friendship's second things

somewhere in this our conversations got stale

[maybe that's the wrong word. words are a bulky attempt at a feeling. my sister has a thing about words. something about cultures story telling and painting and how we're visual and literary communicators]

i don't know if it was the content
things that were the rarity
and then became the all
and it was a default

it's like making out in a relationship
or sex for some people.
you love someone, and it's all from who they are, and then you get them, and you date, and then you kiss, and it says everything, there in that action;
"i want you near me"
"you're the object of my affection"
and then soon it's all you do
and you miss them, because you put the expression of your affection first, as a means
not the end
and maybe that's us
and some of those things we do that were special shifted to the norm
and you forget why you're not feeling new things, when you're doing the old things
and then before long, a relationship that is the primary topic of its own conversations isn't really anything at all

c.s. lewis talks about friendship and relationships being two people standing side by side looking at something great together and saying "i think this is amazing" and "so do i"
like people with music and film and art and beauty, and hobbies and sports and video games and places
but if you turn to that person and say "i love that i love you" and they say "i love that too" and that's all you have, you're at a bit of a loss

i don't think that's us
i'm just working out the word 'stale'
and thinking of a synonymous idea
or synonymical

but you know that feeling when we're shoving the bi-product up centre stage.
c.s. lewis said it
"Put first things first and we get second things thrown in: put second things first and we lose both first and second things"

acceptable worship

Hebrews 12:28&29 say
“let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire"
Acceptable worship, Consuming fire.
Now the author is this letter has in mind the book of Exodus and the book of Leviticus and the whole old law. And these terms come straight out of Leviticus 9 and 10. You might know the story, the Israelites have just been given instructions about priests and sacrifices at the tabernacle, at the temple. And Aaron has just been commissioned and ordained and he has offered the first sacrifice and followed every letter of the law. He offered acceptable worship. But then in chapter 10 we read

Now Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, each took his censer and put fire in it and laid incense on it and offered unauthorized fire before the LORD, which he had not commanded them. And fire came out from before the LORD and consumed them, and they died before the LORD.

Leviticus 9 Aaron offers acceptable worship, Leviticus 10 his sons offer unauthorized fire and are consumed by the fire of God. So the central question for Hebrews chapter 13 is 'what is acceptable worship?'
And the one thing that I think really matters here is that acceptable worship for God is not working for His love, it is not working for His forgiveness, it is not working for His acceptance. Those things are not just missing the grace of God, they are unacceptable worship.
We had a massive problem between us and God but Hebrews 1-12 has already outlined and celebrated how that has been solved, fixed, restored, forgiven.

and Hebrews 10:12&18 say
But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God,
Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer any offering for sin.

There is no longer any offering for sin
that sentence brings a very great calm.
And with easter this week, this verse is a great reminder of why we celebrate. I once wrote about easter in these terms “the world wakes up to the deafening calm of sin paid for”. It’s done, the sacrifice is made, it’s been paid for.

So do you see that any attempt from us to be good enough for God, to be righteous on our own, these are unacceptable sacrifices. It’s done it’s been paid for. Do you see that if we get this wrong we’ll be in a world of trouble? We’ll be coming to God with our guilt and our legalism and our promises to try harder to be good enough for Him. But none of that is required, none of that is acceptable, we are to come grateful for what He has given and promised to us.
But only once you can say “I am receiving a Kingdom that cannot be shaken” and “Jesus has offered the perfect sacrifice for my sins and I cannot be more forgiven and I cannot be less forgiven” are you ready to obey.

Acceptable worship is gratitude.

masters

some of you will say "i'm free, why do i want to be a slave?"
i would ask you to be completely honest with yourself; are you really free? you're not.
who or what is your master?
if it is alcohol if it is drugs if it is food if it is pride if it is straight As and achievement, someone, something is your master. here's my question - is it, are they better than Jesus?

- mark driscoll

no fear of falling

from these moments we awake
our heads clear of the mistakes
how we never hit the breaks, or felt it stalling

piper on lewis

"He helped me become alive to life.
To look at the sunrise and say with an amazed smile,
“God did it again!”
He helped me to see what is there in the world;
things which if we didn’t have them,
we would pay a million dollars to have,
but having them, ignore."

the safe castle

i saw alice in wonderland at the movies.
there is a red queen and a white queen.
and for so much of the film there's tension and discomfort and we're in this world of danger. for all the time alice is in the red queen's court she's only protected by a made-up name. and for all the beauty and mystery and magic of the world it wasn't 'safe' and there were no anchors or stability.

but the story gets around to alice being discovered and attacked and chased and she runs and runs and runs and gets to the white queen's castle. and high on a stone balcony of the castle, on the neat white stone under a clean night sky she stands overlooking a series of quiet, tall waterfalls.

for whatever point they were aiming at making, i was so struck by that calm. one day soon, maybe tomorrow, i'm going to live in a castle like that. but better. i couldn't stop thinking of how tangible it will be, my daily, momentary lived reality will be in a calm paradisal kingdom. i'll walk that balcony. the instant i'm there i never won't be there.

what's wrong with the world?

is there anything wrong with the world?
i heard the sentence "things aren't as they should be" today.
but i thought - things are as they are. things just happen, they just exist, occur, they just are. where does this higher standard come in?

look at the news, read about war and murder and rape and injustice and genocide and theft, adultery, abortions. these things just are. and really, someone could say "nothing is wrong with the world". this is the world. there's no more wrong in these things than there is wrong in a fish swimming in water. that is the nature of the game.

i see this as one side of a contract. because as soon as you respond by saying "but they're wrong, it's obvious that they're wrong". then i will say - then the universe must have meaning. and it must have been founded upon some system of justice. and that system must be real enough for us to know, but too high for us to keep.

and whatever else you believe, you can't deny that, because you signed on the dotted line. and you're now only one step away from hearing the best news that any human has ever known.

flowchart

box 1 - we're alive
right?
i mean, that's the starting point, because that's our certainty
and you have to look at life
and weigh it
and across every dimension its breathtaking
complxities of our bodies, development in the womb
at 8mm an embryo's heart is beating
you know, ecosystems, the balance
the perfect percentage of oxygen in the atmosphere to breath, but not cause spontaneous combustion
the axis of the planet, the distance friom the sun, the spin - day and night; work and rest
the complexity of the brain, human emotion, art, expression, love, significance
the meaning we demand for every single event before we agree to it
relationships, procreation
jump out to the galaxy being 100,000 light years across in diametre
sitting in the middle of a universe of hundreds of billions of other galaxies. the universe is beyond comprehension
i mean we could go all day. take any one thing and think for more than 5 minutes and you'll be floored.
death, and fear of death. our scrambling for being remembered, our inherent morality, systems of justice
the fact that there are 12,000,000,000,000,000,000 atoms in a grain of salt
the human eye, the concept of language
and even the things we feel that can't be expressed
i guess at the end of thinking (if there was an end) the first flow-chart box is "are we here by chance, is there no order or meaning to life, or is there a meaning, is there a purpose, a "god"?"
as a person who's alive in this life and reality and on this planet spinning in this universe, i can't not think that there has to be a god behind it all.
the big bang doesn't make sense of my reality. it tells me i'm an accident created by pre-existant, eternal atoms who bumped into each other and created this? i can't take that. and it tells me that everything i've ever felt comes to a total of 'nothing' and i can't believe that's true.

box 2 - ok, if there is a god. has it/he/she/they made contact with the world. are they knowable in any way. or is it/he/she/they a force out there not to be known?
and i suppose it's 50:50 to an extent
but if you take the world as it is and the people we are in the reality that is, then you consider that this was conceived and created by this 'god' then you've got to account for
1. that's a lot of effort, to then take no credit and remain an anonymous force. seems logical for there to be some impact remaining, some fingerprint or evidence of god
2. if you consider how intensely relational we are as people. that life is up when relationships are, and never more down than when relationships are breaking apart. how keenly we pursue love and companionship. how we worship it in all our art. how we long to be known and to know.
and if we're the creation of a 'god' it would make more sense that that 'god' be knowable. relational. relatable in some way. rather than not.
i lean towards realtional, because i have a box 3 and because of the above logical reasoning - 'logic' being another evidence for the first box)

box 3 is also somewhat logical
if god is knowable in some way - is it in one of the major (or minor) world religions (i.e. some people are onto the communication/understand-ability that 'god' has provided) or is it a 'communication' that no one has really grasped and organised and understood yet?
and i suppose i'd consider that if 'god' was making a universe that plays out like a rubick's cube times by a symphony orchestra to the power of an orgasm and then times infinity (in complexity, logic, beauty, feeling and experience) then i'd back it/him/her/them as able to communicate in a way that is understood by people - i.e. the god who made the world and 'communicated' to the world is probably one of the world-religion gods

scopes of comparison

this is a question, not an answer

i think about in the movies when they want to show that someone is really powerful, they show some intro sequence where they come up against some impossible situation - like a truck coming at them or a gun pointed at that them or another strong guy who they destroy. and it's the most exciting thing to see some hero walk into a situation where they are surrounded by ten guys who think that he is about to get destroyed, but he's got that quiet calm because we know he is more powerful than all of them. and when you follow some protagonist through a series of adventures and you become more and more impressed with how powerful he is, then they meet someone and we learn that the new character is one hundred times more powerful.
and it's those comparisons that make us say 'wow'. and they put it all in perspective.
and we love that first guy, and we love that second guy, because we've come to understand just how great they are. and if i saw a man on the train and knew that he could crush a truck i'd be in such awe.
are you with me here?

but something is lost when we jump to 'Jesus was God in human form'.
and there's something in Him having 'too much power' that our minds can't handle it.
he was a man. he was a man on earth. he was a man on earth who would think the universe out of existence.

maybe it's like zooming out on google-earth and for the first little while your brain says, "wow, look sydney's huge" but then it's too far and too much and you can't hold the comparison together and pretty soon you're back at the old familiar shapes on the map and you feel as though you 'understand' the size of the planet. but there's something missing. because we still look at a cliff or a waterfall or a tree and say "that's giant" without the same awe when we see our entire continent on a map.

he loves the unlovely

Jonathan said last night:

"He loves the unlovely.
which is why some of your are saved"

i don't know if i did physically, but inside i was nodding in full agreement.

unapproachable

i took quickly think of God as the idol my mind had created; where he is my buddy and it's kind of me to give Him my time, but He knows that it's hard for me to care about Him. and when my mind and life wander i think that i can come back to Him with a knowing smile that says 'sorry to do that to you, but you know me...' as if i'm that friend who jokes about always being late.

in numbers they are counting the different branches of the Levite tribe and each branch has a different role in the assembly and disassembly of the tabernacle. the Kohathites deal with "the most holy things" - the ark of the Testimony, the table of the Presence, the lampstand, the gold altar, the articles for ministering in the sanctuary, the bronze altar, all the utensils. but it's Aaron's job to go in and cover everything in (usually three) layers of cloth before the Kohathites transport it.
and in numbers 4:20 it says about this set apart 'branch' of the Levite tribe of priests (which in the previous chapter have all been given to the LORD as the firstborn of Israel)

"But the Kohathites must not go in to look at the holy things,
even for a moment,
or they will die"

and if i sat and thought about that for long enough, as i should, i'd start to feel a very great weight in regards to God, and i'd probably not be so flippant or so wayward. and it would send me searching for something like the cross on calvary hill which is the one chance humanity has to know anything but destruction from the LORD. and the temple curtain tearing would seem all the more amazing, and God's love for the world in Jesus would be my greatest treasure.

each other

i read numbers 5:5-6 today

"The LORD said to Moses, "Say to the Israelites: 'When a man or woman wrongs another in any way and so is unfaithful to the LORD, that person is guilty"

and it struck me the 'logic' that God has here that we don't have.
it explicitly says when a man or woman wrongs another in any way they are unfaithful to the LORD.
and i'm sure that a lot of our thinking about reality is wrong and a lot of our 'intrinsic', inherited values are wrong. but while i don't know what all of those are, and i do know that it is definitely true here. my emphasis and weight on relationships with other people ought to have the weight of being a decision and impact directly upon God. it is He who has said that we should love our neighbours [as ourselves] and my decision to comply or not can't be made on the basis of that person's 'value' or 'appeal' but it is a matter of my faithfulness to the LORD.
David knew this. psalm 51

"Against you, you only, have I sinned
and done what is evil in your sight"

look where we were and look where we are

it's these two years in london that have me thinking about life more than ever. but no one else seems to think about it with me.
i said to Rob today 'look, we met in this alley last year and now we're walking down it to the flat we live in together'. look where we were and look where we are. i think these are such transient years. we're all here, gathered in this experience of a staff team for two years. look, we've come from all over the world and we're in this together. i say to John when we're cleaning 'look at us now John, one day soon this will all be memories' and he says 'yes' but i don't know if he means it. but all these moments and feelings and significances are just temporary, they're just building blocks. and i said to Sioned and Jayne and Anna 'how strange is it that all the way through your life and at every moment you've been conscious and alive and you've felt every interaction and every event as if they are all that matter, but when you look back on being aged 5 or 8 or 12 or 17 you can only remember pieces of it. all these minutes get simplified into a small list of memories' - and do we see now how all of this that we're doing is just going to get bunched up and collected in our minds as a time we used to be in? look where we were and look where we are and think where we will be. life is so heavy and so real. and then in staff meeting Kenji and i look at photos of Jane from when she was younger and her family photos and her newspaper clippings as a nurse. and you can't fake that stuff. you can't decide what you are going to grow up to be. and i asked whether her flat was Emmanuel property, but the thing is, from here on it's Jane's. she's not going anywhere from here, there's no next step in a career, she's in these people's lives and she's working hard for the kingdom here. and we come and go, pass through in our two year blocks, overlap by one either side and then spend the rest of our lives not being near each other. and here in my room, with all my photos on the walls, and my blackboard square and my 'not to be forgotten' stencil and the conversation turns to my visa's expiration and me trying to stick around for a couple of weeks to say goodbyes. and how come september i'll need to be out, i'll need to give my room up, paint it new and paint it clean and paint myself out of the memory of the house. and another two years will roll on by with new faces on a photo board and sunday lunches with 'get to know you' questions, and i'll be on a plane, flying away from a gap already closed-in, taking a hundred thousand memories with me. and i'll leave my chords of significance tied to a thousand different places, with holographic ghosts memories playing over and over in the same streets. and here hurrah we're off again. life is dealing us all her pains and thrills. and in all of it, in the years from now someone will say 'i once knew...' or they'll say 'i've been there before' and our encyclopedic memory bank files away a place-name in a list. all the burns and bravery we suffered make us more of who we were going to be. but i am inclined to stop the song before it's played out and consider which piece of the whole i am inside of now. and how does my today change my tomorrow. form it, force it. i'm carrying all of this in my feelings and when it seems most significant, i can't help but ask 'do you remember where we were? because look where we are now'.

the new covenant

i was behind in my reading and so i covered hebrews 1-10 today.
and there are so many beautiful sentences
(on top of all the beautiful points being made)
the overwhelming encouragement that we are not judged on the law

7:18-19

"The former regulation is set aside because it was weak and useless (for the law made nothing perfect), and a better hope is introduced, by which we draw near to God"

8:7-8

"For if there had been nothing wrong with that first covenant, no place would have been sought for another. But God found fault with the people and said:
"The time is coming, declares the Lord,
when I will make a new covenant
with the house of Israel
and with the house of Judah"

8:13

"By calling this covenant "new," he has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear"

9:12

"[Christ] entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, having obtained eternal redemption"

and then 6:18

"God did this so that, by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope offered to us may be greatly encouraged."

the criteria for someone who benefits from the new covenant is someone who has fled to God to take hold on the hope that is offered.