Readings:
Romans 7:15-25
Psalm 145:8-14
Zechariah 9:9-12
Peace little lamb, little love
Trust in the deep love at the heart
Of all our beings
The love we are abiding in
The love we are cultivating from
Strips away all that binds us
All that trips us up and blinds us.
Walk with me, beside me.
Carry what I carry.
Rest is here, in the sharing.
I can do all that you long to do.
I can lead you, step where I step
To know with the mind is not enough.
Let me shape you
Till knowing is deep in the bone
Till doing is without thought
But springs forth from the heart
For the joy of it!
that life may flow
All the toil.
All the failure forged
Through the fire of love instilling
Into being, into body
Everlasting Spirit
Found only in becoming like our father.
Let me show you who he is.
Let him show you who I am.
Let us show you who you are.
- Abi Johnson
Devotional:
I find personality tests fascinating. More than 8 billion people on the planet, and yet we all supposedly fit into 9 enneagram types or 16 Myers-Briggs personalities or 8 DISC labels. Maybe, if you're like me, you get a different answer every time you take the enneagram test. So far I've been an 8, 1, 5, 4 and 9, and if I take it a few more times I can probably round out the wheel. It's possible I just needed more sleep, or perhaps it's a little harder to pin down the complexity of a person than the test would suggest. Or maybe, also like me, you've also learned which questions lead to which results for Myers-Briggs — depending on my mood on any given day, I can swing the results between judging and perceiving. What personality does that make me, and does the test know I'm tricking it?
The results are still gratifying to our ego: I think like this celebrity or icon from history, or I get fun labels like Architect or Virtuoso or Executive. If I'm operating in health, I’ll see this type of behavior, but if I'm operating in stress, it will show up like this. A roadmap to our identity feels like a cheat code to hack our environments and relationships to our advantage. They suggest a formula for peace, as long as you can know everyone's type, evaluate their stressors, and work with their motivators, as well as have the presence of mind to recognize all of yours and respond accordingly in each moment.
You see the flaw. Of course we can't capture the whole of humanity with such a narrow set of options. Of course navigating the range of experiences and emotions isn't as tidy as simply knowing some rules or definitions. It can easily spiral into performance, trying to overcome some trigger or impetus so that I might be more like the prescribed persona.
I think this is exactly the trap our authors today are trying to help us escape, but not using sheer willpower like self-help books would have us attempt. Our authors in Romans, Psalms and Zechariah are trying to show us a different truth, one that rests from our striving and grounds in abiding. Let's look closer.
First, remember from Sunday our invitation to participate in the wisdom of the Father, the same who includes us and transforms us. Against that, our world is mistakenly structured around the misplaced wisdom of separation, one that would say you need to dance this way, or mourn that way, or lead this way, or keep this company and evaluate how well or poorly we conform.
It's the same fractured thinking that causes us to look at ourselves and use the frustrated words we read in Romans. I did this thing once, but it's not the pattern I want to be doing. Humanity tries to accomplish the good things we want, but collectively we still see evil happen. Sin—that thing which is external to us—is inhabiting and dwelling in us. It's right beside the joyful willingness to serve God's wisdom, and we can watch the war waging.
But here's where I'd like to pause, because if you're on autopilot, you just read war waging, and you heard some sort of willpower test of personality fortitude again. We start to think in terms of performance to overcome some innate part of us that is bad. We imagine that if we are just disciplined, we can smash that evil part of our body down far enough so that it's too weak to do anything. If we can compartmentalize our being, we can focus on our strengths and not prioritize fixing our weaknesses, just like the personality tests tell us to. Statistically, that’s the better use of our efforts because you can't change who you are, right?
Wrong. It's so close to the truth that it really sounds good, and we almost miss it. We almost thought that it was going to be about cutting off our hand to ensure we do right. Look at Paul’s conclusion though: on one hand his mind serves the wisdom of God and on the other his body serves the wisdom of sin and its separation. On one hand, the earth is fully redeemed by Christ’s work, but on the other hand it is still groaning. You might think it sounds like he’s repeating his intro around doing and not doing, but Paul’s already desperately asked who would rescue us and named Christ Jesus. If Paul can see war waging but have hope, then there is more here to see. It’s not a debate of whether the angel or demon on our shoulder will win. We need the rest of the story.
Let's put it a different way. We are made in His image, which means as He creates us is the most like Him we can be. You and I, when we are our truest, most “us”, are reflective of His image. There's not a part of what He made that we need to squash down; there’s merely a mindset cohabiting within us that we need to dispel. There's a thought process that makes us question our placement with God, makes us doubt our ability to trust Him. We aren't waging an internal war to kill some part of us; there is only a lying, external-to-us mindset to evict. That's what Paul identifies – this mindset is at war, and who will rescue us? Thanks be, it's Christ Jesus our Lord, the same who, as it says in Matthew, reveals the Father to us.
And here is the actual roadmap to identity. Because as the Father is revealed to us, we learn more about ourselves. As we said Sunday, it's at the dinner table where we learn what our family is like, how we speak, how we act. Jesus, who would sit at the table with all, invites us too, and there we learn what the Father is like.
David has been at that table. Look at the words he uses. He speaks of God's goodness and lovingkindness, extending through generations and across nations. Those character trait words in Hebrew get translated to many words in English. It’s not just goodness. His goodness is His mercy is His compassion is His kindness is His loyalty is His faithfulness. His justice is His mercy is His righteousness is His glory. We read the fruits of the Spirit and divide them up again like they're parts of our personality to level up. We strive to be more patient, but determine we’re sufficiently joyful already. But He is One. Father, Son and Spirit are peace and exude life because They are whole. Our task isn't to strive to be more loving and “operate in health”, as much as it is to rest in Him, mind set on Him, that we would be whole—wholly ourselves and wholly like Him in His image. Wholly kind, wholly good, wholly faithful, wholly patient, all at once as we walk in the reality of being with Him. As I saw it online this week: Fruit is not the goal. Abiding is the goal. Fruit is just what happens when you get the order right.
The picture gets even more profound in Zechariah, where we see how God’s kingdom and influence is inescapable. He notes from the River to the ends of the earth, God's dominion extends. Think about it in other terms: from the abundance and wealth of provision, to the desolate, empty and lacking, God is over it all. This means there isn't a facet of us, of humanity, that can't be filled with all He (wholly) holds. Zechariah sees that the wisdom of God, the offer and invitation to His rest and peace, extends beyond himself, his family or nation, but to the very edges and fringes. There's no weird or odd personality, nothing outside or excluded. It all is His, and He fiercely wages war against any mindset that would try to separate us.
He has a track record of it. Zechariah shows us through the restoration of the Kingdom. Where a mindset might be powerful and influential, just as the large kingdoms with chariots and bows would have been to Judah and Israel, God's kingdom extends with greater power, greater influence, longer and more enduring impact. There's no defeating Him, because He comes with peace.
He invites us to return to the stronghold, the only time in the whole Bible that Hebrew word is used. Come to me, weary-laden. Come to the place of mighty protection. Be with the One who saves and guards like none other, and find peace. Find all that you thought lacking, filled and restored double. Walk with Him, yoked together, to find that the swirl of striving to be isn't your battle to wage. Rest in Him, knowing that being the most you is what He intended you to be, is what we are learning from Him. You, yes all of you, the person He made to be like Him, is intended and welcome.
We aren’t a checklist of traits to fix or a broken personality to resolve. We are beloved and welcome.
May we—as His intended and loved creation, made to be and become like Him—find our restful belonging in His presence, freed from the striving of trying to be anything other than His children. And may we be at peace knowing He is banishing the tricking mindsets that would try to separate us or dissuade us from trusting Him.
A Prayer for Each Moment
God our Wisdom,
You always envision us together, always defend us against who or what would suggest we are separated. As we walk and talk, let us rest in the peaceful confidence of belonging with You.
Amen
A Prayer for Each Other
Our Father,
Give us ears to hear from you who we really are as we wake up to the revelation of the Holy Spirit and listen to your wisdom! Give us courage to walk out that wisdom instead of what we thought previously.
Amen
Blessing
May we cast off the thoughts that judge us and instead rest in the lightness and ease of His gentle love.
Photo by Valentin Salja on Unsplash
Romans 7:15-25
Psalm 145:8-14
Zechariah 9:9-12
Peace little lamb, little love
Trust in the deep love at the heart
Of all our beings
The love we are abiding in
The love we are cultivating from
Strips away all that binds us
All that trips us up and blinds us.
Walk with me, beside me.
Carry what I carry.
Rest is here, in the sharing.
I can do all that you long to do.
I can lead you, step where I step
To know with the mind is not enough.
Let me shape you
Till knowing is deep in the bone
Till doing is without thought
But springs forth from the heart
For the joy of it!
that life may flow
All the toil.
All the failure forged
Through the fire of love instilling
Into being, into body
Everlasting Spirit
Found only in becoming like our father.
Let me show you who he is.
Let him show you who I am.
Let us show you who you are.
- Abi Johnson
Devotional:
I find personality tests fascinating. More than 8 billion people on the planet, and yet we all supposedly fit into 9 enneagram types or 16 Myers-Briggs personalities or 8 DISC labels. Maybe, if you're like me, you get a different answer every time you take the enneagram test. So far I've been an 8, 1, 5, 4 and 9, and if I take it a few more times I can probably round out the wheel. It's possible I just needed more sleep, or perhaps it's a little harder to pin down the complexity of a person than the test would suggest. Or maybe, also like me, you've also learned which questions lead to which results for Myers-Briggs — depending on my mood on any given day, I can swing the results between judging and perceiving. What personality does that make me, and does the test know I'm tricking it?
The results are still gratifying to our ego: I think like this celebrity or icon from history, or I get fun labels like Architect or Virtuoso or Executive. If I'm operating in health, I’ll see this type of behavior, but if I'm operating in stress, it will show up like this. A roadmap to our identity feels like a cheat code to hack our environments and relationships to our advantage. They suggest a formula for peace, as long as you can know everyone's type, evaluate their stressors, and work with their motivators, as well as have the presence of mind to recognize all of yours and respond accordingly in each moment.
You see the flaw. Of course we can't capture the whole of humanity with such a narrow set of options. Of course navigating the range of experiences and emotions isn't as tidy as simply knowing some rules or definitions. It can easily spiral into performance, trying to overcome some trigger or impetus so that I might be more like the prescribed persona.
I think this is exactly the trap our authors today are trying to help us escape, but not using sheer willpower like self-help books would have us attempt. Our authors in Romans, Psalms and Zechariah are trying to show us a different truth, one that rests from our striving and grounds in abiding. Let's look closer.
First, remember from Sunday our invitation to participate in the wisdom of the Father, the same who includes us and transforms us. Against that, our world is mistakenly structured around the misplaced wisdom of separation, one that would say you need to dance this way, or mourn that way, or lead this way, or keep this company and evaluate how well or poorly we conform.
It's the same fractured thinking that causes us to look at ourselves and use the frustrated words we read in Romans. I did this thing once, but it's not the pattern I want to be doing. Humanity tries to accomplish the good things we want, but collectively we still see evil happen. Sin—that thing which is external to us—is inhabiting and dwelling in us. It's right beside the joyful willingness to serve God's wisdom, and we can watch the war waging.
But here's where I'd like to pause, because if you're on autopilot, you just read war waging, and you heard some sort of willpower test of personality fortitude again. We start to think in terms of performance to overcome some innate part of us that is bad. We imagine that if we are just disciplined, we can smash that evil part of our body down far enough so that it's too weak to do anything. If we can compartmentalize our being, we can focus on our strengths and not prioritize fixing our weaknesses, just like the personality tests tell us to. Statistically, that’s the better use of our efforts because you can't change who you are, right?
Wrong. It's so close to the truth that it really sounds good, and we almost miss it. We almost thought that it was going to be about cutting off our hand to ensure we do right. Look at Paul’s conclusion though: on one hand his mind serves the wisdom of God and on the other his body serves the wisdom of sin and its separation. On one hand, the earth is fully redeemed by Christ’s work, but on the other hand it is still groaning. You might think it sounds like he’s repeating his intro around doing and not doing, but Paul’s already desperately asked who would rescue us and named Christ Jesus. If Paul can see war waging but have hope, then there is more here to see. It’s not a debate of whether the angel or demon on our shoulder will win. We need the rest of the story.
Let's put it a different way. We are made in His image, which means as He creates us is the most like Him we can be. You and I, when we are our truest, most “us”, are reflective of His image. There's not a part of what He made that we need to squash down; there’s merely a mindset cohabiting within us that we need to dispel. There's a thought process that makes us question our placement with God, makes us doubt our ability to trust Him. We aren't waging an internal war to kill some part of us; there is only a lying, external-to-us mindset to evict. That's what Paul identifies – this mindset is at war, and who will rescue us? Thanks be, it's Christ Jesus our Lord, the same who, as it says in Matthew, reveals the Father to us.
And here is the actual roadmap to identity. Because as the Father is revealed to us, we learn more about ourselves. As we said Sunday, it's at the dinner table where we learn what our family is like, how we speak, how we act. Jesus, who would sit at the table with all, invites us too, and there we learn what the Father is like.
David has been at that table. Look at the words he uses. He speaks of God's goodness and lovingkindness, extending through generations and across nations. Those character trait words in Hebrew get translated to many words in English. It’s not just goodness. His goodness is His mercy is His compassion is His kindness is His loyalty is His faithfulness. His justice is His mercy is His righteousness is His glory. We read the fruits of the Spirit and divide them up again like they're parts of our personality to level up. We strive to be more patient, but determine we’re sufficiently joyful already. But He is One. Father, Son and Spirit are peace and exude life because They are whole. Our task isn't to strive to be more loving and “operate in health”, as much as it is to rest in Him, mind set on Him, that we would be whole—wholly ourselves and wholly like Him in His image. Wholly kind, wholly good, wholly faithful, wholly patient, all at once as we walk in the reality of being with Him. As I saw it online this week: Fruit is not the goal. Abiding is the goal. Fruit is just what happens when you get the order right.
The picture gets even more profound in Zechariah, where we see how God’s kingdom and influence is inescapable. He notes from the River to the ends of the earth, God's dominion extends. Think about it in other terms: from the abundance and wealth of provision, to the desolate, empty and lacking, God is over it all. This means there isn't a facet of us, of humanity, that can't be filled with all He (wholly) holds. Zechariah sees that the wisdom of God, the offer and invitation to His rest and peace, extends beyond himself, his family or nation, but to the very edges and fringes. There's no weird or odd personality, nothing outside or excluded. It all is His, and He fiercely wages war against any mindset that would try to separate us.
He has a track record of it. Zechariah shows us through the restoration of the Kingdom. Where a mindset might be powerful and influential, just as the large kingdoms with chariots and bows would have been to Judah and Israel, God's kingdom extends with greater power, greater influence, longer and more enduring impact. There's no defeating Him, because He comes with peace.
He invites us to return to the stronghold, the only time in the whole Bible that Hebrew word is used. Come to me, weary-laden. Come to the place of mighty protection. Be with the One who saves and guards like none other, and find peace. Find all that you thought lacking, filled and restored double. Walk with Him, yoked together, to find that the swirl of striving to be isn't your battle to wage. Rest in Him, knowing that being the most you is what He intended you to be, is what we are learning from Him. You, yes all of you, the person He made to be like Him, is intended and welcome.
We aren’t a checklist of traits to fix or a broken personality to resolve. We are beloved and welcome.
May we—as His intended and loved creation, made to be and become like Him—find our restful belonging in His presence, freed from the striving of trying to be anything other than His children. And may we be at peace knowing He is banishing the tricking mindsets that would try to separate us or dissuade us from trusting Him.
A Prayer for Each Moment
God our Wisdom,
You always envision us together, always defend us against who or what would suggest we are separated. As we walk and talk, let us rest in the peaceful confidence of belonging with You.
Amen
A Prayer for Each Other
Our Father,
Give us ears to hear from you who we really are as we wake up to the revelation of the Holy Spirit and listen to your wisdom! Give us courage to walk out that wisdom instead of what we thought previously.
Amen
Blessing
May we cast off the thoughts that judge us and instead rest in the lightness and ease of His gentle love.
Photo by Valentin Salja on Unsplash
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