the Flesh, our Roles, & Identity in Christ...

For years I ambitiously built my sense of self - as a Christian - in the flesh: a Christian businessman who did well and employed lots of resources for ministry, a young pastor with a growing organization, and a teacher who was thought highly of and sought after by those he taught.

Of course, this is more the norm than the exception. In just the last few days...

> I had a conference with church leadership out of state. Their ministry is in transition and - as often is the case - the spiritual wanderings of the leadership has made for spiritual wanderings for the local church. No one knows where they're headed or for how long because a leader isn't sure who he is or what he's called to...

> I got to teach with a ministry that is having an authority struggle around who gets to make which decisions and under what conditions, not for what logistically helps the ministry, but what rights the leaders have to be making the decisions. Not surprisingly, the pie they are fighting over seems to be shrinking...

> I began coaching a leader who has the gifting to teach but is struggling to embrace the opportunities to use that gifting under the authority of those who might not be quite as gifted...

Now, I understand the sovereignty of God is bringing about His desire for His people and will even use our flesh as necessary to bring it about. And I realize that all of us as believers in Christ are on the same path as God brings us - through every circumstance - into deeper intimacy and revelation with Him. I even realize that the performance measurements of the world are much too often applied to the Church (attendance, buildings, and finances are NOT the determinants of spiritual success). Nevertheless, my prayer is that we as leaders of His Body will be quick to embrace the Truth of His life as it applies to every area of our circumstances.

Here's what I mean: Where God would reveal my flesh as an obstacle to experiencing His grace is not punitive - it's actually FOR me. And He will go to great lengths and any expense (proven by the Cross), to bring me into deeper intimacy and dependence.

For example, if I am seeking identity in my role as a pastor, God is certainly willing to sacrifice any organization, any program, any budget, or any employee that I would come to recognize the work of my flesh in that role. Our Father doesn't do this as punishment, but rather to keep a grace-based leader from actively (and "successfully") pursuing identity in the very role through which I might proclaim His grace.

So - elders who may find identity in authority, teachers who may find identity in knowledge or presentation, leaders who may find identity in the affirmation or loyalty of their followers, and administrators who find identity in the effectiveness of their stewardship... we are each in great jeopardy of losing the fleshly source of our identity as God - who would not spare His own Son that we might find Life in Him alone as our Source - will surely be willing to allow our struggle in losing credibility, lacking knowledge, floundering followship, or financial foibles so that we might come to a greater dependence on Him for Life and identity.

Is it necessary that we should lose all things for our Life in Christ? Yes and no.

We cannot cling to any of these for life or to define ourselves, so in a sense we must lose all things as Paul proclaims in Philippians 3, "...that [we] may know Christ" alone. But can we quickly and even eagerly release these fleshly sources of faux identity instead of having God remove them from our hands? Can we bring them to the altar excited about Christ as our Source without Him pruning each from us by cutting shears? Can we run to dependence without being brought to desperation?

Absolutely!!

The question is, "Will we?" Will you run to dependence instead of defining yourself in your role, your circumstances, your position, your resources, or your worldly successes? Will you give up the right to have or to get that you might revel in all you have and are in Christ?

By being willing to receive the revelation of where we are living in the flesh ("good flesh") and pursuing Him alone as the chief goal of our life - deeper intimacy, understanding, fellowship, and participation with Christ - He will not just be our Source (which He is), but will give us abounding experience and expression of His grace for His glory.

My prayer for you is that you will be quick to embrace the revelation of the flesh that may be IN you but is NOT YOU! ...that you will be quick to pursue revelation of Christ Himself as he wants to - AS God, prove Himself to BE God in your circumstance ...and that you will quickly and increasingly experience run to dependence without being brought to desperation in the very circumstances in which He wants to prove His grace sufficient for you.

Evolution of "Me-ness"

So - I was reading a blog I wrote almost a decade ago on then-current debates of displaying the ten commandments at government facilities. The Christian community was up in arms. Militant atheists were organizing and on a rampage. It was ugly.

Worse still was my response via blog as a very former version of myself. I waxed eloquent and persuasive about the virtue of posting the ten commandments (mostly that it was an invaluable resource for morality!) Ha!) while encouraging a different kind of Christian response of love and selflessness that was otherworldly compared to the atheist regime bringing the attack.

At the time I thought - let's encourage people to live out of love toward the world while encouraging an otherworldly morality. Praise God I no longer think that!

Don't get me wrong... in itself, the ten commandments are good. A supernatural righteousness is good. A loving response to a lost world - good. But to think that the law of the Old Covenant would in any way correlate to a moral life - supernatural or otherwise - is LUDICROUS! The believer doesn't need reminded of the Law, but of our sonship of God by the finished work of Christ. Like the prodigal son, we forget who we are as a saint, are reluctant to reconnect because of our false expectations of performance, and inhibit the glory of the Father by His finished work to bring us fully into perfect relationship with Himself by our identity as His child by grace alone.

The law was never intended to bring about righteous behavior, but to bring proof of our inherent UNrighteousness, driving us back to dependence on God as our Source. As Jesus proved to the pharisees of His day, those who think they have any chance of maintaining any of the law become a stumbling block to those who are truly seeking God, and their SELF righteousness is an abomination to the very heart of the Father.

All that is to say - I was shocked at my legalism of even just a few years back. I was disappointed in my encouragement of Christians trying to keep the law, as if we should live in ANY relationship to it as believers who are saved and have a righteousness from God by Grace - who IS Jesus Christ.

More than shocked and disappointed though, I was thankful.

Thankful for His revelation of a new economy of grace in the New Covenant. Thankful for Christ who is our Life, whom I didn't understand that I fully possess. Thankful for a relational paradigm of living with God, not a performance standard for gaining from God.

...And I am thankful for not only my evolutionary journey in grace - far from complete - but for the opportunity to be a part of your journey, as we increasingly discover the Life we have in Christ, the glory that is God's through His grace to us, and empowerment of that grace to live in relational righteousness - the very character of God - by His merit not ours.

I hope you are already celebrating the reality of the advent of Christ - that He came not only to give His life for you, but TO you that He might live His Life THROUGH you for His renown as you rest in Christ who is our Life and Peace and Righteousness by grace.

ridiculously graced...

-mike.

http://StoneLife.org