It was an incredible military breakthrough. Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, Commander Joe Rochefort broke the Japanese codes. From an intelligence base on Oahu, he predicted an attack on Midway Island for June 3, 1942. Because of Rochefort's skill, the United States surprised the Japanese Navy with its first defeat in 350 years. Four carriers were lost, one cruiser, 2500 men, 322 aircraft, and the best of their pilots. The tide turned in the Pacific; Japan never recovered momentum. Commander Rochefort never received proper credit. Instead, intelligence staff in Washington falsified reports and claimed the fame, even though they had predicted a June 10th day of attack, a week late. Washington sealed the records for 40 years. The real hero was moved from intelligence and assigned to a dry dock in San Francisco. In the book Deceit at Pearl Harbor, Ken Landis tells of a note kept on Rochefort’s desk; it read: “We can accomplish anything providing no one cares who gets the credit.” "That,” says Landis, “was the attitude that won the battle of Midway."1
This story highlights a character quality that stands out in our world of image management and celebrity seeking, where style is mistaken for substance and visibility is taken for virtue. The trait goes under various names. Some label it modesty, others humility; some speak of self-control and wisdom. Whatever the name, the measuring stick for approval is internal, not external. The right thing to do is the right thing to do, particularly if no one is looking, because there is One who is always looking, One who, as Jesus said sees in secret. “Character,” wrote D.L. Moody, “is what a man (or woman) is in the dark.”2
Each of us has a private life and an inner world. Only we know it in depth, and only God who sees the heart knows it fully. We know in part, but we are already fully known to the eye of our heavenly Father with whom there are no secrets and therefore no privacy.3 What we think and feel, what we hope for, our besetting sins, the passions that drive us, our fears, and what we dream about at night. Each of us is an irreducible mystery of layer upon layer, which is at least part of what it means to be made in the image and likeness of a God who can never be exhausted. You are not a problem to be solved; you are a mystery to be explored in concert with the One who made you and offers to remake you in Jesus Christ.
There are ways to heighten our awareness of the inner world. If we take up the spiritual discipline of silence and solitude, which is a form of fasting from distractions, including people, the inner world bubbles to the surface. If we take up the practice of journaling, which is the discipline of setting up a correspondence with our own soul, it comes out on paper. If we open our heart to a friend or pastor, which is the discipline of spiritual direction, they will see what we do not and offer insight and encouragement.
Our visible life is the small part, our inner world by far the larger. Like an iceberg or deep river, most of us is hidden. The discipline of voluntary fasting reveals all the things we are attached to in order to feel good; secret giving reveals our attitude toward money and security. Prayer is being vulnerable with God and risks God speaking back, which can be startling when it happens. Your thoughts are interrupted, and you know you have been addressed. It is distinctive, and often funny; I laugh out loud. At other times, when I have ignored the call and seen the consequences, I feel pierced as with an invisible saber. I grieve what I missed and whom I disappointed. If you are not aware of this dynamic, spend some time with John 10:27, “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me....”
Thursday evening was the last night of Bible school. After the children sang songs about Christ and my heart was warmed by their faith, an offering was taken, almost as an afterthought. I heard the voice nudge me, “Empty your wallet out of gratitude.”
I looked, and there was a single twenty. I quickly argued myself out of generosity, and just then, at that very moment I was leaning up to put my wallet back into my pocket, the man behind me -a disabled man who is not a member of this church and who has not much money at all -dropped in a twenty without a thought and without even breaking the conversation about fishing with the man on the row in front. A saber went through my insides. I winced; my disobedience had been exposed by divine timing and a superior example. I gave it later, but all the joy was gone. It was now an act of repentance. I warn you: If you pray, God will speak; if you fast you will develop new hungers, and if you seek the virtue of generosity, God will completely expose the cheapskate hidden in your little soul!
Whatever the external effects of the classic spiritual disciplines, the primary effect is the formative influence they have on us. They take us from shallow to deep. They empty us out for new capacities. And when we take them up in response to the call of God, they in a sense take us up as students and work from the inside out. To get a tan, you lay in the sun. To grow fitter, you exercise. To learn to think, you read and listen; to develop style you read good writers. To grow in grace and the spiritual wisdom of the Christian life, you pay attention to which disciplines the Lord is calling you to at this point in your life.
A spiritual discipline is a practice taken up in response to the grace of God. Some are for all and at all times: public worship, immersion in Scripture, seeking justice, tithing, fasting, Sabbath keeping, acts of service to the poor, honoring the body with self-care, prayer, witnessing, truth telling, confession and repentance, chastity and fidelity, taking the Lord’s Supper- the standard package. Each Sunday’s worship is a smorgasbord of spiritual disciplines on display. Others are taken up from time to time as needed: pilgrimages, journaling, retreats, extraordinary giving, extended silences, particular vows, voluntary suffering, acts of personal obedience, vigils, formal counseling if needed, other forms of abstinence and self-denial. Just as a physician has many therapies and a coach many exercises, so the church has a treasury of spiritual disciples through which grace is available.
To work in a garden or on a house, multiple tools are needed; each one does a different job, and with all of them together crops are grown and homes built. Same with our following of Jesus and our partnership with our immediate supervisor, the Holy Spirit. They offer us the use of certain tools, what we have come to call means of grace. And if there is a lack in our churches today, it is that pastors are neither practicing much nor teaching often the set of proven practices that offers the most promise of conforming us to Christ. We have pointed people to an empty plot of land, told them to plant a garden or build a house, and then not given them the required tools. Any wonder the Christian life does not seem to work for so many of our people who have grown passive and discouraged. Duty gives way to drudgery, and the delight vanishes. Tedium is great, testimonies few. Dry spells are to be expected, but when they go on and on and on, help is needed. Every Christian needs to understand the basic theology and practice of the spiritual disciplines, just as every believer needs to have a practical understanding of the gifts of the Holy Spirit and the strategies of spiritual warfare. There are just some things you have to know, and I can’t know them for you. They can’t be delegated, but they can be learned from books and living examples.
So God asks me to dance and learn some new steps; I say Yes, but where we are headed is not clear. I cannot change me at any real depth; that is the lie of self-help. My unaided will is not strong enough to wrench my life into a new path for very long. The ruts of sin are deep and my habits too comfortable. Depth change comes through cooperation with the God of grace who has many avenues of approach, and the name for that cooperation is one or more of the spiritual disciplines which are grounded in Scripture and church tradition across the ages. Spiritual disciples are places I am saying a deliberate Yes to God. Of themselves they do not make anything happen; in fact, each contains its own temptation to pride and self-deception. They only work when God works through them.
Two stories come to mind, the first from the Jewish tradition. Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach once said to a student, "Full experiences of God can never be planned or achieved. They are spontaneous moments of grace, almost accidental."
The disciple responded, "Esteemed Rabbi, if God-realization is just accidental, why do we work so hard doing all these spiritual practices?"
The rabbi answered, "To be as accident-prone as possible."4
The second is from the East. A disciple asked, “What can I do to attain God?”
The master answered, “What can you do to make the sun rise?”
The follower was angered, “Then why are you giving us all these methods of prayer?”
And the master replies, “To make sure you’re awake when the sun rises.”5
These are not two stories but one told in two ways; each leaves us with the insight that the benefit of spiritual disciplines is always indirect. They hold us open to the surprising work of God. And the result from God’s side is always out of proportion to the effort from ours. It takes energy to respond to God’s grace, but even the desire to take up the effort is itself a gift which can be refused. The God who offers the discipline also offers the desire to take it up and the ability to persevere. John Ortberg gives us a visual image to understand the interplay of what only God can do and what we must do with God’s aid. He writes:
“Significant human transformation always involves training, not just trying. Spiritual transformation is a long-term endeavor. It involves both God and us. I liken it to crossing an ocean. Some people try, day after day, to be good, to become spiritually mature. That's like taking a rowboat across the ocean. It's exhausting and usually unsuccessful.
Others have given up trying and throw themselves entirely on relying on God's grace. They're like drifters on a raft. They do nothing but hang on and hope God gets them there. (But) neither trying nor drifting are effective in bringing about spiritual transformation. A better image is the sailboat, which if it moves at all, is a gift of the wind. We can't control the wind, but a good sailor discerns where the wind is blowing and adjusts the sails accordingly.”6
TURNING TO THE TEXT
If we aim at being his contemporary followers, it is important to admit that Jesus knows what he was talking about when it comes to transformation. To look back at ourselves through his eyes is to meet the truth; we do that by paying careful attention to what he said. Jesus is the expert; if it disagrees with him, it’s simply wrong, and if it coheres with what he says, then it contains a measure of truth no matter where it comes from. This is how we deal with other religions and philosophies. We are clear on the center and open around the edges. Christ is the living center around which life is organized. And make no mistake, what we are aiming at is not improvement but transformation, to becoming a new kind of kingdom people whose life together makes the message of Jesus believable. The world window-shops the church and then, if interested in the wares, comes in to meet the proprietor of such fine goods.
For us the world is that which is most pressing and most real and most demanding. It’s always there and never stops its pressure and allurements. There is so much is coming at us from within and without that to keep our focus on God comes only in fits and spurts.
I look up at the beauty of the night sky, but not often. I am so focused on tasks and spend so little time outside that I forget there are a moon and stars on display each night. Months go by. Then, all of a sudden, I look up, “Stars and moon, I forgot you were there; the world is a large place. I am nothing but a mole burrowing in the earth. Have mercy on me, O Lord.”
Same with God. Christians can go days, even weeks or months, so busy that we pay no attention to the God who is there. Then we look up or look inward or get a divine tap on the shoulder and are startled at what we have ignored. This is one of the many meanings of being a sinner and experiencing the debilitating effects of spiritual blindness and deafness. We forget what’s in front of us and the One who is always near.
But for Jesus that was not a problem. It’s why we call him Sinless and Savior and Rabbi and Lord and why the Nicene Creed states that he was one in substance with the Father and the Spirit. He lived in our world, was more aware of its depths than we are, but in the abiding center of his attention was the person of the Father whom he always obeyed and the presence of the Spirit he always followed in order to obey. So that when he spoke to his followers of receiving a reward from your Father who is in heaven, for him it was not a theoretical idea but a constant experience into which he invites us for show and tell. To Jesus heaven was as viewable as earth and the Father nearer than the closest friend. Jesus lived by vision and by voice; he was divine revelation walking around on foot. He lived in the midst of many but before an audience of only One. He loved people, but aimed to please only One. The secret of Jesus was his secret life with God. He was able, as we are not, to maintain full contact on two dimensions at once: with whoever stood before him and also with the Father through the intermediary ministry of the Holy Spirit. Secure in the Father’s love, Jesus did not need his ego stroked. He had lots to display, but no need for show. “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.... Listen to him.”7
vv.1-4 The Spiritual Discipline of Loving Charity.
Jesus assumed, as did his fellow Jewish teachers, that faith in the God of Israel was not just an invisible, inward thing, a feeling or disposition of mind, but that it had visible practices and supportive disciplines, two of the most important of which were giving aid to the poor and voluntary fasting. People who know this God do these things. They share their goods, and they know that we do not live by bread alone but by every one of God’s words. They sometimes fast from food in order to feast inwardly on God’s secret things. It seems that a little less money and, from time to time, a lot less food have ways of keeping us open to the God from whom all blessings flow. The one curbs our acquisitiveness for things, and the other acts as a brake on our out-of-control bodily appetites. This is why the greedy can’t tithe and the gluttonous resist fasting. It feels like death, which it in fact is. When you first do these things, you will feel like you are dying! And that is a good thing!
Because he knew the human heart so well, Jesus issued a warning to those who were eager to take up spiritual disciplines in order to satisfy the hunger to know God. It is hard to shift the audience from those who see your outward life to the One who sees your inward life as well. Verse 1: “Beware,” he said, “of practicing your piety before men, in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven.”
As long as we are on this earth under its current oppressive regime, we will always be tempted to play to the wrong audience and look to people for approval. The temptation is to live socially but not spiritually and to jockey for the admiration that comes from applause rather than the affirmation that comes from God, alone and in secret. But Jesus wants us each to have a secret life with God, to have a bit of what he lived with constantly and to find a delight no one can take away. This is the sweet center of genuine faith, not just outward conformity to religious duties but a sense of intimacy and adventure with God.
Douglas Coupland is the postmodern literary icon who coined the term Generation X with his novel by that name. He grew up secular, but in one of his books he discloses a spiritual quest common to many in the secular world. He writes:
“Now, here is my secret. I tell it to you with an openness of heart that I doubt I shall ever achieve again, so I pray that you are in a quiet room as you hear these words. My secret is that I need God—that I am sick and can no longer make it alone. I need God to help me give, because I no longer seem to be capable of giving; to help me be kind, as I no longer seem capable of kindness; to help me love, as I seem beyond being able to love."8
More and more of my time as a pastor is being taken up with the poor, the materially poor and those who admit they are poor in spirit. I take it as a compliment that the Lord sends them my way; when I feel overwhelmed with their stories and needs, it drives me to prayer and away from shallow schemes of help. Like Douglas Coupland, they need God, and I do too! And when God puts a poor person of either category in your path, it is an opportunity from heaven, and if you see it as anything else, as an embarrassment or an interruption, then you are simply not in touch with the heart of Jesus. Some need food, others medicine, but all need time, a listening ear, a sense of respect, the guidance of Scripture, and much prayer and encouragement. If the poor are uncomfortable in our churches, then the problem is with us, not them. Georgetown is full of poor, unchurched people. They are the test of our faith, not how many Bible verses we can quote or who the influential people are in our little circle of acquaintances.
Jesus did not say if you give alms, but when, and he was speaking to the disciples. Jesus expects his people to have enough to give away. Helping the poor, not just through taxes and institutions and impersonal social service programs, but personally and face-to-face is the responsibility of every Christian. If you are not personally involved with anyone who on the desperate edge of life to the point that their face and tears fills your prayers, then you are becoming increasingly useless to the kingdom of God. Stop hiding from such people. Stop arranging your life to avoid them. They are the angels of God in your path.
The quickest way I know to relieve spiritual boredom and to recover the joy of the Lord is to acquaint yourself with someone in real need, not just as a project to gossip about but as one as beloved of God as you are. It makes prayer edgy and real; it makes the Bible come alive with relevance; it makes the gifts of the Spirit necessary equipment instead of optional extras. It raises all sorts of social justice questions for which slogans and ideologies of the left and the right are inadequate. We don’t have a homeless problem in America, we have a love problem in the church. Too many of God’s people are hiding in social superiority and hoarding in fear rather than helping in faith. Jesus assumed we would all be involved with the poor who need our money and our friendship and our faith. His only concern was that in doing it we not play to the wrong audience. It’s not about building a resume but about being a secret partner with God. So no trumpet fanfares, shine no spotlights, no looking over your shoulder, and no keeping score with your conscience. God knows, and that’s enough to have a grand ole time together doing the kingdom stuff!
What is Jesus after in this matter? After a people so transformed by the kingdom that engaging the poor is something they no longer have to think about. It’s so much a habit that they are not aware they are doing it any longer. Like riding a bike or knitting. You could even say that they are so lost in the work that the impossible has happened: their left hand does not know what their right hand is doing. C.H. Spurgeon put it this way:
“Let us hide away our charity- yes... even from ourselves. Give so often, and so much as a matter of course, that you no more take note that you have helped the poor than that you have eaten your regular meals. Do your alms without whispering to yourself, ‘How generous I am!’ Do not thus attempt to reward yourself. Leave the matter with God, who never fails to see, to record, and to reward. This is the bread, which eaten by stealth, is sweeter than the banquets of kings. How can I indulge myself today with this delightful luxury?”9
Just this past week in private conversation I had a man tell me with joy that he and his wife were at the double tithe level of giving and were aiming at more. He then left me with money for an ex-convict who was coming to see me in an hour. The next day a woman was able to start a job to support her four children because that money bought two pairs of pants and a pair of work shoes. That is the kind of man that God will be following around all day pouring out all kinds of secret blessings. That was the same night I turned down heaven’s offer to give an extra twenty at Bible School! How little I learned! Richard Foster wrote:
“When we let go of money, we are letting go of part of ourselves and part of our security. But this is precisely why it is important to do it. It is one way to obey Jesus' command to deny ourselves. When we give money, we are releasing a little more of our egocentric selves and a little more of our false security. Giving frees us to care. It produces an air of expectancy as we anticipate what God will lead us to give. It makes life with God an adventure in the world, and that is worth living for and giving for.”10
Jesus is not trying to make your life miserable and narrow, just the opposite. We are heirs of the riches of the kingdom of heaven. But neither can he give us what we want on our terms. If you want kingdom rewards, you have to walk the kingdom way, which means that God gets the right to squeeze you often and squeeze you hard that the poor in this world may find hope and help in Jesus Christ and in his church. And the only real reward God has to give is more of himself. I would rather have more of the anointing of the Holy Spirit than more money. I would rather have a bigger heart than a fatter paycheck. I would rather have
an impressive life than an impressive portfolio. God has more than met all my needs. All the stuff is his, and there is nothing wrong with you enjoying some of it, as long as you don’t set your heart on it and think your goal in life is to pile it up and protect it and brag on it.
Who in this church will plan for a ministry to single mothers to have a night a week to be spiritually encouraged while they kids are cared for? Who will teach them how to stay away from bad men? Who will show them how to feed a family on Food Stamps? Who will pray with them to heal the wounds of incest and rape and the shame of prostitution? Who will be a father and mother to those who were abandoned? I am broken hearted with what I see in this town. Who will help and not expect credit? Who will fast and pray and obey?
vv.16-18 The Spiritual Discipline of Voluntary Fasting.
Fasting was a second spiritual discipline Jesus assumed his followers would practice after
his death and resurrection.11 To fast is to go without food, and sometimes even without drink, for a specified time, in order to humble yourself and give the time to intense spiritual activity, especially prayer. It says I want God more than food, and it uses the pains of the belly to remind us that our real hunger is for God.
I recently spoke to a woman who had not eaten in four days, not because she was fasting but because she had no food to eat. She had lost her job. This is not the kind of fasting we are after; this is the kind of fasting we must work to eliminate. The fasting Jesus spoke of was not involuntary, it was not a weight loss technique, it was not a means to coerce God, and it was not for display to make other people think of you as particularly holy. It was a serious denying of the belly in order to draw more deeply on the grace of God.
Did you know that at ordination every United Methodist minister answers this question, "Will you recommend fasting or abstinence (i.e., partial fasting) both by precept[12] and example?" No obligation is so quickly forgotten as this one. Never have I heard it discussed at a pastor’s meeting or heard a sermon on it, except ones I preached! It is on none of the reports I fill out; there is no accountability for this commitment.
Speaking of the lack of spiritual vigor in some early Methodist societies, John Wesley commented that the neglect of fasting was "sufficient to account for our feebleness and faintness of spirit." He went on to say, "We are continually grieving the Holy Spirit by the habitual neglect of this plain duty." It may surprise you to learn that Wesley required all his early preachers to fast two days during the week (Wednesday & Friday), would not ordain any person who would not keep this pattern, and called a general fast for his followers once a quarter.13 One reason for the spiritual vitality of early Methodism was its practice of spiritual disciplines, including regular fasting as a common discipline.
I have practiced fasting off and on over the last thirty years, both as an aid to prayer and as a remedy against one of my besetting sins which is gluttony. Gluttony is eating beyond what is required, usually to satisfy some emotional need or to cover internal pain with a calorie coma. Obesity is a spiritual as well as a medical and psychological problem. I find that I commit gluttony when I am anxious or fearful, which is too much of the time. Food is a safe place to hide, isn't it? A socially acceptable fix, a way to numb feelings.
Being a person prone to excesses of all sorts, I often find it easier not to eat at all than in moderation. Periodic fasting is a potent reminder that my belly is not God, and that the grace of Christ is sufficient. I often cry when I fast, not because of low blood sugar but because I see my sins with new clarity and fresh grief. Quietness steals over my soul and my true motives are unmasked. I find that I cannot fast and remain hardhearted toward God. As we humble our bodies by kneeling, so we humble our souls with fasting. Fasting has the remarkable property of revealing all the things to which I am overly attached. What a tune up is to a car, fasting is for the Christian. It is a form of preventive maintenance for the soul.
It is my habit to fast from Thursday evening to Friday at three. That is normally when I write sermons and a time when it is particularly crucial for me to listen for God. On occasion I fast for longer periods. For one year before I asked Lori to marry me I fasted every Tuesday and sought God's guidance for our future. Every day I reap the benefits of that year of fasting in a loving wife and a solid marriage. In times of great temptation and of weighty personal decisions I have fasted, once for five days until the temptation was broken. I share my own experiences with you not as a matter of show but as your pastor to encourage you to follow me as I follow Christ with stumbling steps.
Not all can fast; some have medical reasons that prevent such a discipline. But they can help the rest of us find other ways to practices the disciplines of self-denial for the sake of the kingdom of God. How about fasting from TV and media for a week? What hours might be freed up for something other than mind-numbing entertainment and useless information? Might we then have time to get to know our neighbors and have something as silly as a game night or a neighborhood gathering? Read a good book? Read our Bibles? Wouldn’t that be a novel idea?
How about fasting from the interruptions of cell phones for a week? What about fasting from all criticism and gossip? How about a week of silence and listening in which I speak only when necessary and with as few words as possible? What about the weekly fast from work the Bible calls Sabbath-keeping, which for me is he toughest commandment of all? What about fasting from consumer culture and asking God to make us content with what we have? Don’t buy anything for a whole week. Make do; see what you can do without; disbelieve every advertisement; see how hard it is to say not to more.
The experience of the church across time is that fasting brings focus and intensity to seeking God; it whets our appetite for divine things. It is a tool of humility and repentance. It is something Jesus did and expects us to do, and if we neglect such explicit teaching, he might wonder whether we believe him in these matters or not. His feelings will not be hurt, but our lives will be impoverished. As with charity, Jesus words are not if you fast, but when you fast. There are many good books on these topics, and I can recommend them to you.14
Now to the controversial issue of rewards, which Jesus was not at all skittish about appealing to. Those who believe that rewards are not a motivational issue don’t understand how we are designed. Our behavior is purposive and oriented toward pleasure. This is not something defective; it’s how God made us. We were made for the enjoyment of all things in God, and in this fallen world addiction is when we seek to enjoy something apart from God and ask it to deliver satisfactions it was not designed to offer. Our desire gets stuck to the object and can’t get free. Addiction is a sign of idolatry, that I am overloading something in creation and asking of it what it was never intended to supply. All addictions have spiritual roots, which is why 12 step programs or outright miracles are the only real cure.
But it is OK, I think, to be hooked on God. Jesus was; over him the heavens were open and the Spirit always descending like a water fall. Opening blind eyes must have been fun, even better raising the dead so that the funeral director had to return the fees! The disciples got drunk and high on the Spirit at Pentecost. Being filled with the Spirit is a repeatable phenomena. Genuine joy is intoxicating. Heaven is a party with no hangover. I am told that crack cocaine is really good the first time. The touch and reward of the Lord is even better.
I had such an experience three weeks ago while praying with a young woman who had been horribly abused and was living in foster care. I met her at the Jamison Inn where I was staying at Annual Conference; she was cleaning the rooms and nineteen years’ old.
She was sitting in the lobby when I walked in wearing my collar. I looked at her; she looked at me and said, “I need to talk to a pastor.”
We went into the office, and I listened. I believe that a special place in the hottest parts of hell are reserved for those who steal the innocence of young men and women. They steal what cannot be replaced and inflicts wounds that are hard to heal. Her dad was in jail.
At the end of the prayers of forgiveness and restoration the Lord spoke to me clearly, “Give her enough money for a fun night with her friends. She never had a father do that for her. I did it joyfully. I told her I was standing in for the earthly father she never had. I cried; she cried; I was full of joy the rest of the night. Back in my room, the desk clerk called about thirty minutes later and said, “What did you do in the hotel office?”
“What do you mean, What did I do?”
She said, “It’s different down here, like love is all over the place. You can feel it. The cleaning lady said you prayed for her. Will you pray for me?”
I did, but first a question came to mind. I asked, Is there anything in you life that you know displeases the Lord? It was quiet for a moment. She was a Christian and had moved in with her boyfriend a few days before. After a brief discussion of why shacking was a bad idea if her goal was marriage, I prayed with her. The joy was there as well.
It was a reward from God, one after the other. A middle-aged white pastor praying with two young black women in an office and on the phone. It was a kingdom thing and a Holy Spirit thing. No other way to explain the oddity of it. I was high on God and the joy of the gospel. This is the reward God gives for those who seek him in the means appointed, two of the chief of which are charity to the poor and fasting. I like retelling the story because it brings the joy back, and I like the joy of the Lord. I like having Jesus interrupt my day and my expectations for kingdom work. I like it when he draws outside the box.
I did not say addicted to religion, which can, in the ultimate perversion of intent, be the last safe place to hide from God; I say hooked on God, wanting more of God. God has many rewards, but the best of all is nothing other than more of God. Did you know that your heart can sing? The rewards of seeking God are intrinsic, meaning they are part of the thing itself. A man who marries for the reward of money is a mercenary; a man who marries for the reward of love is a true lover. One scholar wrote, “The proper rewards are not simply tacked on to the activity for which they are given, but the activity itself in consummation.”15 The reward for years of practicing violin is the joy of playing a Beethoven sonata or a bluegrass tune in which you enter what is called the zone, a place of purity and ecstasy where you merge with the music. God will meet our needs, but our deepest need is for more of God. It is amazing how quickly things and stuff come back into perspective once you understand the rewards of God. Nothing is better than the reward that comes from God. Success without God is a dead end and path Satan uses to destroy the up-and-out.
Virginia Law Shell tells that she once heard of a father who asked his son when he planned to purchase a much-needed automobile.
"When God sends my 100 fold return," the son replied. He explained, "Recently I gave a gift of $50. When God sends my reward, I'll have $5000 and buy my car."
When he realized his son was serious, the father responded, "God is already sending your reward. It comes every two weeks, and it is called salary."
Shell comments, “It is time that we Christians stop and assess what we really believe about prosperity. A life lived for the glory of God is its own reward.”16 And if you do not believe that, you have much to learn about the secret joys of knowing God. I’m at a place in my life that if God does not send it, I do not want it. It would only be a distraction from the real stuff, the kingdom stuff, the chance to move deeper into God’s work in the world.
CONCLUSION
In one area of Africa where Christianity began to spread, converts were zealous about daily devotions. They would find a spot in the wild thickets and pour their hearts out to God. The spots soon became well-worn; paths were created. Without a thought, one's prayer life was made public. If someone began to neglect his or her prayer life, it would soon be noticed. Believers would gently remind those in neglect, "Grass grows on your path."17
Are you practicing the disciplines of the kingdom, or is there grass on your path? What will you do about it? Jesus said, Not if, but when you give alms. Not if, but when you fast. That is an invitation to the secret joys of the kingdom of God, and they are offered to all who take him up.
1. Edited from PreachingToday.com search under Mt. 6:1-4.
2. Idem.
3. 1 Corinthians 13:12.
4. PreachingToday.com search under spiritual disciplines.
5. Brian Cavanaugh, The Sower’s Seeds (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist, 1990), 43.
6. See No. 4 above.
7. Mark 1:11, 9:7.
8. Life After God (New York: Pocket Books, 1994).
9. C. H. Spurgeon in Faith's Checkbook, Christianity Today, Vol. 32, no. 5.
10. Quoted in "Reflections," Christianity Today, June 2, 2000.
11. Mark 2:18-20.
12. Book of Discipline 2000, para. 321, question 16. “Fasting has been a part of Methodism from it's early beginnings. John Wesley considered fasting an important part of a Christian's life and he personally fasted weekly. To Wesley, fasting was an important way to express sorrow for sin and penitence for overindulgence in eating and drinking. He believed it benefited prayer life by allowing more time for prayer. He also felt fasting was more meaningful if combined with giving to the poor. Wesley did advise caution against extreme fasting and against fasting for those in fragile health.” Accessed at umc.org search under fasting.
13. Judith Woodward, "Fasting: Relic or Relevant," Circuit Rider, January 1986, 3.
14. Three of the best are Richard Foster, The Celebration of Discipline (San Francisco, CA: HarperSanFrancisco, 1998); Dallas Willard, The Spirit of the Disciplines (San Francisco, CA: HarperSanFrancisco, 1991); John Ortberg, The Life You’ve Always Wanted (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2002).
15. A.W. Hunter as quoted in Charles Talbert, Reading the Sermon on the Mount (Columbia, SC: USC Press, 2004), 106.
16. Virginia Law Shell, Good News, Jan./Feb. 1991.
17. PreachingToday.com search under spiritual disciplines.