• Our hope-filled future is bound up in sharing the story of Jesus, in discipling others, in bringing those disciples together into communities of believers, and in developing and releasing those believers to create other communities... till Jesus the King comes again!

the Temple

Posted on September 3, 2012 by wtdavid

Today’s post comes from Amy in the Philippines about chapter 13: The Temple

Jesus, King of Kings, enters Jerusalem on a non-consequential donkey.  He is the Lion of Judah and the lamb on the throne.  He enters the courts of the Temple for the Jewish holiday of Passover and his concern is for the nations.  The curtain is torn, and the Temple takes a new role in the lives of God’s people.

Keller tells us that Jesus’ personality, that which is full of “perfect justice yet boundless grace, absolute sovereignty yet utter submission,” is a “complete and beautiful whole.”  And the wholeness of our God’s beautiful personality is passionately concerned for the holiness of his people, including the Gentile nations.

I love that Keller draws our attention to what Jesus is doing.  Honestly, I never noticed the part where Jesus says, “Is it not written: ‘My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations’?”  But Keller draws us to this point because, he says, Jesus is not only overturning tables of money-changers, but overturning the sacrificial system itself.  He’s standing up for those (the nations) who still don’t know that God is fighting for them.

He’s preparing them, and us, for the cross by challenging the system of sacrifice enacted by God.  Keller tells us of the sword that blocked the way for Adam and Eve to re-enter Eden.  And the “sword” that exacts the death sacrifice of animals to atone for sins.  And the sword that Jesus must face to take the penalty for us and bring us into the holy place.  Jesus’ pre-Passover time in the Temple wasn’t filled with traditional worship, but was a last declaration that the Temple the people knew would never suffice again.  There was a new Temple now, known in the Body of Christ, and it was for all people.

But the most challenging part of this chapter for me is the parable of the fig.  Finally I know now, thanks to Keller, that Jesus’ curse on the fig tree was not unjust, but because the tree was meant to be fruitful even when not bearing figs; it was essentially not doing its job.  And neither was the sacrificial system of Israel.  And Keller asks us readers, “…is it clear to the people who know you best that your character is undergoing radical regeneration?”  In other words, are you a fruitless fig?

And that, Keller tells us, is Jesus’ challenge to us all: “Jesus, who unites such apparent extremes of character into such an integrated and balanced whole, demands an extreme response from every one of us…This man who throws open the gates of his kingdom to everyone, then warns the most devout insiders that their standing in the kingdom is in jeopardy without fruitfulness.”

Does your life and ministry show that Jesus is the one who opens the Kingdom? 

Or are you filling the courts of your work with activities or goals or objectives that get in the way of His purpose (i.e. creating a sacrificial system of your own)?

Are you fruitful where it counts? 

And I couldn’t ask it better than Keller: “Is it clear to the people who know you best that your character is undergoing radical regeneration?”

 

Next installment of the King’s Cross blog post will be September 10th, looking at Ch 14 “the Feast”

Filed under: Character, King's Cross | 2 Comments »

the Ransom

Posted on August 27, 2012 by wtdavid

Today’s post comes from Lynette in Cambodia about chapter 12: The Ransom

Most of us seek out people who are “easy to love”. . . people who don’t have problems or issues. . . people who don’t require a lot from us. . . people who are just fun to be around.  Yet according to Jesus’ example and Keller’s summary, “all life-changing love is substitutionary sacrifice”.  I tried to think of some incidence, some person, something where that statement was not true.  Sadly, I could not.  To love someone, really love them, requires tremendous sacrifice on our part, maybe not initially, maybe not for a time;  but, there comes a time in every relationship where we face the question, “Am I willing to deny myself for the sake of the other person?” Or put another way, “Am I willing to love this person in a redemptive way?”

Looking at our life and ministry through the eyes of “redemptive love” shades what we do, why we do it, how we do it, and to whom we do it in a completely different light.  Redemptive love enables us to love the unlovely, to be lovely when we feel unlovely, and to seek ultimate good for those that the Lord allows to be in our circle of influence.  Keller brings out the passage, Jeremiah 29:7, which spoke to me specifically when my team moved to a new provincial location.  “Seek peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile.  Pray to the Lord for it, . . .”  During our time in that province, that verse kept coming up in my heart as a basis for why I was there coupled with Matthew 5: 16, “Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven.”

Jesus is our example of redemptive love through His life, ransom and resurrection.  So the first challenge I leave with you comes from Keller, “ Be so sacrificially loving  that the people around you, who don’t believe what you believe, will soon be unable to imagine the place without you.”  Does this characterize the place where the Lord has “carried you into exile”? 

The second is how would loving sacrificially (redemptively) change a relationship in which you are currently involved?

 

Next installment of the King’s Cross blog post will be September 3rd, looking at Ch 13 “the Temple”

Filed under: King's Cross, Reflection | Leave a comment »

King’s Cross Speaking to Us

Posted on August 20, 2012 by wtdavid

Reading Henry & Janet’s (WT Singapore) recent prayer letter, I really appreciated the honesty with which they shared what the Lord has been teaching them through the book, King’s Cross.  “Keller is bringing home a lot of things that have been toying around in the back of my brain for the last few years, but he also is introducing so many new things,” Henry wrote.  The following are some excerpts from their letter that I trust will encourage many of us:

“Recently I had the tremendous privilege to speak to about 270 church leaders in Asia. Being given the freedom to develop my messages as I saw fit… and as I felt God’s Spirit leading me, I felt very much at ease talking about God’s awesomeness and His Grace. Often the church tends to focus on what we as Christians are supposed to be doing. Not often enough do we concentrate on what God has done. I am as guilty as anyone. We tend to build our lives on our religious beliefs and guard or guide our lives by the rules we feel are what God wants us to keep. Too seldom do I just allow God to be my vision for life. Too seldom do I look at the world the way He would have me to look at it.

In His Sovereignty, God has allowed Janet and me to live in S.E. Asia for most of the last 33 years. We have been blessed by what God has done, and by whom God has placed in our lives. Yet, I know so little about this amazing God who created the universe. And sadly, it is so easy to get sidetracked by the little things that can cause irritation or disappointment (especially in other people), or by challenges that we were not expecting and lose sight of what God is trying to do in our lives through those things. Lately I have been challenged by a book I am reading … called “King’s Cross: The Story of the World in the Life of Jesus” by Timothy Keller. Now, I know that not everyone gets the same sense of impact or satisfaction out of a book or a movie, but I don’t think you could miss on this one. Keller’s insights into scripture and his applications to my life are incredible.

For example, from his comments on Mark 4: 35-41, concerning the reaction of the disciples to the storm on the sea… and to how Jesus then stilled the sea…. “… if I go to Jesus, he’s not under my control either. He lets things happen that I don’t understand. He doesn’t do things according to my plan, or in a way that makes sense to me. But if Jesus is God, then he’s got to be great enough to have some reasons to let you go through things you can’t understand….. He can love somebody and still let bad things happen to them, because He is God – because he knows better than they do.”  I remember the amazing peace I had 10 years ago when Janet was in the critical care ward for eight weeks on life-support. I knew God would do the right thing, but I had no assurance that Janet would still be with us. It was out of my control, but Jesus gave me peace.

Keller’s comments on Mark 5 really hit home: “Right now, is God delaying something in your life? Are you ready to give up? Are you impatient with Him? There may be a crucial factor that you just don’t have access to. The answer, as with Jairus (whose daughter died while he waited for Jesus to talk to a woman who had touched Him in the crowd*), is to trust Jesus.” (*explanation added by me) Just as I was able to trust Jesus with Janet’s life, am I now willing to trust God for my future?  Now that I face the challenge of raising more finances for rent?  Now that my job description is still in the process of being written?  Now, after living out of suitcases for 5 months.. with a possible 5 months of the same on the horizon?”

Henry & Janet leave us with a good question to reflect on this week: how will I express my trust in God with what is in front of me this week?

 

Next Monday, we restart our study by looking at chapter 12: “the Ransom”

Filed under: King's Cross, Trust | 1 Comment »

the Trap

Posted on July 16, 2012 by wtdavid

Today’s post comes from Chris in France.

This chapter speaks to my own story.  I’m older than most of you and I spent a long time climbing the greasy pole towards career success.  I had some temporary wins but eventually someone added extra grease to the pole and I was out.  The euphemism is Voluntary Early Retirement, but I was no volunteer.  Despite my best efforts, or because of them, I was a failure.  Painful as all this was at the time, it has led to great blessing for me.  You see, I wasn’t very useful to God while I was busy succeeding.  While Keller focuses on money, I found success to be the greater trap.

It’s interesting that Jesus didn’t seem to have a problem with worldly success.  When Jesus met the rich young ruler, he didn’t say that he was a bad person because he was rich and powerful.  Jesus didn’t condemn the virtuous accumulation of wealth or power or influence.  When Jesus met the guy, he loved him – because he understood the terrible trap this young man had fallen into.  The young man wanted to be good and was having some success in this quest, but sensed in himself that he was missing something critical.  Jesus, in his tough love, immediately makes a terrible offer to the young man that goes to the heart of his problem.  Could he put aside success and his potential for much more of it, and trust his life to Jesus instead of to himself?  Jesus was asking for trust not just in the life to come, but in this life – right now.

It’s incredibly hard on self to lose in the struggle for worldly success.  I found my own fall desperately difficult.  I saw myself (for an agonising moment or century) as the rest of my world must have seen me – a middle aged loser.  How much harder it would be for a young man, with so much ahead of him, to choose such a fate voluntarily.  What would everyone think of him?  What would he think of himself for giving away so much?  And so, he went away sad, rich and powerful but still trapped.

Many of us also live our lives inside the success trap.  We live as if we and not God were the source of our jobs, talents, opportunities and eventual success.  So we find it hard to imagine that all we have earned – social position, educational qualifications, possessions, work achievements – are not only temporary but possibly undeserved gifts.  We are beggars spiritually who must ask for help to be saved.  But our self-respect has trouble handling beggar status when it comes to our worldly successes.  We find it hard to rely on the One who has already given us everything.

Tough times seem be coming again in Europe and North America (and perhaps even in Australia).  The jobs, investments, property and arrangements many of us trust for security might be threatened – even lost.  Suddenly, we might not be successful.  It will be humiliating but it could also be ultimately liberating.

My question; How would you cope if you lost all the success you’d worked for?  What would reliance upon Christ look like at that moment?

 

Next instalment of the King’s Cross blog post will be August 27th, looking at Ch 12 “the Ransom”

Filed under: King's Cross, Reflection, Uncategorized | 2 Comments »

the Mountain

Posted on July 9, 2012 by wtdavid

Today’s post comes from Kevin in the US.

The mountain—the transfiguration—provided an opportunity for true worship.  A sick (and dying) daughter provided an opportunity for true worship.  Both of these situations are written about in Mark 9.  In an exercise of pure focus on the only person worth complete attention and adoration, a person can seek to ascribe to God the worth that only He is due. 

But there’s more, according to Keller.  I was fascinated by Keller’s term ”repentant helplessness” as necessary in true worship.  I’m not fascinated in a “what-a-cool-phrase” kind of appreciation, but a gut-wrenching, face-slapping, wake-up call that helped me to see worship in yet another helpful light.

Repentant helplessness.  Yes, in my efforts to ascribe worth to our Savior, there is often a lot of me involved.  My comfort, my setting, my surroundings, my mood, and many other factors often play a role in my worship.  The type of music, the style of dress, the “spiritual temperature” of those around me often affect my focus—and appreciation—of Him.  But how selfish is that?

If my focus is on Him, and if (as I believe) “the things on Earth will grow strangely dim” in light of Who He is, I need to repent of my demand for proper circumstances to influence my worship.  I need to acknowledge my utter helplessness in absolutely everything—even in the fact that I can approach the God of all creation!—in order to really and truly worship.

We are already accepted by Him, but not because of anything we did—or do.  It’s what He has done in light of our selfish ways.  Pursuing Him also empowers us to live for Him in this broken and hurting world.  Like Peter, James, and John on the mountain, we can experience this.

Is there “repentant helplessness” in your worship?  What does that look like?

 

Next week: chapter 11 – “the Trap”

Filed under: King's Cross, Reflection | 2 Comments »

the Waiting

Posted on June 11, 2012 by wtdavid

We had just arrived home that morning, caught a quick nap and then got ourselves ready to head to the wedding of the daughter of some good friends.  We arrived in plenty of time and got seated along with the hundred or so other guests.  Then we waited … and waited … and waited.  Several announcements were made from the front to the effect that the bride was on her way.  “We have never been to a wedding that started this late.  What could she possibly be doing?” were thoughts that ran through our minds.  Then the bride showed up and all that complaining disappeared in the joy of the ceremony that followed. 

When Tim Keller writes: “God’s sense of timing will confound ours, no matter what culture we’re from.  His grace rarely operates according to our schedule,” we can readily identify with the frustration that arises from our lack of patience in regards to His timing.  Just as we felt when our friends’ daughter was “late” for her own wedding, so we wonder in frustration what God is up to when He doesn’t seem to come through “in the right time.”

However, it is in the delay that God often speaks to us, and we can easily miss His message.  Keller writes: “But precisely because of the delay both Jairus and the woman get far more than they asked for.  Be aware that when you go to Jesus for help, you will both give to and get from him far more than you bargained for.”  What we may learn to give is a deeper commitment and call to follow Him, shedding our self focused way of living which may treat God only as a help in time of need and not a Redeemer needed every day.  What we may learn to get is a richer appreciation of His presence with us, of His love for us despite how we may feel or think.

Keller is right that often in our response to life situations we try to “hurry Jesus” and demonstrate “impatience with the waiting.”   I think it might be a good thing to adopt Thomas Cranmer’s prayer as our own: “Grant that we may both follow the example of his patience, and also be made partakers of his resurrection.”

 

What words would you use to describe your struggle with impatience when it comes to God’s timing?  What would it look like for you to trust His timing and His seeming delay to act according to your timetable?  What one or two thoughts would you share with someone you are discipling about learning or growing in one’s patience and ability to wait?

Filed under: King's Cross, Reflection | 6 Comments »

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