students of jesus

This Christmas I’ve published a 25-Day devotional, one for each day in December. Each one is drawn from the scripture, because even though these holiday stories are familiar, they are still the word of God to us, capable of teaching and guiding us through life. And because the burden of Christmas makes us busier and more prone to stress, each meditation is designed to be read in a minute--and provide something to consider all day long.

The eBook is available over at Amazon.com, but here’s a sample page:

From the Life of Joseph:

DAY TWELVE

Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly. (Matthew 1:19)

The narrative shows us what a righteous man looks like. In his confusion and pain, Joseph’s first concern was for Mary. How many of us would have this priority? Perhaps this is why the scripture labels him a “righteous man.” Joseph's righteousness is rendered not in terms of his relationship to God, but in terms of his relationship to Mary. True righteousness extends two directions—toward God and toward others.

This Christmas I’ve published a 25-Day devotional, one for each day in December. Each one is drawn from the scripture, because even though these holiday stories are familiar, they are still the word of God to us, capable of teaching and guiding us through life. And because the burden of Christmas makes us busier and more prone to stress, each meditation is designed to be read in a minute--and provide something to consider all day long.

The eBook is available over at Amazon.com, but here’s a sample page:

How God Speaks:

DAY EIGHTEEN

God speaks through dreams: The record shows that God spoke to Joseph exclusively through dreams. What’s more, Joseph took these dreams seriously and made life-altering choices based on them. Would you marry someone or move to a foreign country based on your dreams? Joseph did! In fact, we are in the habit of referring to "our dreams," but what if they are God’s? Dreams are mentioned no fewer than four times in Matthew’s Christmas narrative. The scripture demonstrates God can and does guide his children through dreams. Imagine: in an emotionally charged situation like the Nativity, just when we would be tempted to ignore our dreams as a product of our subconscious, God is present: leading, directing, and guiding—through dreams.

At last: A Christmas devotional for incredibly busy people.

Each day in December, in one minute or less, you can capture a concept that will enrich your journey toward Christmas day. Everyone's busy--and the holidays only add to the list of things to do. Yet Christmas is something more than a celebration of an event from long ago or modern holiday centered around shopping.

God is still speaking through the Christmas story: the gospel narratives centered around the birth of Jesus are filled with encouragement and revelation concerning the love of God and his wisdom for us today.

This practical eBook format means you can catch a devotional moment on the go: from your e-Reader, at your desktop, holding your tablet, or on your phone. If you can create enough space to read these one-minute devotions, you can carry their thoughts and ideas with you the rest of the day.

Available for Amazon Kindle and Kindle Apps.

I did not grow up a church-boy. After becoming a Christian I wandered through backyard Bible studies, late night prayer meetings in odd places, and lived my Christian life among strange, semi-cultic fellowships of networked home churches. I was baptized by a college kid, who dunked me into a suburban swimming pool just after midnight. One of the people who got baptized that night shouted, “Hold me under a long time--I’ve got a lot to die for!”

I must have been 25 years old before I ever saw a proper church baptism. When I did, I was fascinated with the phrase repeated over and over again, “Arise to walk in newness of life.” The words rang with freshness and truth. They also sounded vaguely familiar, so I used my New American Standard Bible and tracked down the words to Romans, chapter 6: “Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.”

It’s an amazing assertion: that the born-again experience produced an entirely new creation, a new order of being. My amazement, though, gave way to an observation: these words were too good to be true. Most of us gently changed the meaning to something easier to grasp. “I’ve been clean-up by God,” or, “My sins have been washed away,” or, ”My past has been forgiven.” All these things are true, but they are something very different from a new creation. Eventually I began to wonder, what good is it to have your past forgiven, if you are essentially the same person? When someone is only forgiven--merely forgiven--the recidivism rate for sin is sure to be 100%. We will do it again.

But imagine a new creature, something--someone--born from another realm, with different desires, different needs. Someone who feeds on different food, breathes different air, and drinks from an entirely different fountain. Imagine that the change is wrought inside-out, so that the outer appearance is unchanged, but the spiritual body chemistry is other-worldly. What if we could be redeemed versions of the pod people from Invasion of the Body Snatchers?

It’s worth meditation: what if newness of life actually meant a life of another kind? But that would be too weird, right?

It’s one thing to call the prodigals home. It’s quite another to have a home worth returning to.

In a post last year I highlighted Christian prodigals, people who love Jesus but live far from home. They have taken the family inheritance and squandered it on travels in Christendom; left their family in search of something else and live as if their family is dead. In the comments at that post more than one person observed that “home” may not be what Jesus portrayed in his parable:
When you've been harmed by men pursuing their own agenda, it's easy and natural to be skeptical of all church institutions. It becomes hard not to, when it's happened more than once.

It’s a fair question: What if we return home to a place ruled not by the Father, but by older brothers filled with judgment or manipulation?

Another friend texted me to ask what if work or marriage or life have brought about a change of location, and the new landscape is barren and cold? What if you left home for all the right reasons, but there is no family of faith healthy enough to adopt a mature son:
My previous church feels like home and everything in my new city feels like a maternity ward.

He has a point: so many Evangelical churches focus on the new birth to exclusion of worship, community or spiritual formation. What happens if you’ve eaten at a healthy table only to find bread and water at the next?

Still another friend observed that the restless heart of the prodigal needs a transplant:
Christians drifters will never find that perfect church, so they are going to stay just long enough until the newness wears off and they see a few flaws, then it's off to some new church that seems more exciting and more spiritual. Reminds me of Bonhoeffer: "Every human wish dream that is injected into the Christian community is a hindrance to genuine community and must be banished if genuine community is to survive. He who loves his dream of a community more than the Christian community itself becomes a destroyer of the latter, even though his personal intentions may be ever so honest and earnest and sacrificial."

And when you quote D-Bon, it’s the last word, right? Well, no, actually. These friends and others have only opened the conversation.

Students of Jesus is about spiritual formation. It’s about each of us developing the kind of relationship with the Master that leads to rest and peace. It’s about taking the yoke of discipleship. I’ve tried to avoid criticisms of the church at large because I have no voice or control over the church at large. Besides, church-bashing is so fun and easy it requires no particular insight or revelation. Anyone can do it. Still, it’s true that our personal spiritual formation is not complete apart from the community God intended--the church.

How can we address the deep need for true community of the Spirit when there are churches devoid of such life? How can we hold the Christian prodigal accountable for their own hearts when some have left home out of self-preservation?

To those who have been wounded by the church I would point toward the Lord Jesus. The testimony of John reminds us, “He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.” (John 1:11) It’s not news that religious houses may be the places most in need of his presence. If we return home with a Christlike character we will be welcomed by some and abused by others. A modern truth: when we return the Father may not be waiting inside the building at all. The older brother may have taken over or--worse--the farm may have failed altogether. In these cases our calling to return may be especially difficult and sacrificial; we will take our place among those Jesus calls “blessed” in the beatitudes.

To those who are searching for a new home I would point toward the journey of Abraham. The father of faith “was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God.” (Hebrew 11:10) He had seen the blueprint and was searching for where the architect and builder was at work. The benefit of a growing up in a healthy home is that we will not settle for a poor substitute. Our past becomes the blueprint for the future. There is a difference between running from home and looking for a new one: Dr. Tolkien reminds us that “not all who wander are lost.”

To those who see the fatal flaw in human idealism I would point toward the power of the call. Jesus understood that the very offer to “Come and see” can change lives. There was no shortage of idealists in Jesus day. He welcomed those with high ideals and tempered them with down-to-earth teaching about birds, flowers, foxes, wheat and tares. When his disciples believed fire from heaven was the answer he demonstrated the wisdom and true power that flows from keeping after the Father’s business. We can explain there is often a disparity between the builder’s plans and the worker’s craftsmanship. We can help them realize that a thoughtful pastor understands that much of his work may in fact be wood, hay, and stubble.

These are merely fingers in the wind. How should we speak to the Christian prodigal? How can our actions and counsel make a place for those who believe they have no place? There’s no shortage of comment when describing the problem--why not help me explore the solution?