Treasure

“The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field. Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls, who, on finding one pearl of great value, went and sold all that he had and bought it.”

Matthew 13:44-46

“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also…. No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.”

Matthew 6:21,24

These two passages really question the supremacy of Christ in our lives. A few weeks ago at Encounter (a winter conference with CCC), God used these verses to challenge me and reconsider the things to which I assigned value. I had heard these verses so many times before, but I had never fully understood what they meant until then.

It was two different levels of understanding, kind of like the difference between knowing ice cubes are cold and then feeling one draw the heat from your palm as you hold it. I began to realize that a lot of things I considered valuable were worthless in comparison to Jesus Christ and his gospel. Things that weren’t necessarily bad, but things that nonetheless were taking foremost position in my life, things into which I was ceaselessly pouring my time, thought, energy, and resources.

God is infinitely generous. He gave his son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. He gave us his word, through which he has revealed himself and speaks to us. He continually gives us mercy instead of justice. Sometimes, though not necessarily, God blesses us with a great career, a loving family, sufficient money, good health, and widespread influence. Because of sin, it is almost effortless to exchange these things for God and to allow them to become the object of our supreme devotion.

On the contrary, putting Christ first in our lives allows God to transform us by the power of his Spirit and by consequence, the material things God has allowed us to have are transformed into things God can use, ultimately, for his glory. Careers are transformed from pursuits of personal achievement to a means by which one can influence more people for Christ.  Financial resources are transformed from a way to facilitate modern comforts into a method by which one can practically minister to the physical needs of others and display the generosity of Christ. Marriage is transformed from a social convention into another mode by which two people can display, to a lesser extent, the relationship between Christ and his church. Health is transformed from a selfish quest into a tool one can use to go places others can’t in order to share Christ with those who haven’t heard.

As we replace created things with the Creator, anything and everything that we are and have and can do is now made available for God to use as he chooses and leads us. What an honor.

Awesome song by jesusculture

Great song. Check it out.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IoezWBPGRAc&feature=related

A dream

I dreamt a dream not long ago

Whose significance I do not know

(there was a knight with armor shining)

He was met with much applause

And through the village he was riding

And yet I could not help but feel

His gleaming, spotless, seamless shield

(it brought to him so much renown)

Was made of glass and not of steel

As he marched onward through the town

On he rode to face the beast

And soon he stood there face to face

(the knight his loyal sword kept steady)

All the while his lustrous shield

At his defense, was at the ready

Upon the enemy’s attack

I saw it split from front to back

(into thirty pieces it did shatter)

It seems the ever slightest flaw

Caused the steadfast shield to fracture

The knight then realized his defeat

And thus began his swift retreat

(undoubtedly amid much peril)

He glimpsed a cleft in the rock

And in its Faithful guard took shelter

As for me, I shook my head

And laughing, turned to him and said

(trying still to hide my grin)

“Victory seldom comes to those

with armor tainted by their sin.”

The dispirited knight had no reply

I sensed that something was awry

(he stood there silent without objection)

And as he turned and removed his helmet

I gazed upon my own reflection

Speed dial

Quick note: the other day, I stumbled across a verse in Isaiah that stuck with me…

“Before they call I will answer; while they are still speaking I will hear.”

Isaiah 65:24

Off the charts

Today, some friends of mine got up around 4 am to  watch the sun rise at a popular viewing spot (called Pretty Place) about 45 minutes away. This made me think about the sun itself, so I decided to look up a few interesting facts about the sun. It’s pretty incredible, to say the least.

The sun is roughly 93 million miles away from the Earth. Within the sun’s core, where nuclear reactions occur, the temperature is estimated to be around 15,000,000 K (27,000,000 deg F) and 340 billion times the atmospheric pressure at sea level.

The sun’s energy output is estimated around 386 billion billion megawatts.  In 2007, the marketed energy consumption for the entire world was roughly 500 quadrillion BTU. This means that in one second, the sun produces more energy than we would use in 731.8 million years. That’s 731.8 thousand thousand years.

The sun contains 99.8% of the total mass of the solar system. It has a diameter of about 870,000 miles, and it is so large you could fit 1.3 million Earths inside of it (remember the Earth is about 24,900 miles in circumference, depending on where you measure).

So the sun is so large, the entire Earth is extremely small in comparison. But this left me wondering how large the sun is compared to our galaxy.

Our galaxy, the Milky Way, contains between 200 and 400 billion stars, and it is shaped like a disc with diameter of about 100,000 light years. To clarify, a light year is the distance light travels in one year. With the speed of light around 186,282 miles per second, this makes a light year roughly equivalent to 5.9 trillion miles (5.9 million million miles). This, in turn, means the Milky Way is around 588,000,000,000,000,000 miles across.

This means the size of the sun is literally zero in comparison to the size of our galaxy. And our galaxy is one of about 150 billion other galaxies in the visible universe. That’s insane.

“By the word of the Lord were the heavens made, their starry host by the breath of his mouth….For he spoke, and it came to be, he commanded, and it stood firm.”

Psalm 33:6,9

I wonder if David knew what we know when he was writing this.

Something routine

I’m embarrassed that it has taken me this long to find time to write here.

This post will not be very long.

Lately, I’ve been reading through Malachi.

“Oh, that one of you would shut the temple doors, so that you would not light useless fires on my altar! I am not pleased with you, “says the LORD Almighty, “and I will accept no offering from your hands.”

Malachi 1:10-11a

Maybe more important than offering something to God (time, resources, abilities) is the fact that God deserves the best of what we have.

Maybe I’m not doing so well.

A few notes from John 1

Each Gospel emphasizes a different aspect of Jesus. The Book of Matthew was designed to show Jesus as the King, Luke to show Jesus as fully man. The Book of John was written to show that Jesus was fully God. This is evident from the very first verse (John 1:1) which reads:

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.“

This verse tells us at least three things about Jesus:

1. Jesus has always been. He says this himself in John 8:58. This is something we often take for granted, but it is very important to understand. Jesus did not come into existence at Bethlehem; he has always been, even before creation.
2. Jesus was with God. In the beginning, Jesus was with God the Father. Before the creation of man, God decides to make man “in our image” (Gen 1:26). This is in agreement with our understanding of the Trinity.
3. Jesus himself was God. Look at John 10:30. Jesus did not simply claim He knew God or that God spoke to Him, He was claiming that He was God.

In this verse alone, it says that Jesus was both with God and was God. How can both be true? This leads us to the Trinity.

The concept of the Trinity is hopelessly confusing to man. Over the summer, I worked staff for a summer missions program for local middle school and high school students. One night, the speaker told the students to ask their group leaders anything they wanted to know or didn’t understand about God (easy enough, right?). I had a group of sixth graders, and they asked me about the Trinity…how God was three and yet one? Imagine trying to explain something like this to a bunch of middle school kids. I simply said both are true and that’s part of what we believe as Christians, and I referenced scripture like John 1, but I could never give an explanation that satisfied them. Why is the concept of the Trinity so confusing to us as humans?

I think part of the reason is we live in a world of mutual exclusion. Pass or fail, circle or square, yes or no, one or the other. Never both. Everything in our physical universe is governed by logic. We exist in the universe, and we have to play by the rules. God does not. Since He exists outside of the universe and created it Himself, He is not bound by logic. It’s like the age-old philosophical question: can God make a rock so big He himself cannot move? He can do both, which seems impossible from our perspective.

I’m not a huge fan of Rob Bell, but Bell provides an interesting analogy. He said explaining something like the Trinity to man is like trying to explain a soup can to a two-dimensional being. Imagine this person has no perception of depth. How do you describe the can? Well, it’s a rectangle, if you look from the side. If you look from the top, it’s a circle. Which is it, a rectangle or a circle? Both. How can it be both?

One of the most fundamental things to remember when studying theology is that people will never be able to fully understand God. I think there are some truths we have to simply accept from the Word of God, truths we will never understand in this life. Considering the attributes of God should put things in perspective for us, reminding us of how small we are and how great He is.

Ecclesiastes on the human condition

I think if I could pick any major other than the one I’m in now (career implications aside) I would choose philosophy. Philosophy, as it is defined, is the rational investigation of the truths and  principles of being, knowledge, or conduct. Literally meaning “love of wisdom,” it has involved innumerable people searching for truth and meaning. These qualities are exhibited by all people, and it is a fundamental difference between humans and the rest of creation. What drives us to seek truth outside of ourselves?

I think Ecclesiastes provides an answer. Let’s look at Ecclesiastes 3:11:

“He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men, yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end.”

Ecclesiastes claims that God has set eternity in the hearts of men. Why is this such a problem? Because we don’t get it. We can’t understand God or what He has done because we’re constricted by time. God is eternal, man is mortal.

Think about it. Have you ever tried to picture something that never had a beginning? We all say that God is and has always been, but have you ever really sat down and thought about it? It will drive you crazy. It’s completely beyond our reach; everything we know as human has a beginning somewhere. We learn by drawing analogies to things we understand, and there simply is nothing to which to compare eternity.

One of my favorite verses is John 8:58, where Jesus is defending himself before the Pharisees. When Jesus speaks of Abraham’s joy at His coming, the Pharisees object vehemently, pointing out that Jesus is not even fifty years old. Jesus replies:

“I tell you the truth, before Abraham was born, I am!”

Notice how Jesus didn’t say “I was.” What at first appears to be a strange, grammatically incorrect translation turns out to be an incredibly powerful indicator of the eternal presence of God, and God the Son through Jesus Christ. Jesus was pointing out that He is not bound by time at all. This is critical to our understanding of God.

For me, it’s really tempting to see God as an eternal being passing through time with humanity, just as an all-powerful Being who doesn’t age. But this is not completely true. God isn’t bound by our physical universe: He is not restricted by time. He is the one who set time into motion.

So why did God set eternity into the hearts of men? Why would God purposefully create, in each person, a desire to seek out something they can never understand?

I think it’s another picture of the grace of God. God created us to seek fulfillment in Him, and outside of Himself there is no fulfillment at all.  That is one of the themes of the book of Ecclesiastes. No matter how hard we try, nothing will have substance outside of a connection to God through Jesus Christ.

This is a very good thing. What a great display of God’s mercy, that we have an internal mechanism that drives us toward Him. This curiosity set in our hearts is what keeps us from being content with everything around us. It keeps us searching for truth, and it is designed to lead us back to our Creator.

A beginner’s guide to Ecclesiastes

To tell the truth, before just recently, I was never a big fan of  Ecclesiastes. It was one of those books I tended to skim through and not study or ponder with any significance. However, a few weeks ago, I began to go through the book as a part of a small group study, and now, I think Ecclesiastes may be one of the most intriguing, philosophical books in the Bible.

At first glance, the book appears to be nothing but complaints about life. To some extent, this is correct, but it’s easy to be distracted by this and overlook the poetic language and beautiful imagery the Teacher (probably Solomon) uses to make his point. In the first chapter, he starts out with a statement (Eccl 1:2) that probably sums up most of the theme of the book:

“Meaningless! Meaningless! says the Teacher. Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.”

Encouraging, isn’t it? In the next verse, he poses the question to which he sought the answer (Eccl 1:3):

“What does man gain from all his labor at which he toils under the sun?”

The rest of the book consists of Solomon’s attempt to answer this question. In the next few verses, he proceeds to give examples from the natural world which help illustrate his claim that everything is meaningless, a “chasing after the wind.” (Eccl 1:14).

Throughout the next chapter, Solomon describes his attempts to discover what is worthwhile. He built houses and vineyards, bought slaves and cattle, acquired silver and gold, and so forth. He remarks that he denied himself nothing he desired and earnestly sought after anything he thought had substance. At the end he claims, in verse 11:

“Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind; nothing was gained under the sun.”

After this he provides different reasons why this is true. He begins to resolve the matter in verse 24:

“A man can do nothing better than to eat and drink and find satisfaction in his work. This too, I see, is from the hand of God, for without Him, who can eat or find enjoyment?”

That’s the background of Ecclesiastes. The deep thinking begins in Chapter 3. But more on that later.