly.  In the same way, we have to be prepared to continue on with our lives, learning new things, going into new environments to preach the Gospel.  The reassurance we need for these situations is that Jesus is going to be glorified in everything that we do, so long as we believe.

Taking on a new job or learning something new, or going through a new struggle is something that we will face, and it will be frightening.  However, when we know that God is in control, we will succeed, for God will be glorified through our courage.

Day 159: Who Sinned?

And His disciples asked Him, saying, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?"  Jesus answered, "Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but that the works of God should be revealed in him."  John 9:2-3

 Jesus has told us the same things in many different ways, yet we still fail to accept the message.

This above passage talks about judging.  We are called not to judge.  We should accept this as the end of the story, but we always want more.  At least, the actions that I observe both around me and even in me show that we all want more.  We want a better explanation on how not to judge.  We want things to be made plain and simple enough.  Or so we say.

In this event, Jesus adds an important detail: our judging prevents us from seeing the works of God.  When we judge, we start to place ourselves on a pedestal constructed of pride.  In fact, we attempt to build a throne that equals God's with our own pride.  However, we end up being the blind people whenever we do so.

Whenever we decide to judge, we put our minds and our whole bodies' resources into judging rather than helping and loving.  The disciples, rather than trying to heal the blind or help him at the very least, decide to judge, forgetting everything else that they had been taught.  In the same way, we abandon everything good, everything loving, when we focus our attention on judging.  Rather than going out and helping others, we end up hurting both ourselves and those in need.  Whenever we don't show love to those in need, we divide the Kingdom of God and destroy it.  That's not what we are called to do.

We are called to unite.  We are called to love.  We are called to be God's Kingdom on earth.

Day 156: Putting down the Stones

So when they continued asking Him, He raised Himself up and said to them, "He who is without sin among you, let him throw a stone at her first."  John 8:7

I always find this story to be one of the most intense in the bible.

I'm sure there are many LGBT people who have heard this same accusation placed on them, that "the sin for this punishment is death by stoning."  The idea of stoning to death is so heavy for me as a gay man, and it's something that I fear every day I live.  I fear that my expression of who I am is threatening my very existence here in the United States.  We can talk all about those other countries, the ones where they speak differently, believe differently, and look differently and how they have so much intolerance, but I find much of that hatred to be mainstream here in a country I'm sometimes reluctant to call home.  On top of there being this sort of animosity from the outside, I also feel uncomfortable (although not as much as to fear for my life) among people that I would love to call family: gay brothers and sisters, transgendered, non-binaries, people who don't fit in with the rest of the mainstream culture.  Yes, as a Christian, I have felt much animosity, such as the questions, "Why do you associate with them?" or, "Why do you pray to their God?"  or, "Isn't that just contradictory?"

I feel pelted, at the very least, by pieces of gravel on a constant basis.  Sure, I'm not being killed nor tortured physically, and I pray that I never will be.  Yet, I find the contradictions to be the same from two (supposedly opposing) sides: love is all, unless you're different.

If we look to the beginnings of Christianity, we find ourselves a man who was radical and odd.  He opposed the teachings of the day, challenging the highest teachers.  In fact, he would end up teaching them, and many would even be foolish enough (seemingly, at least) to follow after him.  He claimed to know more than all the teachers from before - a man who doesn't even seem to have left us a written book.  Yet, his message was the same: love one another.  Jesus teaches us every day that we need to love one another as he loves us.  He teaches us that we need to be there for all those in need, not just the ones who look and act as you do.  He teaches us that we need to build up a community with love at the center.

As I have been getting more familiar and involved with the LGBT community, I have learned a few mantras that keep the community together, and the biggest one is: love.  Yet, on the inside, I feel that many of those in the community have forgotten the first days of our revolution, the riots at Stonewall Inn.  Trans women cried for all of us to love one another without judgment.  But, today, gay Christians cannot be trusted nor respected.  The color of your skin determines where you belong, whether top or bottom, masculine or feminine, skinny or fat, young or old.  I find that our own community is hurling stones towards one another rather than making the world a better, more welcoming place.

This change, of course, doesn't happen instantaneously.  In the story above, the people leave gradually, not all at once.  I wonder how long the departure must have taken.  How awkward was the situation?  Where was the pile of stones?  We may never know, but we do know that love prevailed in the end.  Loving unconditionally requires each one of us to reexamine our lives, figuring out what things we have learned and/or taught ourselves are harmful to our community.  It's only whenever we get rid of all those prejudices that we actually start to build up a meaningful community.  When we focus our lives on love and not on judgment we start to forge strong relationships with one another, for those are manifestations of our love that we have.

Day 139: Accepting Change

"He who rejects instruction hates himself, but he who gives heed to reproofs loves his soul."  Proverbs 15:37

This comparison cannot be any more extreme than this: hate and love.

Why is this necessary?  Well, if we think about this, it applies to so many different aspects of our lives.  In a general sense, we need to be willing to learn from everything, especially our own mistakes.  We can go forth in our lives doing things the same way we've always done them, but if that is harmful, we only bring ourselves further and further into damage.  When we accept change in our lives, we can turn away from anything that harms us and become better people.

In a spiritual sense, this is important because it is our whole life we are talking about.  Jesus speaks to us every single day.  It's only when we accept the change that Jesus calls for us to do that we will be able to become better people.  Accepting that change will involve not just a confession by word, but also a change in how we live our lives.  We need to live out that change.

In school, I was taught that doing drugs was bad for the body.  It's bad because each use will continue to damage the body, and if done enough times (the amount depending on the individual) it would lead to an addiction, which was very difficult to turn back from.  We learned to point our judging fingers towards those who used drugs.  That's an extreme case, but it still explains this proverb to me, because it's very easy to look at other people and see how they're damaging their lives with their own habits.  We can see when our friends are in destructive relationships, dead end jobs, or making bad decisions for their health.  We say to ourselves, "they must truly hate themselves."  This proverb, though, calls us to point that finger back at ourselves.  We need to investigate all that we do.  Are we willing to accept change?  It's easy for us to point out that necessity in others, and since we already can, can we do that to ourselves?  Can we truly live out that change?

The only way we can love our soul is by accepting and living the change that Jesus calls us to do.  It will involve a commitment, but we have already made that commitment in our baptism that we remember every time another member is added to our great family of baptized people.  We have to remember that we are in this world, constantly resisting the devil, fighting the good fight.  We need to stop hating ourselves and, instead, start bettering ourselves.

Day 138: Leading with Love

"The ways of righteous people are acceptable before the Lord, and through them even enemies become friends."  Proverbs 15:32

This proverb is inspiring to me, and the first thing that comes to mind is: lead by example.

We are to lead by example because that's the way to establish a way or a path.  Paths are formed by lots of effort.  It can be over the span of ages, with the feet, hooves, and paws of many trodding on the same path, or it can be made with the effort of one or more workers making the path.  The important thing to remember, though, is that all our examples should be things that will bring others towards God.

Indeed, the proverb says, "through them even enemies become friends," which means that there is a clear path that leads to righteousness.  And, in Godly terms, we understand that our notion of righteousness involves transforming our lives to bring us closer to becoming manifestations of the unconditional love that God has for all of us.  This means that we need to put aside all our prejudices along our journey of purification.  It's not enough just to confess with our mouths and words.  We need to live our faith.

Leading by example will involve lots of effort on our part, especially because we have to know where we ourselves are going.  We can figure this out with our prayer and our bible reading.  We will find out that God is always calling upon us to love our neighbors.  And, when we truly adopt this principle of love, we will start to bring others into our community purely by our example of love.  Leading by example doesn't just mean to teach others about our ways.  Leading by example means that we will lead ourselves forward with this example.  It'll be a process, but it will be rewarding for us and for all those around us.

Day 116: Faithful Servants

"Salt is good; but if the salt has lost its flavor, how shall it be seasoned?  It is neither fit for the land nor for the dunghill, but men throw it out.  He who has ears to hear, let him hear!"  Luke 14:34-35

I feel that because I have heard the salt metaphor thrown around in church for so long I have started to forget the message.

Jesus says this after talking about what it takes in order to follow him.  We need to be prepared to give our whole lives over for him.  And that's where the idea of this odd kind of salt comes in.  I don't think I've ever heard of salt losing its saltiness, but if it loses it, it has absolutely no purpose.  It's not a pretty stone to look at, especially in the way we have it granulated these days.  It's just there.

Jesus, then, is calling us to remember our calling in life.  We have to remember what our purpose is, which is to serve.  We need to build communities for God.  We have to spread the Gospel, the love.  However, that means that we have to be ready to take on the mission.  We can't let anything drag us one way or another.  I find that we are filled with fear so many times that we start to make up excuses for not going forward with our calling in life.  We start to fear the lack of money in order to join a ministry.  We fear the loss of friends after devoting our lives to God.  We fear losing all of our material possessions after following God.  But that's where we can become this saltless salt.

If we are truly the body of Christ, we need to be the strong bones, the pliable skin, the healthy organs, the plentiful tissue.  We can't be just half of that, for if we do that, we instead become something more like an abnormal growth, a tumor, or even a cancer to the body.  Instead, we have to look around us and figure out how to build up our community and how to bring others to Jesus.  It's one thing to know every word in the bible, but it's a completely different thing to put it all into practice.

In order for us to live as good salt and as good servants, we need to be preparing ourselves constantly.  It's not just about saying that we accept Jesus as our savior, nor is it only about having a degree in theological studies; it's about living our faith.  When we live our faith, everything we do will become a lesson for those around us to learn, and a lesson for us to grow from.  We have the example, Jesus.  Now is the time for us to follow his lead. 

Day 109: Godly Teaching

"And a servant of the Lord must not quarrel but be gentle to all, able to teach, patient."  2 Timothy 2:24

Here's something that gets ignored way too often.

As followers of Jesus, we are called to be teachers of the Gospel.  However, that teaching comes with certain responsibilities - patience and gentleness are just two.  What we might forget with these responsibilities is that we need to have them in order to teach.

Jesus was a very patient teacher and a very gentle one as well.  He allowed for people to come up to him with questions that were set up as traps.  He was willing to teach people from all walks of life.  He was patient with many of his students, even when it seemed that they were never going to learn.

Why is that so important?  How about the notion that God is love.  God loves us so much that God will be patient with us in our learning.  God teaches, corrects, and helps us all the time, and all of these things are done out of a pure love for all of us.  A teacher of the Lord has to be someone who is willing to show what the Lord has done for her to all of her students.  She has to live the Gospel that she teaches.  Jesus did that, and we must follow.

Jesus accomplished a great deal of teaching because he did not push away students.  He achieved this through his welcoming teaching.  He calls people to come to him.  He calls all of us to listen to every word he says.  If we do the same, perhaps we can maintain a full classroom.  If we teach the way that Jesus has taught us, then we will walk with our students closer to God.

Day 107: God's Gift

"If a son asks for bread from any father among you, will he give him a stone?  Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent instead of a fish?  Or if he asks for an egg, will he offer him a scorpion?  If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!"  Luke 11:11-13

This is one of my favorite passages from the bible because it explains the grace of God so well.

We know how to carry out transactions so well that it just becomes second nature to us.  Yet, that by itself is a display of courtesy towards our neighbors.  We are prone to give whatever anybody requests.  Now, that doesn't go without acknowledging that there can be an entirely different context surrounding these occasions.  We can give things over with an attitude.  We could even give things that are of poor quality.  But in general, we will give when we are asked.

Imagine being in a classroom and somebody asks for a pencil.  Unless it's during an important test or competition, there is always someone there to give over a pencil, even if it's short, chewed up, and without an eraser.  These are the kinds of things Jesus is referring us to.

Paul has taken many opportunities throughout his letters to explain what the Holy Spirit is.  It's kind of like a gift basket for us, with everything being useful (unlike a basket with a few things we could just do away with).  The Holy Spirit is something that guides us in our living.  It's a mode of communication from the Holy Trinity to us.  It's also something that drives us to pursue godly things in our lives.

So, if we can ask our friends and (occasionally) our enemies for things and receive what we'd asked for, how much better would be the things that come straight from God?  God, who is all loving, all caring, all forgiving, has shown us a gift.  We are receiving a gift that comes out of all things that are good in the universe.  The Holy Spirit is good.  God's gift is perfect.

Day 105: Spiritual Discipline

"But reject profane and old wives' fables, and exercise yourself toward godliness.  For bodily exercise profits a little, but godliness is profitable for all things, having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come."  1 Timothy 4:7-8

Here's an excellent metaphor for spirituality.

The two verses seem to make up two important components for spiritual discipline: self-control and practice.  If we take a step backwards to follow the physical metaphor, these two components are diet and exercise.

Dieting is a very interesting field.  I must say that in our modern times, a healthy diet is quite hard to come by.  On the one hand, everything that is being advertised is quite unhealthy, from soda and fast food ads on TV to having all of the processed snacks in eyesight at the supermarkets.  On the other hand, many diets that claim to have health benefits have absolutely no scientific backing or approval.  In fact, even studies in support of fad diets tend to be debunked and/or retracted.  Therefore, dieting consists of resisting the temptations of advertisements and the temptations of fast results.  The only solution is to go to your personal doctor and/or nutritionist to find out what is best for you.  In the same way, spiritual self-control involves quite a bit of resisting of temptations - both of things that will only harm our minds, bodies, and souls and of doctrines that claim to be able to be a quick fix to our problems.  Yet, we have our authority more easily and readily available to us than a doctor (with the long waits and exorbitant costs).  God is just a prayer away, and the word is only a book a way (or even an app!).  We have all that we need, but we need to put these things into practice.

Exercise is quite straightforward.  Do this, and that will happen.  Do cardio, and you will lose weight.  Practice strength training, and you will get stronger.  The best thing about exercise is that you can see the results.  Looking at your physical appearance, you can see when you lose some weight or gain some muscle.  When you are performing everyday tasks (such as walking up stairs or even walking around for certain periods of time) or even when meeting with a personal trainer, it becomes very clear whether you have been doing your exercise or not.  There is no lying.  The same goes for our spirituality.  If we don't put it to practice, it will be quite obvious.  If all we are doing is asking questions and not researching or praying or reading, then we will be left with the blubber of ignorance.  If we don't put the teachings of Christ into practice, we will forget them.  Words are nice, but if they take no root, they are merely noise or scribbles.

Just as a nutritionist or a doctor wants us to get healthier, the same goes for Jesus.  Jesus wants to see us become the best that we can be.  Through his teachings, Jesus shows us how to get into shape.  Until we put them to practice, they will mean nothing to us.

Day 102: Edifying Evangelism

"As I urged you when I went into Macedonia —remain in Ephesus that you may charge some that they teach no other doctrine, nor give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which cause disputes rather than godly edification which is in faith." 1 Timothy 1:3-4

This is a good admonishment that we don't hear enough.

We need to bring our evangelism back to the basics: the proclamation of the Gospel.  There are times when we allow for different things to get in the way of proclaiming the Gospel.  Jesus gave us some very good examples of how to proclaim, especially with the use of parables (and even explaining some of them to us in simple terms).  But we can also become obsessed with different things.

One thing that I think of is how we might become obsessed with that one Bible verse and try to figure out how we can make that Bible verse our own.  The truth of the matter is that we want to start making the entire evangelization to be something that glorifies ourselves rather than God.  When we show that we have so much knowledge about a certain matter, we can start to distance ourselves from those we are trying to reach.

Instead, we should remember that evangelism involves godly edification.  Rather than argue with others about minutia, we should be edifying one another, especially those who are new to Christ.  Jesus spent his entire ministry building up his disciples, and he is also edifying us each time we communicate with him through our prayers, worship, and reading.  Therefore, we must continue this tradition to our own students.  We must continue to build them up rather than tear them down.

Day 086: Willingness

Then Peter opened his mouth and said: "In truth I perceive that God shows no partiality.  But in every nation whoever fears Him and works righteousness is accepted by Him."  Acts 10:34-35

Hallelujah! Christ is risen today!

We are called to proclaim this miracle loud and clear to everyone who will hear it.  We must follow Peter's example, which is to proclaim the Gospel from our own witness of Jesus.  We all have witnessed Jesus, and it's time for us to proclaim him.  For Jesus has broken down all the barriers to our faith.  Jesus has come down from heaven to preach to us, gone down into the depths in order to liberate the souls of the deceased, and has broken the barriers of language through his teaching.

Jesus has commanded us to go out and proclaim the Good News.  And why not?  Time and time again I get the question, "How can you remain so calm?"  My only answer that wells up from my heart is that Jesus is taking care of me.  Jesus is the one who has guided me through my life so that I can become a better person.  I am by no means perfect, but I pray every day that my life might become one that will bring me closer to all of those people around me.

God has spoken to each one of us.  It is now up to us whether to receive the Good News.  God has used each one of us as loud speakers so that others can witness God.  Jesus is teaching us every day through the scriptures and through our communities.  We all have been called to the communion table with Jesus.  We all have the great opportunity to live a life with Jesus.  All we need to do is accept him.  Accepting Jesus is not just a one time thing, though.  So many children go to school every day, but not all of them learn.  They have heard what they need to hear, but it is always up to them whether to apply what they learn.  They have to practice what they learn in order to maintain their newly learned skills.  In the same way, Jesus is constantly teaching us, so that we might be able to have willing spirits and willing bodies.

Use the Easter season to proclaim the Good News in every way possible.  Live out your prayers.

Day 028: Steadfast Beliefs

"Instruction guards righteous ways of life, but instruction incapable of criticism goes astray." Proverbs 10:18

This proverb suggests a narrative that seems to be making its rounds in this political season.  In a debate or a press conference, someone poses a question to a politician, and that politician, in turn, dodges the question entirely.

Another example is when gay men (or women as well, I'm sure) who keep their homosexuality to themselves, finding partners here and there for one night stands on mobile apps or websites, blatantly reject their being not straight.  They can be politicians who vote against all pro-LGBT measures but still maintain their app accounts.  They can be activists who openly condemn the LGBT community but still have their man of the night.

We are scared by our own beliefs, but we don't want to be challenged either, for that would require us to humble ourselves from being masters, sages, or teachers to becoming students, apprentices, or babies.  But, as Christians, we have a great example of what we are supposed to do.

Jesus was not at all afraid of his message or his mission.  He talked to all the chief priests, church leaders, and scribes about all things religion.  He talked before multitudes about all the things that are supposed to be happening.  He explained everything to his disciples, correcting them when they went astray.  He took all of these teachings straight to the cross - death - the ultimate criticism.  But, he rose, and his teachings are still relevant to this day.

This proverb calls us to listen, to learn, to investigate.  When we don't listen, we find that we are alone in our thoughts, hating the world around us for not understanding.  When we don't learn, we can take our own thoughts and bring them into some radical conclusions - some of which can be very destructive to ourselves and to our world around us.  When we don't investigate, we don't understand why we even believe what we do in the first place.

We need to take all this into account, so that in the face of criticism, we can remain resilient.  We need to listen to God, to learn from God, to investigate God.  God is willing to teach us.  Are we willing to learn?