Recently as I cleaned my house, a million times I thought that I wished something was different. I need to replace those blinds. This closet needs to be reorganized. This carpet has a bump in it. I wish I was better at decorating.
Then I'd catch myself and feel guilty for obsessing over such external things. I'd think of my Christian brothers and sisters in India who would look at my house and be amazed. I have to admit to myself that I really don't know how to live in an affluent country and keep my focus pure.
As I sat and talked to Jesus about this, He helped me see that at the bottom of all my worrying is a simple question: Am I enough?
This is a common problem for American Christians, I believe. The problem is that almost universally we answer that question incorrectly. We decide our effectiveness, success, happiness by comparing ourselves to our neighbors. This is exceedingly dangerous and an effective strategy of the enemy. When we do this, we are rendered completely impotent. We no longer look to our Creator and Lord for direction and clarity, but we look around and develop our values according to what we see around us.
I am just as guilty as the rest. Recently in a conversation with my husband, I admitted how I have been challenged by the book I am reading called Revolution in World Missions. In it, he talks about the huge need to support native missionaries in reaching their own people. These missionaries, on fire for God, are risking great peril and suffering greatly in order to reach the world's most unreached people groups. Many times they cannot adequately provide for their families as a result.
I know such families. In India, we have partnered with George and other pastors who work full time jobs and have families but also take in homeless children, support tribal pastors off of their small salaries, travel frequently to train and support these pastors, and many more things. Time and time again, I have been humbled by their unwavering focus. And I'm convicted.
As American Christians, we live in a totally different world. One that encourages us to not be too extreme and definitely don't make our lives uncomfortable for the Gospel. And I admitted to my husband that I could easily make most physical sacrifices (send money to these native missionaries, have less clothes, spend less on entertainment) if everyone else around me was also. You see it's hard to be the one who is doing without especially when you see everyone around you having fun, going on trips, and having their kids do all these extracurricular activities. When I see these things, I feel like I'm missing out. I want to try harder to have have this kind of life. And slowly I find myself aligning my goals and purposes, not with the vision God has given me, but with the vision the American church has embraced so readily--comfort.
I am telling you the absolute truth when I say that I am seriously struggling with this. And I doubt I'm the only one.
Recently, we've been studying the minor prophets in our Sunday school class. Sometimes this message can be a bit repetitive, and I have been tempted to just gloss over the lesson and assume I already know what it's going to say. This morning as I studied Zephaniah and looked over my notes from Nahum, I saw something that I have been missing.
Over and over God was warning the people of Judah that a day of judgment was coming. He warned, threatened, and pleaded with them to see that their empty religious activities were offensive to Him. They denied God's involvement in the world: "...and I will punish the men who are stagnant in spirit, who say in their hearts, the Lord will not do good or evil!" (Zephaniah 1:12). They took advantage of their neighbors; they worshiped false gods. They didn't really think God cared about what they were doing. They thought they could get away with living the way they wanted with no consequences.
God does all he could to warn them of this dangerous thinking. He says over and over in the Bible that what you do matters. God sees. We will reap what we sow.
Yesterday at the Vero Beach Prayer Breakfast, I was told that Phil Robertson issued a warning to the American church--I wasn't there so I can only summarize what I heard from others--saying that Isis (and many other serious problems) wasn't our main threat. The true danger lies within us and our inability to recognize the spiritual implications.
Judah eventually received the judgment that God warned them was coming. The judgment came in the form of the Babylonian invasion. Jerusalem was destroyed. The nobility and a large portion of the population were exiled and made little more than slaves. God used an outside force to bring the judgment that He said would come, but the power to stop Babylon was always there. Humility. Repentance. Passion.
I believe this same message applies to us as a church. It applies to me.
"Seek the Lord, all you humble of the earth who have carried out His ordinances; seek righteousness, seek humility. Perhaps you will be hidden in the day of the Lord's anger." (Zephaniah 2:3)
To what are we looking to define our purpose and our ambitions?
I cannot tell anyone what to do in this regards, but I say from with absolute sincerity that I fear that my selfish life will reap what I don't want to reap. I have to actively work against my natural tendency to hoard and to protect. I instead want to know that the life I've lived here on earth was done with the purpose of getting to know Christ better and of making Him known to others.
For each of us, living this life will look differently (God loves diversity), but our passion and focus will be the same. When the church unites under the common vision of reaching the world for Christ, the world will finally understand what unity means. It doesn't mean that we all always agree with each other! It means that we are willing to lay aside our personal preferences in order to work together towards a common goal! This is how marriage represents this beautiful image. You can't get more different creatures than a man and a woman. On top of that, you have different personalities, different ways of processing information, different ways of relaxing, and the list goes on. And yet it is possible for these two completely different people to work together for the common goal of making a home. It means at times that one or the other will have to give up something that they want and sometimes something that they need. But the final image is something that shines brighter than any light in our world. Something our world yearns for.
True love.
Zephaniah spends the first two chapters of the book warning of what is to come. Pleading with the people to see the danger. But it ends with some of the most beautiful passages of Scripture I've ever read. A reminder of God's heart towards us, of His steadfast love.
"The Lord your God in your midst, the Mighty One, will save; He will rejoice over you with gladness, He will quiet you with His love, He will rejoice over you with singing." Zephaniah 3:17
