Refining Charismatic Lables: Rhythm

In last week’s talk, I eluded to an imbalance danger. I tried to make the point that our excitement level as a group of people who want to (and enjoy) feel God (Pentecostal) cannot overshadow the point of our existence as the church.

1. Be known for our love (John 13:34-36) and

2. To make disciples (Matthew 28).

Rob Bell's Nooma series has a great discussion about this "rhythm" thing. You can check it out at www.nooma.com.

In essence, it is important that our whole self incorporate this spiritual mandate and fight the danger of imbalance in our journey. It is paramount that we find our rhythm and place in this God-life.

Along with Rob's "rhythm" talk, comes some different questions to ponder and discuss:

Question #1

What do you believe about God’s involvement in our daily lives?

Read Exodus 3:14 (KJV)

Question #2

Why do you think people, including some writers of the Bible use human physical references like “hands,” “feet,” “eyes,” and “he” to describe God, when other scriptures state that God is spirit and has no form?

See Deuteronomy 4:15-18 (NIV) and John 4:24 (MSG)

Question #3

What does it mean for you to be in or out of tune with the song? Are you in tune?

Question #4

Can you believe in God and be out of tune with the song?

Does it work the other way around?

Question #5

What is more important to Jesus: what we believe or what we do?

see John 10:10 (CEV)

Conclusion

You need to find the song God has written on your heart and be in tune. The song is the rhythm of your life. In tune is the way you live with that song.

Here is where we stand:

Main song

1. Loving God – relationship with Creator
2. Loving Others – being the church and building the kingdom
3. Making Disciples – bring folks along with you

2007 Underground

Loving God – prayer and worship and submission to teaching

Loving Others – groups that serve

Making Disciples – who we bring with us – outreach to build our community and the Kingdom

This is empowerment from Acts 1:8: this redefines the charismatic label.

Refining Charismatic Labels: History

I chose Richard Simmons to signify the danger of goofiness in our spiritual walk. He just makes me laugh and I feel that a lot of times we only see the extreme (goofy Richard) in some charismatic theology. I am out there, but I do have fun at it.

Plato said that all philosophy (the way we think about life) begins with wonder.
Francis Bacon said that wonder dies with knowledge

The main problem with charismatic theology is that it is full of wonder – it seems to void of rational thought and intelligence. We value intelligence. Greeks valued intelligence – the Jews wanted signs.

Charismatic experience is all out wonder. There really is no explanation for some things; and the things we justify we can’t explain we justify. Justification by faith – or at least the lesser evil.

History (this is some great stuff to google)

§ History of Pentecostal & Charismatic faith

§ Early 1900’s
o Azusa Street Revival
o Charles Parham
o William Seymour

§ 1920’s
o Denominational Acceptance & Growth
§ Pentecostal
§ Assemblies of God

§ 1970’s - Today
o Today: Radical Figureheads
§ Benny Hinn
§ Rodney Howard - Browne
§ Brownsville and Toronto Revivals (1990’s)
§ Creflo Dollar
§ Morningstar
§ Reinhard Bonke

o Spirit Phenomena
§ Healing
§ Out of control

How does the label of charismatic history appear in light of these scriptures?

Jesus commented, "Even more blessed are those who hear God's Word and guard it with their lives!" As the crowd led, he took a fresh tack: "The mood of this age is all wrong. Everybody's looking for proof, but you're looking for the wrong kind. All you're looking for is something to titillate your curiosity, satisfy your lust for miracles. But the only proof you're going to get is the Jonah-proof given to the Ninevites, which looks like no proof at all. What Jonah was to Nineveh, the Son of Man is to this age. Luke 11:28-30

He told the dove merchants, "Get your things out of here! Stop turning my Father's house into a shopping mall!" That's when his disciples remembered the Scripture, "Zeal for your house consumes me." But the Jews were upset. They asked, "What credentials can you present to justify this?" Jesus answered, "Tear down this Temple and in three days I'll put it back together." John 2:17-19

Meanwhile in Capernaum, there was a certain official from the king's court whose son was sick. When he heard that Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went and asked that he come down and heal his son, who was on the brink of death. Jesus put him off: "Unless you people are dazzled by a miracle, you refuse to believe." But the court official wouldn't be put off. "Come down! It's life or death for my son."

John 4:47-49

It's written in Scripture that God said,
In strange tongues
and from the mouths of strangers
I will preach to this people,
but they'll neither listen nor believe.
So where does it get you, all this speaking in tongues no one understands? It doesn't help believers, and it only gives unbelievers something to gawk at.

I Corinthians 14:21-23

Are these biblical things happening?

§ Love

§ Healings

§ Disciples

§ Etc.

YES!

But there is also as imbalance danger:

§ Charismatic Actions vs. Great Commission

§ Charismatic Actions vs. Love of disciples (the mark of a disciple)

§ Charismatic Actions vs. Gospel message

The Charismatic actions, weird and inexplicable as some are, should not overshadow the message of the love of Christ.

Being the church and building the Kingdom.

We should pray and seek intimacy with the Creator – but we should always act out our faith!

Self Awareness

We need to come to a place of contentment in

§ who we are in Christ

§ who we are as a disciple

§ who we are in the global church

Too many times we focus on one of these three things and leads to IMBALANCE.

Charismatics simply want to feel God and experience His power. That is not a bad thing. It is when the selfish desire for experience clouds the God-desire for the disciple’s life.

I will close with a quote from Ravi Zacharias. “Until we see in ourselves the uniqueness of God’s touch, we will always want to be someone else and will live under the illusion that being someone else would be better.”

Know who you are – embrace it – and always seek to know your Creator more and more. Be careful to stay humble and unselfish, but go after God with all the tenacity you can muster.

Refining Charismatic Lables: Tongues

When I hear the topic of tongues, I am first reminded of being a child and watching TV preachers and “tent revival” atmospheres. Powerful “god like” preachers calling down power from heaven. They were intimidating.

For anyone who hasn’t had any experiences with this stuff, I consider them lucky. More times than not, our experiences cloud and distract the beauty and wonder of an experience like “tongues.” After all, it’s alluded to (in scripture) as a routined gift for those “Spirit life-ers.” Seeing the distortion and abuse of tongues causes a cynicism and pre-judging attitude toward any belief system and I believe this to be inherently natural. But who am I to say what is extreme? I am simply a continual student in this dance, myself. One will need to judge and educate himself in these matters. What I layout is my (and many others) beliefs and schools of thought on the matter of tongues (but mainly my own).

Before I get too detailed, I believe a life in the Spirit is defined by living a listening life. A believer should be consistently listening and “in communion” with the Creator. Our relationship with the Holy Spirit should be built upon familiarity and submission. A “constant praying lifestyle” is what scripture indicates (pray without ceasing). How else can this happen without communion with the Holy Spirit? It is in this communion, that begins at salvation.

“And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed,

you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit,

who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God's possession—to the praise of his glory.”

Ephesians 1:13-14

Now the Holy Spirit has several functions (Counselor, Teacher, Comforter, etc.); but it has one clearly defined purpose: to empower us to be like Christ and serve (see Acts 1:8).

“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." Acts 1:8

It is in this “empowerment” that we find the early account of other tongues (Acts 2). There are many theories and schools of thought regarding pneumatology (doctrine of the Holy Spirit) and the use of tongues. The synoptics, John, and Paul, all have different emphases. But let’s take the Lucan account in Acts 2, and hold it next to all of scripture for a thorough investigation. This means we may dust off the Old Testament from time to time, God forbid J.

1. Acts 2 – Lucan account with Joel – Personal

2. Tongues in daily life – Personal The Holy Spirit as personal guide – corporate is an issue I will not go into here.

1. Tongues in Scripture (Mother Theresa, Billy Graham) Acts 2 is the most popular instance 2:4

“All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.” Acts 2:4

Tongues – languages (Gk. Glossa) – glossolalia (the guttural noise our words make)

Acts 2:17 – Will prophesy – PROPHETEUO } same passage Joel 2:28 – Will prophesy - NABA } parallel

The language was common – a reversal of confusion (Babel)

This is the main function of public “tongues” – Symbol of Divine Communion. But, Paul makes this phenomenon more personal. Here is where a lot of the “weird” theology happens. Paul speaks more on an active passivity (termed coined by Simon Chan). This, simply stated, results mainly in the personal relationship with God. Therefore, tongues is a personal and intimate revelation of the triune God (Father, Son & Spirit).

* Ephesians 3:16-17 ¹⁶I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, ¹⁷so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love,

* Galatians 2:20 ²⁰I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

* Romans 8:9-10

⁹You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ. ¹⁰But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness.

* The Spirit indwelling the believers who creates the character of Christ.

Paul used tongues more than anyone

“I thank God that I speak in tongues

more than all of you.” I Corinthians 14:18

and uses it as communion with God

“For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays, but my mind is unfruitful. ``So what shall I do? I will pray with my spirit, but I will also pray `````with my mind; I will sing with my spirit, but I will also sing with my mind.” I Corinthians 14:14-15

This intimacy is related through this act. Paul recognized the unintelligible tongue – the physical act of speaking in tongues is not only a pointer to but also embodies the spiritual reality – what is experienced is similar to conversation – one acts and yet feels that one could not have acted otherwise (Chan 51).

This act of praying in tongues is a powerful evidence of the Spirit – what does this mean?

§ It is an embodiment of the Christ life

§ Brings us to a closer relationship with Him.

§ The point is to draw closer through this prayer language.

Many of the church fathers identified tongues as “guttural moanings” and humming. Throughout church history, it has taken several connotations. It has been abused and taught incorrectly. Its teaching has damaged others by making them feel as if they could not “grasp” the Spirit because they didn’t speak in another tongue. Many have taught that tongues is proof - it is merely evidence. Like tears are evidence of depression/sadness – you can still be depressed without tears. But don’t underestimate the power and “commonness” of tongues.

2. Tongues in Life

Tongues were used by Paul daily. How?

§ Constant communion with God

§ A prayer language

§ A safe place of symbolic refuge

§ Power in the communication

We need awareness of this present Holy Spirit.

The Label of Tongues

So last night I talked in Underground on the topic of "tongues" in holy writ. We are in the first week of a new series, Refining Charismatic Labels. I, personally, felt like I botched the topic and spoke poorly. But again, I always feel insecure about communicating. Anywho, I will blog some of my notes later this week on the topic.

I did ask two questions last night, and wanted to blog some of the interesting answers we received. Please remember, these are just folks' opinions and personal beliefs to the questions I asked. Like I said, I will blog my notes a bit later this week:

1. What is the purpose of "tongues"?

• A different way to worship God/A means for communication with God.
• A prayer language that allows a person to pray outside of their own thoughts.
  
• A spiritual gift used for edifying the believer...
• A form of communication to God, that only is between you and Him.
  
• To connect with the Spirit.
• To speak to God without anyone knowing (including yourself)
• To communicate the wonder of God across the language barrier to those who are not believers
• It is God speaking to us, through the Holy Spirit; it is supposed to be done in your prayer closet-privately.
• To translate a sermon into other languages.
• I am not sure.
• To give a message to people from God.
  
• It is a gift from God and that it is evidence of a Holy Spirit baptism. I dont think that it has to be a huge part of your life to be close to God.

2. What is the first thing that comes to your mind when your hear the word "tongues"?

• kissing
• speaking in a different language
• Usually massive misunderstanding of the purpose and extent of the gift.
• At first, I think of older people who speak afte rthe worship has ended...
• Speaking to God
• I'm kinda skeptical.
• Speaking in a foreign language
• It's time to become focused and serious
• Oh geez
• Doubt
• Nonsensical babbling
  
• Confusion, mainly. It has never happened to me before.

These are not all of the comments, but it does show the majority of ideas. I can definitely see a negativity on the second question. Hopefully, our relationship with the Creator will be deeped by our love and reaching out to Him, even if some of us never step foot into the whole "tongues" issue.

I should have my talk/notes blogged by Wednesday, and you can always download the latest podcast if you are an aural learner...(you can also search for it in itunes in the podcast section).

managing the Christ life...cheers

We don’t need anything. We can get anything we want, anytime we need it. We live in the richest country on the face of the earth. We don’t need anything. Our culture provides everything we need. Think about it: what do you really need that can’t be found in our society? What do you need right now? Love? Pleasure? Your needs met? Well, culture can give you a job, can give you a guy or a girl you can love, and can provide you with food and games to give you pleasure. But happiness, you need that, right? Comedy Central. Ok, what about purity of mind and emotion: yoga and introspective thought. If you can think about it enough it will effect the way you live. If you need something, culture can fix it. If culture can’t fix it, then we don’t want you around culture. Leave us, right now, because you make us uncomfortable.

So much of our lives are too surface. Our culture has so trained us to be consumers that we feel that we have no need at all. Think about this: consumerism. This one word drives the empirical mindset of our nation. We, the US, are a huge empire with individual empires. I am the King of my domain. No one can tell me what to do, how to do it, etc. If you are in front of me on I-85 and you aren’t going fast enough I pass you. Or if you stall at a light, I honk my horn. It is about me…this is my struggle, and it is your struggle.

We don’t need a Savior in our culture. The biggest issue here is that life can be figured out without a Savior. Go up to someone and say that you can tell them how to be saved: saved? Saved from what? Saved to what? Is someone after me? Why do I need to be saved? I am ok and you’re ok.

One thing I don’t want to be in this discussion is cliché. I don’t want to paint a typical evangelism sermon on you about why people need a Savior. The point I am making is that people have no desire or reference to saved, and maybe this analogy is not the best: the whole sin problem to Jesus conclusion.

See, the “saving” that provides for needs is different from the “saving” I hear about regarding heaven and hell. I have heard all my life that I need to be saved from Hell so I can go to heaven. Believe me, I don’t want Hell. But I fear that too many of us, myself included, can’t appreciate the “need” we have outside of the heaven and Hell context.

Let me ask this question: if there were no such thing as heaven and Hell, and a lot of people don’t believe in that other than metaphor anyway, what is the point of the Gospel? What NEED does it supply? You see, without heaven and Hell, a lot of evangelism and Christ talk goes array. Why do we need Christ in our consumer culture if it isn’t going to provide anything outside of heaven and Hell?

The problem is not the message; it’s the communication of the message. The problem is not culture; it’s the lack of communication to the culture. Every human being has basic needs:

• Food: we need nourishment
• Air: we need to breathe (physically and emotionally)
• Education: we need to know things (look both ways, etc.)
• Connection: we need to connect to people (friendships)

All of our consumer culture is based around these four basic needs. Find the loophole, please. I don’t think you will. Everything relates to one of these four things. Even myspace and television provides for a consumer need: relationship and networking.

The problem is not culture or the message, it’s the communication. Our culture fills the NEED well. Christ fills the NEED as well, and more eternally and fulfilling. The salvation of Christ is more than an escape from Hell; it is a life lived in community that meets a person’s basic needs. The problem is we, the church, fail at doing that much too often.

Read this passage with me from Acts 2:42. This is how people experienced the absence of basic needs when they came to Christ. Peter has just preached this dynamic sermon about Jesus and the past and he really hit it on the head so well with these people. It is a perfect sermon: it engaged their culture, reviewed their history, and revealed Christ. Now, people believe and this is what is written down about it:

“All the believers devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, and to fellowship, and to sharing in meals (including the Lord’s Supper), and to prayer.”

Acts 2:42 (NLT)

Four things they did:

1. Submitted to Apostles’ teaching
2. Had fellowship (lived life together)
3. Shared meals
4. Prayed together

Now watch this:

1. Submitted to Apostles’ teaching: EDUCATION NEED MET
2. Lived life together: CONNECTION NEED MET
3. Shared meals together: FOOD NEED MET
4. Prayed together: AIR NEED MET

This shows me four things we NEED and a relationship with Christ, done in community, meets the need:

1. We NEED submission:

What you submit yourself to educates you. Who do you sit under and listen to? What person sows into your life the truth of the Kingdom? You should be reading scripture, sure; but a person needs someone that speaks into their lives. Who is that for you? Judge and consider who you listen to: is it a person or idea from God or from the culture? We CAN'T separate from our culture, Jesus didn’t even do that. But we can live in contrast to cultural norms.

2. We NEED community:

We experience this daily. Who do you hang around with? Who do you talk to about stuff? Hopefully, it isn’t just a myspace or facebook community. Hopefully, you’re engaging in conversation and life with people around you. It is my desire that Underground will provide relationships for people. Every Sunday night folks hang out at restaurants and movies and different things. We have a group of folks who are purposefully friendly and welcoming to anyone needing community. We want our community to build and grow together. We have a motley cru of folks from professionals to students to cynics. Community CAN happen here and DOES happen here.

3. We NEED food:

Now, this isn’t just about physical food. We need to feed and be fed. The whole food analogy is summed up in the phrase: “they shared meals together.” This is the whole Kingdom on Earth as it is in Heaven bit. Meeting others’ needs. Being the Kingdom and showing Christ. In doing that, you get fed. Your spirituality goes outside of itself and your perspective is broadened and you mature. This is the idea behind helping the hungry and the needy.

4. We NEED prayer

We need to talk to God together. We need a community that prays and learns to pray together. God talks to us in prayer and we talk to God…it is the air supply of our lives.

Look at those four areas:

1. Submitted to Apostles’ teaching: who are you learning from?
2. Had fellowship (lived life together): who are you hanging around?
3. Shared meals: who are you helping?
4. Prayed together: who are you praying with?

This is the NEED, and we call it offensive and ban it by not living it. It is taboo. But folks, if we really do this, then they will call us HIS disciples and we will be known by our love.

What happens when the Kingdom starts becoming present?

Read Rick McKinleys' book This Beautiful Mess
change your outlook on Kingdom growth here and now
great read and funny, too

greatness

behold greatness: eugene h peterson. you may not have heard of him, but if you have read the Message Bible, he is the guy who paraphrased it. before he did that he wrote quite a few books...he is my favorite author and i got to meet him. i was so nervous. he is great...

UNDO

I grew up in church, people. I grew up non-denominational, foursquare, and Pentecostal Holiness. Oh God, Pentecostal Holiness was torture. We couldn’t wear makeup, wear jeans, watch the smurfs, we had to boycott Disney because they hired homosexuals, we boycotted Proctor and Gamble products at one time, if you went down the beer aisle in the metropolitan city you were going to hell, if you didn’t vote against the liquor by the drink you were going to hell, if you weren’t a Republican you were going to hell, etc etc etc. There were so many things I was programmed with as a child.

I get very confused with the topics we bring up. Like this one, we hear this topic come up every doubt night: alcohol. Obviously, alcohol is something that, if you were raised in a traditional church culture, you were told to avoid. But why? Is alcohol, in and of itself, bad? No. Is marijuana, in and of itself, sin? No. it is what we do with these things that make it sin. So, the question we tend to focus on from there is “Can I have a beer with my meal and still be a Christ follower?” or “Can I drink and still go to heaven?” Honestly, I think we have this fixation as college aged adults, that we want to drink, we want to do these things like alcohol and late night romance because it’s almost like a rite of passage for some of us or something we can do now because we are of age.

I was talking to Pastor Rick (my boss) about this topic and he cracked me up. He said this: “This is not a new struggle! My generation dealt with this and the relative issues, too!” Ya know, when I think about it, Rick grew up in the sixties during the sexual revolution. Premarital sex and homosexual preferences were the normal for college (most, anyway) conversations. Now, granted, Janet Jackson’s boob didn’t fall out on network TV back in the sixties, but Lennon and Yoko did pose nude on their album…the Beatle extraordinaire himself. These thoughts of “what’s accepted” aren’t something that only we have to deal with…most folks who have lived through their twenties have had to deal with this.

Which makes me ask the question: what is the motivation for our questions? I think we get caught up in the “what can I do” and “what can I not do” that we end up forming theories and philosophies that end up no where. I mean, honestly, if the consumption of alcohol was a good thing for everyone, they would allow children to but it, right?

I love what Allen Griffen said a couple weeks ago. I heard him the FACS chapel during the week and he was talking about being trusted. He was mainly talking about romantic relationships and how no one should be trusted with a romantic relationship until they turned 18. It was so funny. He was like: “Our government doesn’t even trust you to get behind the wheel of a car until you’re 16…and then we don’t trust you to drive at night until you’ve driven for so long in the daytime! We don’t trust you to vote until you become 18! We don’t trust you to purchase tobacco, which most adults have now understood to be extremely harmful to your health, until you’re 18! And even then, we tell you this will kill you. We don’t trust you to work and make money until you are 16, and we don’t trust you to spend that money on alcohol until you are 21!”

See, these questions we ask “what can I do…”; these are very immature questions! It’s funny to me, sometimes. I see someone turn 21, and I did it, I wanted to go buy a beer, a drink at a restaurant. Because NOW I FINALLY CAN. That was my motivation.

I can’t answer what your motivation is behind these questions, but the UNDO button comes in to play when you start maturing. When you start exploring your faith for yourself, you have to re-do the UNDO.

Like the UNDO button on the computer, I have found myself hearing things from church culture and implementing them, and then coming around and “undoing” it because I find Christ’s actual teachings are, according to my mood, better or worse.

what does it mean?

there’s a passage of scripture in I John 2:15-17:

Don't love the world's ways. Don't love the world's goods. Love of the world squeezes out love for the Father. Practically everything that goes on in the world—wanting your own way, wanting everything for yourself, wanting to appear important—has nothing to do with the Father. It just isolates you from him. The world and all its wanting, wanting, wanting is on the way out—but whoever does what God wants is set for eternity.

What do you think John is talking about when he talks about the ways of the world? I know on Doubt Night we always a lot of questions like: “can I drink” “how far is too far in a relationship” and stuff like that. I don’t know, maybe we’re asking the wrong questions? To me, the questions seem to fail. We seem to keep pointing away from what the New Testament refers to as “worldly ways.” I would just love to hear what some of you think about this. What makes a Christ follower different if it isnt the way we live every day? Surely it isnt JUST a matter of the heart...i remember scripture saying the heart is deceitful.

doubt night III

we do this thing in underground (our young adult ministry) called doubt night. it is a take off of rob bell's thing up in michigan that encourages any spiritual or bible question in a safe setting to be talked about. i purposefully put people with varied perspectives on the panel so i can disagree with them about things. i think it is healthy to banter and struggle with faith issues.

last night, we had our third doubt night. it was pretty good. good questions: we always always always get relationship questions. we usually get an alcohol question or two. but last night, we got a question about how the earth was populated after the fall of adam...who did cain and able marry, did they commit incest, and stuff like that. there are a lot of theories about this; but they are ALL theories. one theory is that the families mated with each other and repopulated the earth. another theory says there were "heavenly beings" that walked the earth and they helped the process. yet another theory says that the name "adam" represented mankind, and "eve" respresnted "womankind", and that when God created them he created all of humnanity with them. that their sin was that of a mini nation. now, all of these are theories and i am not about to subscribe fully to any of them.

however, the reason the question was asked confuses me. now that i talked to the "asker" i understand. but generally, when we seek scientific data to prove our faith we are either extremely encouraged or discouraged. the fact in this anomoly is that there is no proof...nothing with matter that can give the answer...we just know that if we believe the jewsih account of creation that it happened...the old adage (which i disdain hearing) God said it and it happened and i dont quesiton it...

here lies the problem, questioning is good...seeking is good...but seeking to no avail is disheartening. my logic tells me that credibility holds the key to faith. but my faith tells me that my trust in an all knowing all powerful being of God should bring credibility...even at such a risk.

i think the point of it all is to seek God. the bible talks about unfathomable mysteries...
will my faith in HIM be swayed by these things? if i woke up and turned on CNN and they reported that they had miraculously uncovered hard data that proved evolution (the missing link), what would that do to my faith? truthfully, i dont really know...i think there would be some panic.

i hope i would respond in KNOWING HIM out of the relationship i have with HIM (God). i hope my response, although reactive, would come down to simply knowing. i would hope that my faith would stay in tact.

organic kingdom...part 4

4. The rich earth people:

But the seed in the good earth—these are the good-hearts who seize the Word and hold on no matter what, sticking with it until there's a harvest

Self explanatory. These people have been changed for the long haul. They persevere and constantly refocus their priorities. They may have weeds that come and choke life but they get rid of them…they may get walked on like a road but they cultivate their walk with Christ…they may have an experience like a gravel person, but they nurture and mature.

These people produce fruit. This takes time. This is truly an organic kingdom.

organic kingdom...part 3

3. The weed people:

And the seed that fell in the weeds—well, these are the ones who hear, but then the seed is crowded out and nothing comes of it as they go about their lives worrying about tomorrow, making money, and having fun

The weed people…insert joke here, huh?

When Jesus talks about weeds I think about my pitiful lawn. I have become a man crazed with grass seed and sowing Scott’s solution to rid my lawn of weeds. It’s not working…Caleb is trying to help me with all the things that I need for this thing, but I can’t get it. I always have crab grass…I cant get rid of the crab grass…and there’s these weird horizontally growing weeds now…overtaking the mailbox…I cleaned them out with the weed-eater last week, but I am pretty sure they will resurface. I have spent more money on my lawn this year than I have on books I think. It’s pitiful.

Jesus identifies these people as people who hear, accept pretty much, but basically allows their lifestyle to become so crowded with “stuff” that it crowds out the Kingdom purpose in their life. Busy people…man, I am really busy, myself.

They way it is written in the Greek is that these people hear and believe, right? And after a while, when they start growing, they bring in performance enhancing drugs…ok, broad interpretation, but they bring in enhancements which create problems…they mean well with their commitments (drugs), but the commitments (drugs) start overshadowing the real purpose of Kingdom Living in the first place. Basically, they can’t, as the Greek indicates, mature. This word used here for mature is telesphoreo. It means “producing fruit.”

Have you ever seen someone so passionate about life, or a job, or even an emotional thing like love and helping the world that they get so BUSY with it that their purpose gets miffed in it and disappears? It’s like, I’m too busy being a world changer so I can’t actually change the world. I am too busy being a father (providing home, shelter, money) that my kids have no father. I am too busy being a Christian that no one sees Christ. We see people like this all the time, don’t we? They aren’t all bad, either. They aren’t all clueless…some of them work in churches and ministries but become so bogged down with business that their purpose gets lost.

Jesus knew people, huh?