Eclipse and "Wicked" Men: Anne Shirley Had It Right

There are no spoilers here...FYI. I'm keeping this general and safe. It would be wrong to the code of Twilight to ruin your experience in the theater AT ALL:)

I've always loved, understood and been pleasantly haunted by a line in Anne of Green Gables. Marilla asks Anne as they are walking through the pasture "would you want to marry a wicked man?" and Anne replies in her clever, potently witty way "No, but I'd like it if he COULD be wicked, and wouldn't".

And THAT ladies and gents is why women love Edward Cullen. I realized it this morning waking up out of my "got in at 3am" stooper after the six hour Cullen viewing last night. Not only is he a being that by nature, is supposed to be "wicked", he also has the strength to carry that out if he wanted to. Still, on a character level, Edward is fully capable to give into not only his Vampire instincts but his passions for Bella as well. He really COULD be wicked in every way and on every level, and on EVERY level he restrains himself and won't because of his love for virtue and for Bella (as well as Bella's virtue).

This phase of the story, in Eclipse I mean, there is more revealing about this part of Edward and frankly I loved it and I loved that Hollywood showed it. It's frankly not a popular view in entertainment today at all. Part of the reason Anne enjoys that thought in her head of a man who COULD be wicked but wouldn't is because the level of resisting all you COULD do reveals the level of character and in some cases, love you have for others. It's the revelation of the level of self-sacrifice and unselfishness. Isn't that what all women want, a man who could completely give into his instincts but doesn't for the deeper character quality of virtue? It's a strength we identify as stronger than his physical capabilities.

Ironically Anne Shirley is an Edwardian character, as is Edward (thus probably, his name choice). I can't help but think that Anne would have had something for him had they ever met:) Still, I love Gilbert so my brain won't let me imagine too far into that one.

I realized too that I do have an Edward type husband. Not only is he handsome, he is so self-sacrificing. Yes, he has his struggles but his heart is pure gold to do what is best by me and my kids. He strives well for virtue and faithful love for me. Sometimes I feel like the undeserving Bella wondering why this man loves me so much. I guess that's normal. Oddly, my husband could not be mean if he wanted to so there is no correlation there, but on the level of character and selflessness, he is totally my Edward. And as I came home at 3am and snuggled next to him I wished he was awake enough for me to tell him that. I just listened to the fan and his breathing, and wished I'd not drank so much Diet Pepsi at the theater, thinking how blessed I am to have him. Unfortunately, when he took off for work early this morning the shoe was on the other foot and I have some vague dreamlike memory of him hovering over me and saying goodbye followed by some affirmative groan out of myself.

In conclusion, I loved the movie for many reasons. They followed the book well, they put in some great humor, and they are building the story to my satisfaction. Twilight is famous for is cheesiness (high levels in the first movie...my friend and I literally laugh out loud when Edward runs up the mountain side with his "spider monkey" and it seriously looks like his legs and dangling in mid air) and there are one or two in this one too but they are getting few and far between by now (whew!). I felt especially on the topic of virtue, virginity and marriage, with our culture today they could have really fuzzed over Edward's convictions on those points but instead they make it obvious. I'm still thrilled by that.

The fact too is that any man is capable of selfishness and "wickedness" and though the norm of today may be a myriad of those who just give into every whim of that, I like that we are reminded of the truly sexy man who reigns it all in for (in reality) God (referred more to as "virtue" and "the soul" in general in the story) and the woman and children he loves.

So, go smooch your wicked warrior today. I know I will ;)

"If God Is Good" Session 2: Accept The Diagnosis

Thank you ladies who got together with me last night to discuss Session 1+2 of the book. It was a great discussion. I'm so excited that you are reading and getting lots out of it. Thank you Tammy also for following along with us. It seems that everyone is being blessed and challenged by this book and that really excites me! I love seeing women enjoy their theological mental workouts.:)
On a side note I'd like to say something about my series of this on my blog. I know many of you come by blogs for some fun daily tid-bits and these posts are long, deep and challenging. Perhaps you've changed 15 diapers today and just put three little ones to nap only to come here and think "are you kidding me!?" This series is not going to be a mindless escape at all and for you who are looking for that, I'm sorry! I do hope to pepper in some family stuff to share soon but with the business of school ending, and the importance of the material of this book, I'm afraid this is all I've had time for right now. I'm glad it's break now and I should have time to share more on both levels. I hope.
Regarding Session 2, I'd also like to mention that I'll be kind of skipping the most interesting chapter "Evil's Entry Into The Universe" because it correlates with a blog I've been wanting to do on humility, and whether the sin originates with pride or unbelief. It's a very important post to me and It's not ready yet. It will be a wonderful rabbit trail off this reading but that chapter is an excellent spring board for it. So, look for that soon.
Section 2 Reflections: Accept The Diagnosis
So, another big disagreement I've had with God is definitely covered in this section. I don't like the fact that men are born into a sin nature they did not ask for. Having to come to grips with that in my relationship with God is not easy but it does not mean I stubbornly don't come to grips with it! It's another thing on the road to understanding evil where I have an emotional response but because of my love for my God, and my desire for His glory (which he has chosen to include this scenario) I want to bend my knee not just in submission but in total worship for this being for those purposes.
"Too many people, Christians included, view the Christian faith in bits and pieces. We should see it as a holistic worldview, a large-scale belief system based on the unfolding of redemptive history." (Alcorn)
Here are the biggies for me from this section:

• "What's right in our eyes is not synonymous with what's right". God decides what defines good and evil. How I feel about something being good or evil may be expressed but it does nothing to change the truth He has authored. "We can choose to do either good or evil, but we have no vote in establishing whether something is good or evil. Unfortunately, when evaluating the problem of evil and suffering, many Christians retreat into a man-centered worldview. Once they do this, subsequent discussion becomes almost pointless. If we accept the argument that the highest value of the universe is short-term human happiness in the form of immediate fulfillment of desires, then we cannot defend the Christian worldview, because we ourselves have departed from it. (later on...:) Since evil offends God's nature, the true test of good and evil is how God sees it. Simply serving our desired ends does not make something good; neither does causing our unhappiness make something evil."


• The more aware of sin I am the better...especially my own. "If you have not learned about sin, you cannot understand yourself, or your fellow-men, or the world you live in, or the Christian faith. And you will not be able to make head or tail of the Bible. For the Bible is an exposition of God's answer to the problem of human sin and unless you have that problem clearly before you, you will keep missing the point of what it says." (J.I. Packer) This speaks to us today in the cultural, Christian "movements" of our time. We don't want to talk about sin and human evil, we want to talk about how God loves us. But the true bright light of how God loves us is not seen fully unless the darkness of our sin is first understood to make love's brilliance known and astounding to us. "This I believe to be a fact: and I notice that the holier a man is, the more fully he is aware of that fact" (C.S Lewis regarding the topic of the horror of our own sin)


• My sin is an offence to GOD FIRST, and THEN to those I also offend by it. "We tend to minimize our sin because we fail to see it's real object. When we hurt those we love, we become aware of our sin. Their pain reflects our evil back to us like a mirror. But because we do not see God and see how our sin hurts him, we don't see either the frequency or the gravity of our offenses. We imagine our sin has no effect on him. 'Against you, you only, have I sinned' I think David is correcting in himself the tendency we all have- to limit our sorrow to the hurt we've inflicted on human beings. And when we fail to see that we have sinned against God above all- the One who has maximum worthiness- then no matter how bad we feel about what we've done to others, we will inevitably minimize our sin. Repentance without recognizing our offense against God is not repentance." These thoughts can really guide our parenting as well. What great elements to instill in our children. The problem is, we have to get it through our thick skulls first before we can pass it on, am I right?


• I AM THE BAD GUY. Randy points out that our own evil nature is the catalyst for our sin, not the sources outside us. We are the perpetrators. Not only so, but he points out that apart from Christ, we are equal with the greatest of evil men. "We'll never appreciate Christ's grace so long as we hold on to the proud illusion that we're better than we are. We flatter ourselves when we look at evil acts and say 'I would never do that'. Given our evil natures and a similar background, resources, and opportunities, we would.' (Alcorn) Seeing this awful truth should not and does not have the purpose of self bashing and pointless depression. It's purpose is more realistic recognition of the beauty of what Christ has done for us and results in a more genuine humility and repentance. How could any Christian find themselves evaluating their own righteousness better than anothers under the true realization of this fact? I don't think it's possible, and the fact that we struggle with doing so proves we don't really get our true sin nature outside of our Savior. "They are skilled in doing evil; they know not how to do good" (Jeremiah 4:22) "Only one who is deeply aware of his evil tendencies will humbly take the necessary steps to guard his heart from sin. I've found tremendous freedom in knowing that I am a great sinner. It helps deliver me from pretending I'm better than I am. It makes me more honest before God and others, and hopefully more truly humble (as opposed to merely appearing to be humble as a prideful strategy).(Alcorn) WOW...is that not convicting!? I say bring it on God, because THAT is the character of you I want ingrained in me!

Whether I think my sin nature is unfair or not really does not matter. I may be tempted to think it matters that I don't like it, and I may be honest about the emotion I have of it seeming unfair but none of this does anything to get me where God wants me to be in response to him. For HIS glory, this is the way he has allowed the set up to be. I waste me time to bemoan this fact. "...we will not submit ourselves to the treatment if we deny our disease or bemoan it's unfairness." (Alcorn) Even worse, I continually glaze over it! I think at times I mentally say "search me oh, God and see if there be any wicked way in me....but I'm sure you won't find any." Yikes. My favorite statement from Alcorn in this Section was the following:

"Instead of bemoaning our own predicaments, how often do we look at the world, with all it's evil and suffering, and say to God, 'Forgive me for my part in the world's sin'?"

I think the key is to recognize that my enemy would love for me to fall one way or the other. He would love for me to be laden with guilt that debilitates me or denial that blinds me. Both keep me from humble submitting resulting in astounding joy that is contagious and effective for the glory of my God.

The final chapter is very interesting and addresses the issue of natural disasters. I won't cover that but it's great reading. My favorite point from there was "The synonym for natural disasters is 'an act of God'. Interestingly, beautiful weather isn't widely referred to as 'an act of God'."

....boy, ain't that the truth.

(Click the link on the upper left side bar for links to the reading schedule, and previous posts in this series)

If God Is Good Session 1: Facing the Big Threat To Christianity

What is God's biggest goal toward humanity? To glorify himself by revealing himself to us, as well as fulfill our deepest need which he has placed within us. What is that need for? Himself. Therefore, his greatest goal is to give himself to us. If this is his greatest goal, then EVERYTHING he does will work toward that goal and NOTHING can thwart it. His goal is complete good, and yet we find ourselves looking upon many things in life that we seriously cannot call "good".

"If God is all good, then he would want to prevent evil and suffering. If he is all knowing, then he would know how to prevent it. If God is all powerful, then he is able to prevent it. And yet...a great deal of evil and suffering exist. Why?" (Randy Alcorn)

First of all, I want to point out that if you ponder evil and are in a place of troubled thinking regarding it, don't be discouraged by that. It's better that you ARE pondering it and asking real questions in your heart. Randy states that the fact that the bible brings up the problem of evil, invites us to do the same. He also states that as we are made in the image of God, we are thinking, caring people "wired to ask questions and seek answers". Remember too that if we seek God using his word, he promises that we will find Him. He will reveal Himself to us, and in fact, the elements we are troubled by are the very elements he knew would stir us and his desire is that we WOULD indeed find him.

If instead, what we hope to find is a smooth path of sunshine full of temporal benefit to us, then we will be sorely disappointed. In fact, we will be in complete despair. We will be aching for someone or something to just take the pain away that we find in life, for indeed, it is there and it is real and it DOES touch each one of us. The misconception that God intends to make our lives easy here on earth will set us up to be shattered when trouble and evil cross our paths. The fact that evil is THE problem with God makes it the "trump card" so to speak for those who argue against him, the battering ram that shatters the defenses of a misguided faith, but also the ultimate obstacle to overcome in order to secure true abiding faith in God for who He really is.

Randy says some amazing things about a misguided faith regarding evil and suffering:

"When people lose their faith because of suffering, it's usually a weak or nominal faith that doesn't account for or prepare them for evil and suffering. I believe that any faith not based on the truth needs to be lost. The sooner the better. If you base your faith on lack of affliction, your faith lives on the brink of extinction and will fall apart because of a frightening diagnosis or a shattering phone call. Token faith will not survive suffering, nor should it."

So, be encouraged if you are even shaking in your faith about God and evil. God wants to show you himself and give you a faith you never dreamed of before. If you have lost it entirely, go back to the word and seek truth because truth does reveal itself.

"Losing your faith may be God's gift to you. Only when you jettison undergrounded and untrue faith can you replace it with valid faith in the true God- faith that can pass, and even find strength in, the most formidable of life's tests."

This astounded me:

"But if personal suffering gives sufficient evidence that God doesn't exist, then surely I shouldn't wait until I suffer to conclude he's a myth. If my suffering would one day justify denying God, then I should deny him now in light of other people's suffering."

WOW. Surely we should not wait for our faith to be shaken before we sort these things out! We need to be ready, and we need to help others be ready with a perspective that stands up against this biggest problem of humanity and God. Especially our children.

The WONDERFUL thing about God is that when we ask, seek and knock, we are PROMISED to find Him. "Taste and see that the Lord is Good!" Yet, if we do not taste by feasting on His word and books like this that help us get a right perspective, we will starve our faith to death.

Randy goes on to define and differentiate evil and suffering. I will not attempt to give you everything in my posts. One, because I don't want to take away from his writing, it's excellent. If you are just reading here, you are TOTALLY missing out. If you cannot read the book now, make sure to later on but soon. Secondly, he is just so thorough that I could never attempt it all, and I don't want to. He defines primary and secondary evil which really help you understand evil in general better. He covered some world view responses to evil, refuting their premise. He discusses some arguments against God and evil and gives clear to understand responses. He states that a Christian world view will always and should always do what the scripture does and that is to magnify God and never to do what popular views of evil do and that is to minimize him.

Convictingly he states:

"IF we see God only in terms of his love, mercy and compassion, we will not envision the true God, but only an idol of our own imagination- and that is precisely what we see in the airbrushed God of various modern solutions to the problem of evil."

THAT is why this book intrigued me. I wanted to know my God for WHO HE WAS and not for what I thought he should be. The problem of evil and evil being permitted by him was MY biggest obstacle for responding to Him fully. I wanted to get to the bottom of understanding that. I knew I disagreed with some of the ways I saw God was doing things in his plan for humanity but I knew that I could not attempt to understand his thoughts. In essence I knew I was saying to him "I don't agree with you, but I'm 100% sure you are right." Is that possible to do? Yes, it's through trust and belief. It sounds a little better to say "I don't understand you but I'm sure you are right" but that did not go to the extent of my emotions. There are times I really don't agree. Still, turning TO him and not AWAY from him is the solution. When we turn away, we find despair or temporary pain relievers that disappoint in the end every time until we turn to another, continually distracting us from eternal truths.

"While traveling this long road, I found something surprising: the journey was not only rewarding, but fascinating, enlightening, and at times downright enjoyable. I know it sounds counterintuitive- shouldn't it depress someone to meditate on evil and suffering? In fact, I'd already seen enough evil and suffering to feel deeply troubled. What I needed was perspective. Instead of being disheartened, I'm encouraged. Above all in this process, I've seen Jesus."

Ahh, and that brings us back around. We come full circle to the great goal of God, the revelation of himself, for the glory of himself; for the joy of his people. Therefore, my theory on evil ( I say theory because I've not read the book yet:) is that evil is permitted for the express purpose of God being revealed completely. I think like all suffering, evil brings a further understanding of God's goodness. It is the dark that makes the dawn glorious. It could not come from him so He created the option for it so that it would be taken (the option that is) and create the contrast needed to reveal to his beloved, how lovely he truly is. In a way you could say he purposed to woo his bride to himself through the one element that would show her how excellent he is, the opposite of everything he truly is. If she could see that, she could see who he was better. She could understand why he allowed this revelation and she could love him like she never would have before.

"so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus." Eph 2:7

My post on Session 2 will be this weekend.

When God Paints In Black

I introduced the idea of disagreement with God in my post the other day gearing up for the book club. Is that a new concept for you? It's a recent one for me.

When my grandpa died in 2001, I had my first firey trial with my faith that I think I'd had yet. We were not sure if he died with salvation because he didn't express much to us except that when my mom asked him if he'd made things right with God, he said he had. That was a vague way to end things in my mind. I really wrestled for the first time that God allows many to perish. It was the first time I found myself disagreeing with him.

Somehow we think that disagreement with God means that our faith foundation has crumbled, and God is no longer who we think he is. We assume that what he does should meet with our logic, emotions and sense of justice. So much of what God does does not seem fair to us. I remember being down right angry with God for a while when I started to realize these things. Thankfully, I began to pray my way though them and when I changed my own attitude I began to find greater, even more solid foundations to fall on than I had ever known before.

What are the things I disagree with God on?

1. That sin was allowed to enter the picture at all on any level.

Click here to read my post on the origin of evil itself. It's a huge mystery to the point of seeming a contradicting in our minds when we think of how evil could be birthed in God's world when only good things come from God, and all things come from Him as well.

2. That God says he is willing that none should perish and yet so many will.

Again, this seems like God contradicting himself. If he really did not want them to perish, they why are they? Is he not really in control?

3. That Satan was not destroyed early on when he rebelled.

Again, an all powerful God could have done that, had he chose.

4. That we are born with sin we did not ask for.

Really, it's not our choice to be blind to truth because of sin. If men are unable to be convicted because of sin, how is it fair that this sinful state is thrust upon them when it keeps them blind. How can they really be responsible for a blindness they did not ask for?

5. I certainly disagreed with God when he decided three years ago today that my dad should die at 54.

So, those are just some of my big ones. How did I resolve this and even strengthen my faith with these huge issues I had with God? Well, first I had to be willing to speak them out to him and let him know where my heart was struggling. Then I remembered my children.

No matter what we do sometimes, our children do not understand our rules. They don't think they make sense, they don't like them, they even disagree with them. I could sit there on the bed with them and talk till the cows come how trying to explain my reasoning but what is sensible to me is not going to be to them. There may be some light bulbs going off but many times it's just impossible to always get them to see things from my perspective.

If there is such a leap between a parent and child, how vast the chasm must be between us and God. The great mysteries are deep and wise. We don't have what it takes to wrap our heads around a single one of his thoughts. Even if we do get some of them, it's by the work of God's Holy Spirit which really is not us getting it but the Him in us getting it!

If someone rejects God for the holes they think they have found in His plan or their logic alone, they are just as foolish as a child declaring that their parent is not their parent who loves them because they do things they don't understand or like.

There is freedom in saying to God "I don't like this, I don't agree with this, I don't understand this." The freedom I'm referring to is a freedom from the chains of our understanding that hold us back from running the race we are meant to.

Think about it, what was the first thing Satan wanted human-kind to do? Doubt God. Well, not entirely, he wanted them to doubt and then act on that doubt. Doubting God is a result of a disagreement we have with Him. The disagreement is not something we should feel threatened by. We should expect to disagree with God because our wisdom is not equal to His and our thoughts are not like His. If you should not be surprised that you disagree, don't be surprised or discouraged by doubt either. Let it however spur you to do what it's meant to do, seek Him MORE. He promises that those who seek Him WILL FIND HIM. If you however, rebel and stop seeking because of these disagreements and doubts, you will be stuck in despair. If you, like Eve, allow them to become accepted lies about God, you will sin because you will act on what you believe to be true. Your truth has been exchanged by a lie and that lie is that God is not to be trusted and He is not completely good.

If your children doubt your love for them (most likely because they disagree with something coming from you) does that change the fact that you DO love them? Our doubt or disagreement does NOTHING to alter truth, but it DOES alter our thinking if we do not seek God in our questioning. There is only one way to do that and that is through His word. Rejection of God's word due to acceptance of a lie that it has lost it's validity due to our doubt is locking the gate to the path of our own happiness.

Does that mean God's word will give you all the answers you seek? No. In the book of Job, Job is finally angry and venting out to God. Does God answer him with clever comebacks for Job? No. Does he wow him with logic and wisdom that makes Job say "ah, duh, I get it now!"? No. What does he do? HE SHOWS JOB HIMSELF. There is only one cure for doubt of God and that is reassurance from Him that he is SUPREME. His supremacy gives us the eyes to see WHY he can be trusted. When you look at a planet in the sky, do you think about the fact that you could probably trust the maker of that planet to know far more than you do? When you see a baby being formed in the womb or feel it yourself, do you ponder the wisdom that is beyond you? Could God explain to you how those things were made? Would you understand it if he did? I highly doubt it. I can't even understand 12th grade math or science very well!

God showed Job how HUGE he was and how small Job was. He showed him what he needed to see. God cannot explain Himself to us because He knows we cannot comprehend Him. That is a side note to the fact that He doesn't have to! Yet, how lovingly he reaches down to extend himself to us at any level we CAN understand, be convicted by, or comprehend. HE has given us all we need to trust and come to him.

So, we could be like the child who hears his/her father say "I love you, trust me, do it this way" and respond with obedience. Or, we can be the one who says "no, prove to me first why it has to be this way." Sometimes all our wisdom would be complete foolishness to a child and God knows the same about us.

So, seeking is good, because seeking with a heart of trust and assurance will carry us through the parts about God that we don't get. When we come to those parts we have to reflect on all his amazing attributes to remind us WHY we don't get it. God promises if we seek we will find but what he promises is HIMSELF, not all our answers. Along the way, there are many things we CAN understand about God when we ask these questions and seek answers for them. With the submissive heart, it's all going to be a good journey to take.

Remember, when God paints in black, it's to highlight some element of his amazingly bright and beautiful character here on earth. Should you, the created, take the brush from his hand and declare "no, no, no! Yellow is much more cheerful here!"? The great painting he is creating requires the use of variant dark hues. One day we will stand back and be overwhelmed with delight, but sometimes all we can see are a mess of darkness right in front of our face and hear the echo of promises of goodness. If the artist is promising great things and he's shown you His phenomenal handy work everywhere, don't you think you can trust his masterpiece?

Vampires and Legalism...Look out!

If you know me, you know what ruffles my feathers, legalism. My weakness is that I'm not a good rule follower. That's not good for me. I have to be careful to always re-examine my doings and submit to God let alone search out whether something is people preference or command. It's a constant search for me. My greatest strength is that I'm not a good rule follower. Yes, you read that right. Didn't your mama teach you? "Your greatest strength is also your greatest weakness". The fact that I have a huge radar for legalism has helped me grown in my faith as well as challenge me in my faith. God has used it too weed out times in my life when I've fed my flesh by following the law. Is that possible? Quite. Whatever feeds your pride, feeds your flesh. More on that in a bit.
I was thinking again yesterday about the subject of Twilight (yes...AGAIN...grrr) because I came into a conversation online with a fellow Christian on it. I have to really be careful with this individual because their words and attitude REALLY get under my skin and my own pride tries to raise it's ugly head. Still, my pride being put aside (and yes, I really am purposefully shoving it back in the selfish corner it belongs) there is validity in speaking and discerning truth so I usually walk around pondering these things for days until I work it out. I'd like to dissect her response to Twilight. One, because I think a great deal many Christians have this outlook and also because I long to see logic and truth return to the Christian world view as it did for C.S. Lewis. That man is so logical that it astounds me!
The first comment she said was this:
"I have always found vampires and the like, to be from Satan, and would not ever allow it in my home or into my children's minds."
I don't like when people give this much credit to Satan. That HUGE point being said let's remember something I discussed in my Soap Box On Twilight post , which I ask you to read if you have not,(which I'm sure she did not read, just as she has not read the series or seen the movies so she really does not even realize the Vampires are not evil in this story) VAMPIRES ARE NOT REAL! Satan is, yes, very, very, real. He does bring evil things about according to the allowance of almighty God. I don't even like giving him much credit for that because as we see in Job, he has to ask permission! So, as I said in my post, Vampires have been defined in fiction to be evil, and fiction has the freedom to redefine them at any moment as Meyer has in this series. They cannot be from Satan because they don't really exist! They have been know to reflect evil qualities that parallel our association with Satan and his evil ways. Fiction can make a good witch, a friendly ghost or whatever it wants! Mind you, as I said also before, I don't personally prefer evil Vampire type stories and I would not let my children read them either because there are frightening elements that a child could not handle. These books are not for children however, and quite frankly, the original version of Snow White is enough to make any child have nightmares. We have to realize that our imaginations have sensitivities that have to be navigated by age, maturity and preference.
"I find Christians who are infatuated with it, to be a disappointment, and I don't understand."
First, infatuated is a strong word. To enjoy any type of entertainment could be called infatuation.
To say that you find Christians who do something you don't' agree with to be a disappointment implies that they are failing to meet your standard of what a Christian ought to be. This type of assessing each other is dangerous and feeds pride. If you don't agree with them, you can graciously say so and pray for them but encourage them! To practice saying that we are disappointments to each other is not the right approach. I could be disappointed that so and so let's their daughter wear skirts to church that are too short, but would I tell them that they are a disappointment to Christianity? First of all, that's just unloving, but it also implies that I have the say which I don't. Different Christians will enjoy different freedoms in their family according to culture and conviction and if the Lord lays it on us to pray for them or even to approach them and say something we should. But, please don't start telling them they are disappointments.
"But, it is a matter of opinion and taste, and conviction. If you have not been shown from the Gospel, the wrong in those ideals, it's hard to be convicted about it, isn't it?"
This particular person said she is a fan of "The Office", we enjoy that show too. There are plenty of Christians who could come up with a pretty solid argument against that show. Mind you, it would be a legalistic argument but a good one none the less. In her opinion, the sinful lifestyles, occasional crude humor, and worldliness of that show is "not as offensive as the Twilight series" (first of all, how do you know??? you have not even read them or seen them? you are making a judgement comparison with nothing!). See, what just happened here? We want to draw the lines but smudge them out when something worldly is on our interest level. You can't do that, it's called shooting yourself in the foot. Especially when you have a prideful, dogmatic attitude toward what others choose to watch or read. There is plenty of wrong from the gospel on a lot of ideals presented in entertainment, THAT is why we filter it through our theology instead of letting it threaten our theology! How do you keep your kids from this? Teach them to do the same.
Back to her statement:
"I love the Office too, and I don't find it as offensive as the Twilight Series, but I have to ask myself "does this glorify the Lord...does it bring edification to myself and my family...is there any spiritual value in bringing this into my home?" It's tough for me...I pray for God's strength!"
This is true. Yet, how many things in life do we have the freedom to enjoy that are not necessarily directly glorifying to God. Enjoying things is however a way to glorify God because he wants us to enjoy things! He put this in us as a reflection of his character. We can no more filter out all of the fall of man in our entertainment that we enjoy than we can all the chemicals and fat in our ice cream. Do you however choose the treat that will give you cardiac arrest or the one that is better for you? Entertainment is much the same. Some of it is permissible but not beneficial (1 Cor 6:12). Paul then states in that verse that "I will not be mastered by anything". That is the key. The level at which you expose yourself will effect your spiritual health just as the things you chose to eat effects your physical health.
The point really comes back to the bane of legalism rather than the subject of personal conviciton. For it is here that I had the most shock and awe at the attitude being presented.
"We are all on different sections in our spiritual journey. Some of us are strong in our walk in the Spirit and others are not. Only a few are disciplined and enlightened enough to abstain from all evil."
Wow. Where in the bible does it say that? Where does it say that the strongest Christian man who is the most disciplined and enlightened will be able to abstain from all evil!? Only, ONLY, only Christ was that man. It's true that we are all on different parts of our spiritual journey but I heard Paul say quite the opposite of this when he said:
"Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst. But for that very reason I was shown mercy so that in me, the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might display his unlimited patience as an example for those who would believe on him and receive eternal life." (1 Tim 12:15-16)
Paul was what I would consider to be one of the strongest Christian men ever and yet THIS was his assessment of himself.
We have to be careful what the law does to us. It was only meant to do one thing. When the law shows you what a wretch you are, when it lays you bare and convinces you of what a great deprived sinner you are, it is doing what it's meant to do. When it makes you legalistic and puffs up your spiritual pride to convince you you are more enlightened, stronger, more disciplined than other believers, it is an idol and you are being deceived by the enemy. The law can be a form of feeding the flesh because it can feed your pride when it's not laying you low at the feet of Jesus. How often can we be reminded that the ground at the foot of the cross is even ground?
I realize this is a long post (you are welcome Trish:) but I have one final point to make that I've been thinking about.
I think it could be said that having some evil in our literature is actually a reflection of our being made in the image of God. Now, carry on before you get me wrong. I was listening to the Part 2 of Randy Alcorn's book I introduced in the previous post and it struck me that God himself allowed evil in the world to let his glory and righteousness (good) shine forth all the more. This is a great mystery. It's one of the aspects we will be reading about in his book "If God Is Good". To appreciate the good we have to see it's counter part, the bad. Having evil characters in stories to a degree is nothing new under this sun. Some may be more evil than others, but all make us appreciate the justice, the beauty of love, the redemption of sacrifice, and many more good things. Like I stated in my Soap Box post, a good work of fiction has a dilemma, a struggle, an evil, a problem, a darkness to be overcome. Let's not blow it up into something it's not especially when we don't even know what IT is in the first place because we have refused to read it for legalistic reasons. At the same time we don't want to shrink down the vulgarness that is there in many forms of entertainment. Humbly seek that balance but do not be tempted into legalistic pride whatever you decide your conviction is. You may very well choose to shun something, but do not think you are better or a higher caliber of Christian if you do or you have been tainted by sin when you were trying to avoid it in the first place! It's mind boggling really.
We don't want to give much credit to Satan, but he will tempt us to feed our flesh with entertainment. He will also tempt us to feed our flesh with our spirituality. Steer clear of both and be good watchmen on the walls for both enemies approaching at your gates.

If God Is Good Summer Book Club

Do you have deep, honest questions for God? Are you brave enough to search them out with Him? Do you let yourself wonder how a good God can harden hearts (as he says he did with Pharaoh and even King Saul among others), allow evil to even exist, or permit suffering? These are VERY hard questions I ask all the time. My heart longed to search out answers in this area. The bible says that some of the mysteries belong only to God (Duet 29:29), but does he leave us wanting in this area? Where is the balm for our aching souls when it comes to evil and suffering?
Watch this and then read further: (the sound is fuzzy, sorry)


Many people feel they would be struck by lightening asking deep hard questions of God. Yet, He longs for us to seek him with a full heart. Seeking with complete trust and respect for who He is will always be rewarding. Questioning him with a rebellious spirit angry for the way He has orchestrated things will lead only to despair. It's okay to disagree with God. Do your kids disagree with you? Do you still expect them to trust and obey? Are you okay with them saying they disagree as long as they submit anyway? Yes. It is the same with God. We should not expect ourselves to always agree with Him just as we should not expect ourselves to understand Him fully. If we did, we would be His equal. His ways are higher, and his thoughts are bigger than our little minds can fathom and therefore, we should expect to disagree or find His plan sometimes being completely against our common sense. If you have submitted to a God who promises you prosperity, deliverance from suffering, or immunity from evil, you have not known the true God of the bible.
This summer, Starting June 1st, I'm starting a Summer book club both online and in person for any who would like to join me. The book is "If God Is Good" by Randy Alcorn. If you walk through with me online, there will be a posted reading schedule. If you cannot get it all in on time, please continue on as you can. The discussion will still be stimulating. If you would like to meet with me to discuss the book I'd like to get together with some ladies every other week at a coffee shop. If you are interested in either please comment here and I'll email you details as time gets closer. There are 45 short chapters in the book. All of it is incredibly stimulating reading. It's the type of book you want to underline in. I truly believe this book will help believers help others who are questioning the same things in their life.
The book club will go from June 1st through August 15th. That's two and a half months to read which I feel is a reasonable pace. On the blog, I will be going through X amounts of the book a week and doing a weekly post on thos e passages. Then, the comments are open for discussion on your thoughts or questions from them.
If you get time, go back to You Tube and watch Parts 1-7 of Randy's discussion on this book. I chose Part 2 to introduce you to the book because I felt it zeroed in on what brought me to the book. If you plan to read the book, these are a must. Part 7 is astounding!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYWayNQWiC0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8oRnMYfzFuc

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P1aQ8W8w-Bw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FogTZhygdlY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rc-MObgg40U

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ICxUy9FfZmY

Christian Hedonism Part 4a: The Problem

Please read Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 to know what is going on here.
I came back to the "table" of my thinking to finish this off with joy, frustration, and a great sense of being overwhelmed. There is no way to do Part 4 in one sitting. There is just too much for me to write and too much for you to read and I worry if I put it all out at once you will get exhausted of the reading. So, I'm breaking it down into what I believe will be 5 sub parts, both for my benefit in organizing the thoughts and your benefit in receiving them. They will be:
The Problem
The Power
The Praise
The Prayer and..
The Practical
I'm not trying to be all spiritual with the P's, it's just the best way I could come up with organizing the thoughts in my mind. I don't know how long it will take me to get to them either so I will be taking the week off blog themes till I get through them. They were just too important not to miss though.

The Problem:
I said when I ended Part 2 that the problem I felt in myself and other believers in Christ is that we don't enjoy God. That was bleak to me.
Now don't misunderstand, this is not something I'm just coming up with. In fact, what you read here to day will be more from others than from me. It is something the Lord has been trying to show me and I've been amazed at the congruency of his direction on this topic as many different things in my life that "coincidentally" come my way are right along the lines of this topic.
You may not understand what I mean when I say "we don't enjoy God" and you may disagree with me. If we are not enjoying God as believers, then what the heck are we doing? Well, see if any of this sounds familiar to you:
"....once we've been saved, once we've understood and accepted the message of the gospel, the person and work of the Redeemer becomes secondary to what we're focused on- living the Christian life. ....our attention is primarily focused on our performance, on our spiritual growth. We know that the incarnation and resurrection are important truths to our initial salvation, but that's pretty much where their impact ends. "
"We haven't felt his absence because we're so preoccupied with living life for him."
"I believe that most Christians think fondly of Jesus, are sincerely grateful for salvation, and remember his name as a tagline when they pray, but they don't see his work and life as something to contemplate every moment of every day. I have to admit that until fairly recently I, too, pursued godliness without much thought of him."
"In your pursuit of godliness, have you left Jesus behind?"
(from Because He Loves Me by Elyse M. Fitzpatrick)

Here I was studying Piper and then opened the book I was rather begrudged-ly beginning for our ladies discipleship group when I came across this in the introduction! Do you ever feel God is pretty much taking something and hitting you over the head with it!? I felt Elyse stated the problem a little more clearly than some of the more challenging poetic type language of Piper (that I do love, but it can tie your brain in knots within 30 seconds sometimes). Her focus in her book is really on Christ, so it may seem unrelated to what we talked about in Parts 1,2 and 3 but it's not. Why? Because of what is at the right hand of God Almighty, pleasures forevermore....Jesus Christ. They are all connected and therefore her points are completely valid to this discussion.
Now that we've done some stretching with Elyse and started to feel our mental muscles warming up, let's visit the "Jillian Michaels" of Christian thought exercises- Mr. John Piper:
"For many, Christianity has become the grinding out of general doctrinal laws from collections of biblical facts. But childlike wonder and awe have died. The scenery and poetry and music of the majesty of God have dried up like a forgotten peach at the back of the refrigerator.
And the irony is that we have aided and abetted the desiccation by telling people they ought not seek their own pleasure, especially in worship. We have implied in a thousand ways that the virtue of an act diminishes to the degree you enjoy doing it and that doing something because it yields happiness is bad. The notion hangs like a gas in the Christian atmosphere."
The trap for the believer is working out our righteousness rather than enjoying God. We so often put the cart before the horse. We do our duty and hope to find our delight when we need to delight and find that our heart response to God when we do, is nothing we would dare call "duty" at all. Working out our righteousness actually distracts us from Christ and it causes us to focus instead on our measure and the measure of others. We still are not focused on God.
This is a serious thing because it is falling into deceptions of the enemy. Let me try to explain how.
If God's main goal for us is to be happy in Him, what then would the enemy's main target be? Well, it seems that he would be working that we would attempt to fill that with anything BUT God. For the unbeliever that would be through false "happiness" and pleasure seeking of the world. But what would it be for the believer? What would it look like? How would he take our eyes off Christ and have us once again drinking from an empty well? By the very deception that we don't need to enjoy God, but we need to be a better Christian. God calls out to us trying to give us the joy and happiness of Himself, the goal He has had since the dawn of our existence and we sit there with our hands over our ears and our mouths gabbing "la,la,la,la,la!" at the top of our lungs. The only difference is that the unbeliever does not want to hear God say there is more than the happiness of the world, and the believer does not want to hear that there is more than the striving and striving to be holy!
"We assent to these precious truths of Scripture, but we frequently find ourselves living life like practical atheists- not much different from our unbelieving neighbors down the street- except that our garages are empty on Sunday morning. We forget who he is, what he has done; we don't know why it really matters. Because of this, we fail to remember who we are and how he has called us to live."
(Elyse)
This is the saddest of the sad! I believe it's the passion in God's heart when he says to the church of Ephesus that they have forgotten their first LOVE! What were they doing then? Well, the passage says they were doing really good at working on being Christians! Sobering don't you think?

"I know your deeds and your toil and perseverance, and that you cannot tolerate evil men, and you put to the test those who call themselves apostles, and they are not, and you found them to be false;
and you have perseverance and have endured for My name's sake, and have not grown weary.
But I have this against you, that you have left your first love.
Therefore remember from where you have fallen, and repent and do the deeds you did at first; or else I am coming to you and will remove your lampstand out of its place--unless you repent."

(Revelation 2:2-5)

The strong admonishement is just as heavy as those given to the believers behaving as the ungodly! Yet, we seem to not realize the severity of these words.

The problem with the unsaved is their love affair with themselves. Are we falling in love with Jesus just to abandon enjoying Him (and thereby enjoying God himself) only to fall back in the pit of a love affair with ourselves?
I present to you that this is why God called me OUT of homeschooling. NO, I do not mean that all should be called out. Yet, I had fallen guilty of the above, my friends. I had barely a thought of enjoying God and my savior, I was too busy working harder at the Christian life. I was looking for my fulfillment and my happiness in one person's work, mine. You may not struggle with that if you homeschool, but I did and I THANK GOD EVERY DAY THAT HE PULLED THAT IDOL FROM MY LIFE, AND I HOPE HE KEEPS PULLING THEM! (This does not mean it is an idol or form of idolotry for all or any for that matter, for them I cannot speak nor do I dare to presume, but it had become that for me. It did not start that way, but it became that) He may even call me back at some point but I know now that it would never be to me what it was then. When I stopped homeschooling I had to take a huge leap of faith into the very hand of God. I began to acknowledge how powerful and huge he was and how I needed him. I began to be more and more focused on Him every day. He used that to grow my faith. I still struggle with this battle of self-righteousness. I use to want to be godly to keep up with the godly, now my heart has changed to want to be godly because I want to be like Him. "..our desires will be transformed when our eyes are fixed on his godliness." (Elyse) How often I still struggle with that godliness meter I parade around with me. I've been praying lately that God work in me now not to let the enemy have a foothold in my heart toward my brothers and sisters through that stupid meter either as I interact with them in any way. God has no use for such measurements and they dishonor him entirely. They only serve to do one thing and that is puff up my pride. I don't have to worry about others when my focus is on Christ. But, I digress and see the dust of a rabbit trail starting! LOL!
"Instead of humbly receiving the gracious love of our Father and depending daily on him, we want to believe that we really can improve ourselves. God's love is wonderful at first blush, but because it's not based on anything we've done, it humbles us to the dust." (Elyse)
Does it not pain you as it does me that we are just as bad as the world then in not enjoying God!? This is what I mean when I say I put the cart before the horse. I focus on me! I pray for help for me! I ask that I would do better! OH, heavens! I have forgotten my first love, which is NOT me! My LOVE is CHRIST! All that he has done, all that he will do, all whom he is, all he forgave of me, all he will work in me, all he does in the church around me, the world around me, his wisdom, his might, his promises, his peace above understanding. Do you know that if we pondered more the great things to enjoy about God, we would have so little time to fret about our performance. Our performance is pathetic, and it will always be pathetic. So what is the glory in our life? Whatever God does in us and through us, but that which he can only do if we let him and stop trying to grab the wheel of our deceptive strive for holiness!
I have to bring this back around at some point.....
I think that what we mean when we say that God's goal for us is our complete happiness, that this is what we mean, our enjoyment of Him. We enjoy Him by so many means I'll get to later. It's a constant hunger and pursuit, a passion, a delight and a constant need that God fills. Our joy stays with us through it all, but we also pursue our happiness through pursuing enjoyment of God in many ways. If we don't focus on Christ, we do just as the unbelieving and focus on our flesh. Even if the way we do that is by focusing on our Christian performance, that is still us, and it's still the flesh and it's satisfaction is deceptive.

"Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law, or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh? (Galatians 3:2-3)

"Religious 'flesh' always wants to work for God (rather than humbling itself to realize God must work for it in free grace). But 'if you live according to the flesh you will die' (Romans 8:13). That is why our very lives hang on not working for God.

You may also be discouraged repetitively, depressed again and again, and insecure. Though these are a struggle for us all, the more we understand this view of God not needing our service to Him, the more freed from these we become.

"God is not looking for people to work for Him, so much as He is looking for people who will let Him work for them. The gospel is not a help-wanted ad."

"From of old no one has heard or perceived by the ear, no eye has seen a God besides thee, who works for those who wait for him." (Isaiah 64:4)

"Most of us think serving God is a totally positive thing; we have not considered that serving God may be an insult to Him. But meditation on the meaning of prayer demands this consideration.

Acts 17:24-25

'The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.'

'The Son of Man came not to be served (Mark 10:45). He aims to be the servant. He aims to get the glory as Giver.

This is true, not just in the days of His earthly humiliation, but even in His glory at the close of the age.

'Truly, I say to you, he will dress himself for service and have them recline at table, and he will come and serve them.' (Luke 12:37)

To be sure, we are called servants- and that no doubt means we are to do exactly as we are told. But the wonder of this picture is that the 'master' insists on 'serving' even in the age to come when He appears in all His glory 'with his mighty angels in flaming fire' (2 Thess 1:7-8). Why? Because the very heart of His glory is the fullness of grace that overflows in kindness to needy people. Therefore, He aims 'in the coming ages to show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus' (Eph 2:7)

What is the greatness of our God? What is His uniqueness in the world?

Isaiah answers:

'From of old no one has heard or perceived by the ear, no eye has seen a God besides thee, who works for those who wait for him. (Isaiah 64:4)

All other so-called gods try to exalt themselves by making man work for them. In doing so, they only show their weakness. Isaiah derides the gods who need the service of their people"

(All taken from John Piper's Chapter entitled "Prayer" from Desiring God.... I went from thought to thought that struck me. I really do it injustice to say that is all however as reading on your own you will find much more in between)

The obvious question would therefore be what about all the scripture that tells us to serve God? How do we serve Him. Well, first I have to recommend reading this yourself because I'm not getting it all as I just stated in the parenthesis. But here is a morsel:

"The way to serve God so that He gets the glory is to look to Him for mercy. Prayer prevents service from being an expression of pride." Piper

Ah, and there in lies the rub as they say! Pride is self, self is flesh, flesh is me. I'm back to square one where I'm not enjoying God I've started to enjoy me and my fine tuning Christian ways.

I hope you start to see therefore, how this all comes together. It's a lot I know, and there is more important stuff surrounding it.

Next post I'd like to hit the really joyful aspect of the power behind this happiness. Where does it come from? What makes it such a strong desire in us, this pining for happiness?

Please, please, and I say again, please ask any questions and make any statements of thought. I welcome them all.

A Side Step In Job: Christian Hedonism Part 3 (i guess:)

Well, man may make his plans but God directs his steps. I planned to pick up part three talking about how we don't desire and enjoy God though we may trust him. I posted Part 2 yesterday and noticed much reading and little commenting. I cannot say enough how much of a research this is for me still. If you read and have questions please ask because I'm asking them too and if you don't agree feel free to say on what point. This discussion is an invitation to dive in and filter out what is not true and what is but that does not come from any of us, it comes from the revelation of God through the Holy Spirit to our hearts AND minds. I really do mean when I say I that invite discussion. I want to hear what's turning in your heads even if it's just that you are dizzy! :) Or if you are drawing a blank...you can share that too:) If it's that you just think I'm talking circles and don't get my point, I pray it becomes clear soon.....my point that is. And, you know, I realize that mainly this is a journey God has me on, and I delight in it but I don't expect it to make sense to everyone (as it barely is starting to make sense to me). It's my joy to share with you but I also write so I will not forget.
I do have two things that have come up or been shared with me on my facebook regarding this topic that I'd like to share at the end.

Still, I was pondering some things I had written and re-evaluating their validity with the rest of scripture. I wanted to make sure to clarify that we are not unhappy because we have sinned (though that may sometimes be true, it is not true all the time especially as I think of Job) but that because of sin and our fallen state, we struggle with happiness. It is the same with righteousness. Christ has cleansed us, we are righteous, but yet, we struggle here with being righteous in our flesh. I hope that helps a bit. We have to remember our redeemer HAS indeed redeemed and we are not trying to work for any reward, even happiness, we seek it out of delight from our eyes being opened and our hearts therefore responding.

Also, when I respond to the verse "he will give you the desires of your heart" with "he wants to make you happy!" I DO NOT mean that he wants to give you what you want and crave of the temporal because the fact is that that is NOT what will make you happy. It may give you an earthly delight that can indeed be from him as a gift, or it may be a flat out deception of happiness, but either way, it will not give you what he made you for that being HIM. So, God knows more than we do that the desire of our heart is for Him. He knows that because He put that desire there. It is a separate desire than the desires for earthly goodies from him and it is the very desire I'm wanting to re -captivate and seek, and tell you about. There is a happiness that leaves us wanting, and there is a happiness that when we seek it and desire it, and find it, it fills up our joy. More on that later (don't you love that I always say that;)

So, I take a side step into Job, my chronological reading and study that the Lord used to embellish my train of thoughts about happiness (quite unexpectedly I might add! I love that He works that way!). I was starting to see a connection in the over all message of Job but I was not sure what it was yet. I jumped ahead to start evaluating the very last three chapters of Job as I will be responsible for that devotional post on the Bible In A Year And Beyond site I've graciously been asked to take part it. Yet, I was still back in today's readings in Job 26-29. Job 28 is a pivotal and crucial chapter in the book of Job, and it is a turning point of the story. Job begins to turn toward not just the bigness of God, or his mighty ways that we observe, but his WISDOM that we cannot fathom and that no man can understand.


I began to ponder about wisdom. The Lord reminded me the language he uses to entice us into the glory of wisdom:


For wisdom will enter your heart And knowledge will be pleasant to your soul; (Prov 2:10)


For wisdom is better than jewels;And all desirable things cannot compare with her (Prov 8:11)


How much better it is to get wisdom than gold!And to get understanding is to be chosen above silver(Prov 16:16)


He who gets wisdom loves his own soul;He who keeps understanding will find good. (Prov 19:8)


Notice the language of pleasure, of treasure (paralleling our earthly "luck" or "pot of gold"...prosperity, riches and prosperity), of desiring and wanting, of seeking your own happiness or "loving your own soul" by seeking wisdom. It would at first sound like selfish language to say "loves his own soul", for should he not love God? Ah, but as Piper points out in his book, they are the same, wrapped up in each other. God is our greatest good that we should seek for ourselves.

Now notice the language of desire and seeking:


I love those who love me; And those who diligently seek me will find me. (Prov 8:17)

If you seek her as silver And search for her as for hidden treasures; (Prov 2:4)

She (wisdom) is more precious than jewels;And nothing you desire compares with her. (Prov 3:15)

Acquire wisdom! Acquire understanding!Do not forget nor turn away from the words of my mouth.(Prov 4:5) (here we are not just enticed or encouraged to seek but commanded! God does that too and we need to listen when he is this serious!)


At the same time, as Job discovers in chapter 28, wisdom cannot be gained by human study of any kind, it is from the Lord. The men who advised him did not have it (according to God himself, he says that of them at the end of Job), and Job had heard of it but had not seen it yet.

For the LORD gives wisdom;From His mouth come knowledge and understanding. (Prov 2:6)

The LORD by wisdom founded the earth,By understanding He established the heavens.(Prov 3:19)

Counsel is mine and sound wisdom;I am understanding, power is mine.(Prov 8:14)


And these words seem to echo Job 28:

Surely I am more stupid than any man, And I do not have the understanding of a man. Neither have I learned wisdom, Nor do I have the knowledge of the Holy One. Who has ascended into heaven and descended? Who has gathered the wind in His fists? Who has wrapped the waters in His garment? Who has established all the ends of the earth? What is His name or His son's name? Surely you know! Every word of God is tested; He is a shield to those who take refuge in Him. Do not add to His words Or He will reprove you, and you will be proved a liar. (Prov 30:2-4)

For Job reflects:

"But where can wisdom be found? And where is the place of understanding? 'Man does not know its value, Nor is it found in the land of the living. '"

He even takes a few verses to mention specific gems and precious metals of earthly fortune that cannot compare giving the word picture and enticing of Proverbs that what man desires most and enjoys so highly, cannot compare to this delight.

Another important parallel though is found in verse 22:

Destruction and Death say, ‘We have heard a report about it with our ears.’

I found this astounding because the Word tells us : "We were dead in our trespasses and sin...but you have been made alive in Christ" (my paraphrase of Eph 2)

Because of our state of death we can only hear of wisdom and it's pleasures. Only God, through Christ now to us who came after his coming (and through faith credited to them as righteousness as in Jobs day) can open our eyes to see wisdom. At the end of Job this is the very conclusion of Job himself when he says:

I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear; But now my eye sees You; Job 42:5

Job has passed from death into life. God has let him move beyond hearing into seeing. Even in his state of knowing how great God was, it was not enough to convict his heart to repentance. God brought him to that place (through his suffering) to see that God was wise and that he desired that delightful part of God.

Now, here is the amazing thing about wisdom that ties it in with our discussion on happiness. Our fallen-ness does not keep us from God's wisdom. Even if we were never interrupted with the fall of man, we would not comprehend these things. The moment we understand fully the wisdom of God, we will be his equal. Now, let your mind stretch around this one.....

You will (if you are redeemed) spend now and all of eternity receiving new pleasures and delights from God's wisdom. You will never reach the end. THAT is how wise God is. THAT is what blew Job's mind to realize. THAT is what led him to repent. Yet, the part I feel we are missing out on as Christians is the continual seeking and desiring as for hidden treasure.

My friend Amy made one of the most pertinents observations in the comments from part 2 and I don't know if you caught it. She mentioned this verse:

You will make known to me the path of life;In Your presence is fullness of joy;In Your right hand there are pleasures forever. (Psalm 16:11)

She went on to mention that we know from the Word EVERYWHERE else, who is positioned at the right hand of the Father. It is our savior, Jesus Christ. He is associated with our pleasure and pleasure is something we seek, yet we never attain.

An aspect of joy within Christianity is that it has become more defined as quiet trust, dependence and hope, supernatural delight so to speak (and yes, these are my personal definitions in my mind). The scripture continually uses the language "that your joy may be full" or "restore to me the joy of my salvation". The part of this that we, I, am missing in my walk with the Lord, is that though joy is continual in the ways I defined above, it is missing the element of being continually filled and restored. That is the part that happiness brings into joy that is to crucial to throw out.

So, this was where my thoughts were wondering, and rabbit trailing, and then coming back together. I find that all is connected and all is on it's own as well. The Word of God is amazing that way. But, I wanted to cover these aspects of what happened to Job and the issue of the parallel of the wisdom of God before moving on to the topic of enjoying God. I honestly don't know where I'm going, I'm just enjoying the ride as God brings it along.

On this trail I'm hiking came a quote my friend Donna posted to our C.S. Lewis reading club that my husband and I are in. It is from St. Augustine I believe:

"Humans love many different things and when they seem to have all that they desire, we are accustomed to call them happy. But we can be happy only if we are loving what ought to be loved. Happiness does not consist simply in having what we happen to love. We sometimes are made more unhappy by having what we love than in not having it. When unhappy persons love something hurtful, they are made even more unhappy."

I am tickled by the circles we go in just in that quote! You can truly get logically dizzy you know! It does happen! Yet, I love it. :) And, hey, at least you are along for the ride!

I really liked the quote, and in response to it and something I said about it my friend Alyce commented back to me and I so appreciate her sharing that she was struggling with the concept! Struggling is good because it's movement toward seeking!

"Alicia, I thought of you when I read this. Lewis said so much better what I was wrestling with. 'To pursue being happy can be disastrous, because our natural bent is so self centered, and we love ourselves so much that we go for the wrong things. But to love God results in the happiness we so long for. Happiness should be the result, not the goal.'"

This has been a light bulb moment for me! Thank you btw Alyce for that, and thank you again Lewis! It is a key breakthrough to these discussions . It's the part I have perhaps been missing.

Happiness is not our goal, it is God's goal for us! We don't have to worry about being happy! We don't' have to seek it, we have to seek him! We don't have to seek our desires, we have to seek Him! At His right hand are pleasures forevermore, our Christ Jesus, full of wisdom and truth (full meaning as God is! God made flesh once again...all ties together people!). So, perhaps the originating statement bothered me ("happiness is not God's goal for us") because the Holy Spirit in me knew that it WAS!

Okay, get ready....we are going to circle again....

We do have to seek Him, we do have to desire Him, we do have to find pleasure and enjoy him, NOT happiness, HIM. Why? Because He is our happiness! His goal for us is Himself resulting in our happiness and Himself resulting in our righteousness.

Are you dizzy now? If you are not....read it again..LOL!

So, do you? Do I? Seek, desire, enjoy?

This is the verse on my heart to talk about next "Taste and see that the Lord is good"

What is our trip up? What do we do instead? The world goes to empty wells of happiness, and we may struggle with that too, but what else keeps us specifically as Christians, from craving more pleasure from God? What does it have to do with Christ?

Which Came First, The Happy Or The Joy? Christian Hedonism Part 2

I cannot express enough my bewilderment at where to start the next part of these thoughts. I've prayed that the Lord would make the way clear to me because it has been like a bunch of individual pertinent butterflies fluttering around in my head, delightful and true but I could not, and still am having a hard time putting the random importance into order that would help the reader get my overall point in the best most logical way. I'm a random thinker and a random writer and I have to say, I apologize to you, the reader because you may not get the point until I'm well on my way. You may understand it in different sequence than my brain does and you may have to dive in with me, go "huh?" and then backtrack once a light bulb comes on and you don't understand the randomness before your moment of "ah,ha!". So, bear with me, and I thank you ahead of time. The Lord has encouraged me that I just have to give it the way it comes and let Him do the rest. He did give me two starting points though and I'm hoping He will lead me from there. FIRST OF ALL... you need to read Part 1 to know what the discussion is here.

Part 2
Here is one of my main thoughts:
The fact that we seek happiness in the wrong ways does not prove that God's focus is not on our happiness. It only proves that we are off track.

This would be like saying that because our lusts are corrupted by sin, sexual pleasure is not what God wants for us.
HOWEVER....there are some legitimate observations about the images that these terms procure in our thinking. So, I want to start there because words are so crucial to our understanding but they also can become something they are not through cultural conditioning and experience. The bible uses both terms (though joy is used more) and John Piper bounces back and forth between them himself in his book "Desiring God" and I've noticed that sometimes you could substitute one for the other but not always. This solidified my theory that they are both important, different, and wrapped up in each other somehow. I invite further help on this if you have any because I'm searching with ya.
The Logistics....
Happy: Middle English ; Origin 1300-1350; adjective
"Hap"= "luck"
1. delighted, pleased, or glad, as over a particular thing.
2. characterized by or indicative of pleasure, contentment, or joy.
3. favored by fortune; fortunate or lucky
4. apt or felicitous, as actions, utterances or ideas.
5. obsessed by or quick to use the item indicated; characterized by spontaneous or obsessive inclination to use something.
Synonyms- joyous, joyful, blithe, cheerful, merry, contented, gay, blissful, satisfied, favorable, propitious, successful, prosperous, fortunate.

Joy: Latin (guadium-guad meaning to rejoice or take pleasure in; base of gaudere- "to be glad")
Origin: 1175-1225
Noun
1. emotion of great delight or happiness caused by something exceptionally good or satisfying; keen pleasure; elation
2. a source or cause of keen pleasure or delight; something or someone valued or appreciated.
3. the expression or display of glad feeling; festive gaiety.
4. a state of happiness or felicity
-verb form- (used w/o object)
5. to feel joy; be glad; rejoice
-verb form- (w/ object)
6. to gladden
Synonyms
1. rapture, bliss, pleasure
Greek versions: gaio- I rejoice, guaire "noble"

Ironically the Latin word for for joy itself is "Laetus" which means: happy,fertile, rich.

So, these are interesting and I don't know about you but they give me the feeling that I'm circling around and coming back to the place from which one begins and the other ends over and over and over. I mean that they are all tied in with each other, but I still knew there was something different between them and something that we were missing when we left out that difference. I have been searching to put my finger on that.
Even from these logistical definitions we get the feeling that happy leans into superficial and joy leans into profound. There seem to be things that happy has for us and there seem things that joy has for us. I think the big trip up here in the human definition of happy is the "luck" element. "Luck" gives a feeling of chance and human prosperity completely temporal. It really gives us a feeling of there being no God at all. And yet, part of joy means "fertile and rich" so again we circle.
What is the frustration?
I think I'm frustrated that time and culture have taken the older word joy and added ungodly parameters to the definition, because in our distaste for these, we throw out some things that the word has for us that we cannot miss. I present to you that the enemy has allowed this concept to be tainted because it is one of the most powerful concepts of our relationship to God, but I'll come back to that later.
What is the solution?
We cannot find our true definitions just here. We have to go biblical. Before we take that dive though, let's notice a few other important things about the logistics.
Happy is an adjective, it shows action. It has movement. Joy is a noun and just is what it is so to speak (I'm not good with grammar so help me or let me know if I'm off base here). Many of the things associated with happiness come and go: fortune, obsession, favor etc. Joy has more noble definitions that seem more solid: rapture, keen pleasure, valued delight, exceptional.
Hmmmm, you can see why we find one more biblically appealing than the other. So this is why we now must dive into the biblical intentions and these are not as easy to see because they don't have written explanations and parameters. Remember when I ask you to go back with me that the traditions of men have made these above definitions. I guess I'm asking you now, after filling your head with so much, to take a moment to wipe it clean and journey with me. I promise we will come back around, it just may take me a while.

Which Came First, the Happy or the Joy?
I asked my Christian friend this a few days ago and she said "of course, the joy! it had to!". She was bewildered when I said "nope".
My Premise:
God brought forgiveness through Christ to redeem our righteousness;
He brought joy through the Holy Spirit to redeem our happiness.

You can see that this leads to one thing only, that being that God was originally and fully focused on our happiness. For something to need redemption implies that it has been corrupted or torn away from it's original purpose and position. Our original purpose was happiness. In fact, the biblical concept of joy is proof that we were intended to be happy and it's purpose is to be a supernatural redemption of that state.
"All men seek happiness. This is without exception" Blaise Pascal
"seeking one's own happiness is not a sin; it is a simple given human nature. It is a law of the human heart, as gravity is a law of nature" John Piper
We have been given a hunger to be happy, a desire, a longing, by God. It was his original intent for us above all other things (an interesting side note is that even other religions are a proof of this fundamental truth. For instance Buddhism is all about living a life void of the effects of pain and suffering). There was one thing meant to fill that, Himself. God, being completely full of happiness and of fullest value sought to do the most loving thing for us that he could, make us crave the most supremely valuable thing, Him. It was the birth of the greatest love story that will ever be. The Creator wanted us to want Him above all (here was born our desire for happiness), not because he needed to be wanted but because out of his love for us he knew He was the ultimate thing we would need and delight in because He was the supreme source of happiness. Happiness is best experienced when it is extended to another and God did that for us. More on that later as well.
"It is not a bad thing to desire our own good. In fact, the great problem of human beings is that they are far too easily pleased. They don't seek pleasure with nearly the resolve and passion that they should." John Piper

"God finds our desires not to strong but too weak" C.S. Lewis
Here is a key difference from joy to happiness. The seeking of pleasure, the fostering of desire. This is what happiness brings to the table that joy does not. Notice above that joy is a noun and happy is an adjective. One is a continual state, and one is in motion. We've got the siting part right people, we are joyful (or so we say...more on that later too), but we lack the pursuit of more, the seeking of our pleasure. The very use of the term "true happiness" that we Christians employ is proof that we have decided there is a "false happiness" and I tell you, we have let the false one keep us from the true one not just in our thoughts of eternity but HERE and NOW. The enemy has used our culture to rob us of a great gift that God is standing and holding out for us but we cannot see it. The unsaved putter around that God picking up empty packages that don't satisfy and Christians don't realize that God has more to give because we are sitting wrapped in our blanket of joy (as we have defined it) thinking the gifts from him have been given all ready. We are in a white robe of righteousness wrapped up in a blanket of joy and sitting at his feet not seeing the further gift in hand for us (which really is Himself....continually given). I understand these are challenging things to absorb and excuse me if my word pictures do not help you but distract you. Please throw them out if they distract.
That God does not want us to be happy is a rooted deception of the enemy as are the lures to false happiness he has set up. To say "I am joyful" seems to leave out the action of pursuit. The very "I am" part of that trips us up. The very fact that happiness is fleeting shows us that we need to be up and moving, desiring and seeking pleasure meant for us from God. It's characteristic of fleeting does not prove it invaluable but attained differently. I am joyful but I need to keep wanting joy and that is a process of seeking happiness. Joy is not a finished state, it is in essence a balm for us when we hit rock bottom in this world of sin and there is nothing else. That is why the unsaved don't have it. It is a gift given to us from the Holy Spirit for our aid in our state of fallenness.
"Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart." Psalm 37:4 He will make you happy!? He wants to make you happy. Happiness essentially is the fulfillment of our desires! Our delight in Him is tied to our happiness and it is the meaning of our lives and that is why we cannot say that God's focus is not our happiness and that it's not the meaning of life. It is the VERY purpose for which we were created, to glorify Him by enjoying Him forever.
"As a dear pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you O, God, for the living God" Psalm 42:1-2. Need, want, I am joyful but I need to keep wanting. I am made to want, I am made to desire. I am made to seek happiness. Joy is to help me supernaturally when I cannot be happy because of the effect sin has had on God's intent for happiness ORIGINALLY. The main effect of sin and fallenness here is sorrow, loss, bad health and pain. God intended for us to be happy, but he also intended for us to be righteous. We are no more happy through our day than we are righteous. This does not mean he did not intend these things for us, that they were not his focus and goal, it means we are in a fallen state. Does God want you to be happy all day? Yes, I say that he does (well, the bible says that he does, he commands happiness). Can you? No. Why? Because of sin from which we are freed in our position with Christ but from which we still suffer the effects, not on our souls, but on our minds and bodies. Does God want you to be righteous all day? Yes, I say that he does (well, the bible says he does, he commands righteousness). Can you? No. Why? Because of sin from which we are freed in our ...okay..you get it.
In conclusion (on this point anyway...):
Happiness was the focus of God for us. It still is. He works all things for His glory and His glory defines that we should be happy. Sin corrupted that (as he allowed, but that is ANOTHER blog theme!). His Son brought redemption we call joy. It's a love relationship he wants with His created, a desire that we should want to be happy because He is our Happiness, our fulfillment of ongoing desire. He wanted so badly to redeem our intended happiness that he sent His son not only to bring us the balm of joy, but to restore our continual fulfillment of desire...our happiness. This is why I cringe when we say "God's focus is not on our happiness and it is not the meaning of life." Oh, but good Christian it is! The elements of happiness that were intended for the Christian is something I propose that the enemy does not want us to see because it would catapult our view of God to a level he can't handle. It would make us motivated beyond measure to delight and enjoy God. It would make us his biggest threat. He wants us to call it bad and throw it out along with the precious life changing truth that it holds for us.
So, what is our problem as Christians?
We don't enjoy God. (and yes, I post that black because it is bleak indeed)

..and that is where we will pick up next time.

(Note: if you are not all ready, I cannot urge you enough to pick up a copy of John Piper's book "Desiring God". There is so much more above, beyond and around this topic than I address here. In fact, I'm really taking a rabbit trail off of my thoughts from the book. Piper does not even get into the difference of these terms but there is so much more there to understand that I will be talking about here)

Does God Work For Our Happiness? Christian Hedonism Part 1

Sometimes I feel that we get in these modes as believers where we know the ropes and the rules and we just want to keep pressing on as we know it instead of being challenged to learn new things. I don't fit well in those circles because I have AMAZING joy in learning crazy new things about God. Things that hurt my brain to talk and think about. Things that I've not heard discussed yet in Christian circles. Things that people like Lewis and Piper blow my brain with and challenge me that THERE IS EVEN MORE! OH HOW I LOVE THAT ABOUT GOD! In fact it is the very essence of my discussion here, the very seeking for these pleasures from God, desiring Him, wanting more. To be totally content in Him and yet desire more is the foundation of happiness in Him and from Him.

I want to ask some questions. I want to enter a theological gym of sorts and do some stretches and some painful muscle building. I invite you to enter with me, and to challenge me in any way. I invite discussion and humble hearts who long to banter about the issues of our very existence. Doesn't that sound exciting!? Well, it does to me and you came by my blog so ...here we go:)

What is happiness?

What is joy?

Are they the same?

Is happiness even important to Christians?

Does God long for us to be happy?

Does he long for us to be joyful?

What do they mean?

Is our happiness on God's priority list?

What does the world define as "happy"?

Is it wrong to want to be happy?

Is it a right or a God given desire?

How has sin tainted this desire like it has so many others?

These are the things I want to talk about. This will take a while, and yes, I'm a wife and mother of three children and I work a small job for 2 hours a day. So, I'm not in a hurry to get through this. I WILL get through it though because I feel it is vital to the Christian walk. I think it's something we are missing.

Want to know where to start to get going? Go to http://www.desiringgod.org/ and read about Christian Hedonism. Or, pick up the book "Desiring God" by John Piper.

What inspired this?

I read a lovely Christian woman state that "we think we deserve happiness" and "our happiness is not God's focus and it is not the meaning of life". Although I completely understand where she was coming from and the validity of her statements (and trust me, they ARE valid and true in the sense she intended them), my soul cringes when we say these things. The reason is not because she is wrong but because there is SO MUCH MORE that IS important on the issue of happiness and unfortunately we as Christians stop at this and don't go on into the rest of it. We get this, as stated above, and we get the concept of joy. Those spiritual muscles are stretched and built and we think we are done. We are not. In between there is a whole element that is glorious about God. It comes down to understanding what he has instilled in us when he made us. It comes down to understanding definitions and where they are wrong.

I tell you, I know God wants us to be happy and I think we have thrown the baby out with the bathwater when we shun this word entirely. I will talk about why and how. I will be bold enough to say that God's whole plan was and is for our happiness. Joy, yes, but even happiness. We have to be willing to erase cliche thoughts and go back to the drawing board of EVERYTHING having to do with why we are here and how He is redeeming us back to himself. Like said, it's a lot but believe me when I say, your joy will be made full if you journey with me. It will be embellished in a way you never knew. I'm not the most knowledgeable on these things though so I'm just hoping to inspire and get you started. Seek the word, we will here. Read Lewis, we will be quoting his thoughts for sure, and please, please read John Piper. God has given this man a great gift of deeper thinking into the scripture that continually challenges me and makes God bigger in my thinking than He ever was before.

I'll start you off with this poem to ponder. I look forward to the journey.

When God at first made man,

Having a glass of blessings standing by,

Let us (said he) pour on him all we can:

Let the world's riches, which dispersed lie,

Contract into a span.

So strength first made a way;

Then beauty flowed, then wisdom, honour, pleasure:

When almost all was out, God made a stay,

Perceiving that alone of all his treasure,

Rest in the bottom lay.

For if I should (said he)

Bestow this jewel also on my creature,

He would adore my gifts instead of me,

And rest in Nature, not the God of Nature:

So both should losers be.

Yet let him keep the rest,

But keep them with repining restlessness;

Let him be rich and weary, that at least,

If goodness lead him not, yet weariness

May toss him to my breast.

George Herbert