When Each Part Is Working Properly

When Each Part Is Working Properly.  Formally or informally, the end of August functions as New Year’s Eve for the church, with Labor Day being the unofficial holiday. Happy (early) New Year! The metaphorical ball is going to drop in a few days, not in Times Square, but at the local church. New Year’s at church is a time for remembering our vision (where we are going), being and becoming spiritual mature by knowing Christ deeply, loving God and others authentically, and serving the world purposefully, and reemphasizing our mission (how we will get there), disciples making disciples. What is our spiritual health assessment and next step?

Having spent time at the macro-level in 2024/25 (Ephesians & Hosea), the preaching ministry at Grace will cycle back to the micro-level during the upcoming church year (1 & 2 Timothy, tentatively). We will carefully consider our individual spiritual disciplines, spiritual gifts, and spiritual callings in 2025/26. Every Christian has a salvation testimony, a song in the night, a spiritual gift, and a meaningful ministry largely echoing Paul’s final words to faithful Timothy, ”As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry” (2 Tim. 4:5). All four of those actions are commands: be, endure, do, and fulfill!

The church’s overall health assumes and enhances the individual’s spiritual growth. Its inverse is also true: the individual’s spiritual growth assumes and enhances the church’s overall health. Therefore, whether at the church or in the disciple, the common denominator is spiritual maturity. Our maturity affects the maturity of others; the maturity of others affects our maturity. “Speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love” (Eph. 4:15-16). God designed the church for synergetic spiritual health/growth. When each part is working properly, then each church is able to build itself up in love.

To Obey Is Better Than Sacrifice

To Obey Is Better Than Sacrifice.  You might have used this line today thinking it was a Bible verse, “Ask forgiveness, not permission.” I know that I quoted this maxim for years before attempting to find it in the Bible. It’s not there. (By the way, neither is, “Cleanliness is next to godliness.”)

Experts who track the origins of quotations suggest that the first one to speak or write these words publicly might have been Rear Admiral Grace Hopper of the US Navy. But the saying likely predated her, too. Hopper’s full quote clearly rested in the context of operational expediency inside a large bureaucracy: “Do the right thing within the organization, whether they know it or not. That way you can help the people who work for you.” My paraphrase: don’t wait for specific approval from the organization to benefit the people in the organization.

“Ask forgiveness, not permission,” is sadly applied outside Hopper’s intent to renegades who justify their unconventional behavior that runs roughshod over people and boundaries to achieve personal agendas. Perhaps you can hear an echo of, “Ask forgiveness, not permission,” in another of our extra-biblical maxims, “You can’t make omelets without breaking eggs.” Such a rebellious spirit, however, the Bible condemns directly in at least five places, and indirectly in probably fifteen more.

The first direct condemnation of rebellion disguised as piety formed its enduring biblical principle. King Saul had directly disobeyed God’s command, yet he attempted to deflect his guilt by blaming the people and pretending a religious motive for his disobedience. “And Saul said to Samuel, ‘I have obeyed the voice of the Lord. I have gone on the mission on which the Lord sent me. I have brought Agag the king of Amalek, and I have devoted the Amalekites to destruction. But the people took of the spoil, sheep and oxen, the best of the things devoted to destruction, to sacrifice to the Lord your God in Gilgal’” (1 Sam. 15:20-21). Saul was implying that he had improved God’s command by editing it, but God was not fooled. “And Samuel said, ‘Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to listen than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of divination, and presumption is as iniquity and idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, he has also rejected you from being king’” (1 Sam. 15:22-23).

Harkening back to Saul’s disobedience, this principle is repeated four more times in similar situations: Psalm 51:16, Hosea 6:6, Matthew 9:13, and Mark 12:7. But, it is categorically better to align with God’s word than to course-correct. God wants the heart, not the sacrifices.

Fully Trained

Fully Trained.  For some like military personnel, researchers, athletes, nurses, and educators training for the job can feel like the lion’s share of their jobs. Readiness is a journey not a destination. Disciples of Jesus are similarly always learning. A diagnostic question that provides some definite edges to the indefiniteness of continual training is this: how does a disciple know when he or she has been successful at training? In other words, what are the marks of spiritual maturity, or when is a disciple ready to transition into making disciples of others? Jesus gives a concrete answer to the abstract concept of spiritual maturity. “A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone when he is fully trained will be like his teacher” (Luke 6:40). 

In this way, a disciple is different from a trade apprentice. An apprentice could learn all there is about plumbing and soldering, etc., and become fully trained without any character resemblance with the teacher, but a disciple is fully trained only when he or she resembles the character of the Teacher. It is spiritual training of the heart. Truly, it is when Jesus is represented and reflected in the disciple’s life, decisions, and values (effectively skipping over the human disciple-maker to the Lord himself) that a disciple is ready to make disciples of others. And the beat goes on!

An overarching study of the near-synonym maturity (teleios) comes in handy at this point for setting some specifics about when a disciple is fully trained (katartizo). The verse list for spiritual maturity (teleios) divides into three noticeable categories: maturity of thought, maturity in relationships, and maturity as a skill-set (e.g., orthodoxy, orthopathy, and orthopraxy). True, the training never ends for a disciple, but a spiritually mature disciple is ready to make disciples of others when he or she KNOWS Christ deeply (Bible literacy, gospel fluency, and theological competency), LOVES God and others authentically (worship, identity, and interpersonal balance), and SERVES the world purposefully (spiritual disciplines, spiritual gifts, and spiritual calling).

 

Knowing Christ deeply corresponds nicely with the Great Confession, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God” (Matt. 16:16). Loving God and others derives from the Great Commandment, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and with all your mind … and you shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Matt. 22:37, 39). Serving the world purposefully follows the trajectory of the Great Commission, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matt. 28:19-20).

I Lift Up My Eyes

I Lift Up My Eyes.  As we age it is funny, or perhaps absurd, how we have two tracks for memories. We can remember most lyrics from many songs of our adolescence but not why we walked into the kitchen. A mental block applies to the kings of ancient Israel and Judah, for instance, but not to the character list in Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy. Even the proper spelling of certain common words evades our immediate recall, such as the word trilogy.

Maybe that is why wordsmiths, such as J. R. R. Tolkien, frequently coined new words, because they couldn’t quite remember the conventional word to finish a sentence. Without researching it, I’m fairly confident that unlooked-for was not an entry in the dictionary when Tolkien needed a word meaning: a surprising arrival of assistance when hope was flagging and help was doubtful. But since Tolkien wrote his masterpiece, his often-repeated word unlooked-for has entered the portal of proper English. “Twice blessed is help unlooked-for.”

But the psalmist speaks of divine help that is definitely blessed because it is deliberately looked-for! “I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth” (Psa. 121:1-2). The strident determination to set a faithful gaze “to the hills” marks the pilgrim. Yet it is not precisely the hills themselves that provide the necessary help, though that was a contemporary belief in ancient Israel. It is the Lord who often arrives via the mountain to help his people. Such is the stare into redemptive history that forms a present relief and a future hope. The Lord has been faithful to help, so he is faithful still, although his path leaves no artefact or footprint. The Lord’s help is sought after.

The Lord’s help is also reasonable, consistent to his character. The faithful have every indication that personalized help is on the way. “He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep” (Psa. 121:3-4). The hearts of men may fail, but the Lord is fully attentive of the unsteady pathway that we must walk through the mountains. He is fully able to save, day or night.

Finally, the Lord’s help is effective, willing, and eternal. “The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade on your right hand. The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life. The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore” (Psa. 121:5-8). God’s help is looked-for, sought after, and trusted. Every time we find his help reinforces our confidence in his help.