Dave’s Monday Blast – April 22, 2019
MEN OF INTENTION
Good Morning Men of Intention,
Pastor/Author Jim Denison comments, “No one present in the Garden that night or at Calvary the next day saw Easter coming.” Perhaps they should have after living with Him for three years…but all they were able to do was view the events of that weekend as catastrophic. Regardless, we see this theme across Scripture; think of Joseph before Pharaoh’s dreams; Moses before the Exodus; Joshua the sixth time around Jericho; Daniel when he was thrown into the lion’s den; Lazarus when he was buried; Paul before his journey to Damascus; and John when he was exiled to Patmos.
John 7:5 tells us that, during Jesus’ earthly ministry, “not even his brothers believed in him.” But one of them was Jude, who became the author of the book that bears his name. Another was James, who became leader of the Jerusalem church and author of the book bearing his name. Each of these stories illustrates the same fact: it is always too soon to give up on God.
Our materialistic culture measures reality by the material. The mantra of our day continues, “What you see is what you get.” It’s hard to look at life through the eyes of faith if you don’t have faith. Most of the world’s religions make their appeal on transactional terms.
Denison defines this term: “Pray this or do this or give this in order for God or the gods to do what you ask. The Canaanites invented Baal as the god of weather, then prayed and sacrificed to him so he would provide the rain upon which their economy depended. The Greeks invented the gods of Mount Olympus, deities to whom they would pray and sacrifice when they needed what the gods could provide. If you were going to war, you prayed and sacrificed to Ares. If you were preparing to make a journey by sea, you prayed and sacrificed to Poseidon. The Romans adopted this Greek pantheon, renaming most of their gods but continuing their transactional religion. This approach to religion became a part of the cultural DNA of the Western world.”
As a result, it is tempting for Christians to see our faith in transactional terms. When we do what we think God wants us to do, we are frustrated when He does not do what we think He should. When the Lord does not answer our prayers when we want or how we want, we begin to question His power, His love or even the point of praying. If it doesn’t work, why do it? Hmmm…has this ever happened to you my brothers?
INTENTIONAL men of God know that we don’t have a transactional “religion”. We don’t go to church on Sunday so God will bless us on Monday, our Savior invites us into a transformational relationship.
He calls us to:
1. Know Him INTIMATELY
2. Worship Him PASSIONATELY
3. Serve Him SACRIFICIALLY
Not so that He will love us but because He already does. That’s good isn’t it!
Does God’s answer to your need seem to be delayed? Is His providence slower than your patience? Remember the Garden of Gethsemane. And do not wonder if God loves you. Julian of Norwich (1342 – 1416), witness to the Black Death in medieval England, tells the story of the hazelnut: “It lasteth and ever shall for God loveth it.” In the hazelnut she testifies, “I saw three properties. The first is that God made it, the second is that God loveth it, the third, that God keepeth it.”
Do you believe all three are true of you?
