The Bungee Cord 1-11-21

Hello,

 

How do we know when we are doing God’s will?

 

I ask that because as I watched the on-goings at our nation’s capital, I saw several signs declaring that the folks involved were participating in the will of God.  I saw a cross attached to a flagpole that was carrying a couple of flags, and I saw a flag that said, “JESUS”, on it.  Having seen these things, I am sure that there were some, if not many, who believed that they were involved in God’s will.  (I might say that I didn’t see any of these things carried by those who broke their way into the building.)

 

As a matter of fact, I would venture to guess that at virtually every demonstration hosting thousands of people, the same sights would be seen.  I have seen them myself.

 

How do we know when we are doing God’s will?

 

Those of us who regularly pray the Lord’s Prayer ask that God’s will would be done among us, “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”

 

I am sure that theologians far wiser than I can answer this question with far more wisdom, so, I would rather answer a corollary question:  How do we know when we are not doing God’s will?  My answer: When we are unaware that we might not be doing God’s will.

 

God has placed the Gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ, in human hands.  And in one of Jesus’ parables, we find out that God expects us to do something with His Gospel, and not just safely bury it in the sand or in our hearts. (Matthew 25:9ff). With that expectation in mind, it seems only right that we take the Gospel boldly into the world, infecting the world with the love and mercy of God.  Like a good virus run amuck, we might bring hope to the hopeless, peace to the embattled, joy to the despairing, faith to the despairing, and love to the unloved.

 

But as we do this, we need to remember that God has placed the Gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ, in human hands…..that is, sinful hands.  Nothing that we do or think is free from our entanglement in sin.  Only Jesus has completely emptied himself for others, all the rest of us hold on to at least some self-centeredness. Me.  That is the crux of sin.  

 

That is not to say that God is against “me”, after all there is absolute truth in the song, “Jesus loves me.”  But when “me” gets in the way of God’s love…..love for me, and love for others…that is where sin comes in.  When “me” gets in the way, and it always does to some extent, we don’t listen to others, absolutely convinced of our rightness.  Also, we do things that cannot be undone, leave scars that never heal, and tread heavily no matter how thin the ice.   We allow anger to guide our actions, and words.  We don’t care about others.  We have seen how big of problems “me” can cause.

 

It doesn’t take too much digging into history to find times when “me” invaded the will of God on earth, including the work of the church.  Even at its best, because the church is a bunch of sinners in need of forgiveness and not a bunch of perfect angels, those who bear the name of Christ, Christians, will always fall somewhat short of God’s will.  Yet, when we are led by Jesus’ words, “By this all will know that you are my disciples, by the love that you have for one another,” it seems to me that we are moving in the right direction.  It is a direction away from “me” and toward “another”.  After all, that is the direction that Jesus took in coming to this world, away from himself and toward us.

 

And when we do this, loving one another as Christ has loved us, we find ourselves feeling the pain of others, experiencing the fear that chills their bones, coming to know their loss and confusion, and hearing the roaring lions that prowl their lives.  It is when we gather these things into our decisions on how to engage the world with the Gospel, with the mercy of Jesus Christ, that I believe we are most closely walking on a path of God’s will.  

 

In my mind, it is a supremely arrogant thing to act in such a way that excludes the possibility that we may be more led by “me” than by the will of God.  That doesn’t mean that we should be catatonically cautious in our convictions of faith.  We can be bold, as a matter of fact, we need to be bold because God has placed the lifegiving Gospel in our hands….hands that are likewise dirtied with sin.

 

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger