Category: Discipleship

Make space for the extravagant

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Reflections based on Luke 7:36–50.

‘A woman in that town who lived a sinful life … came there with an alabaster jar of perfume. As she stood behind him at his feet weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissed them and poured perfume on them.’

After a little break over Christmas, we are back to our Wednesday devotionals on worship…

What total extravagance. Could you picture yourself doing that: entering a home uninvited, weeping and wiping Jesus’ feet with your hair and then kissing them and pouring a year’s worth of perfume over them? Jesus not only accepted the offering of worship from this woman, but also told her that her faith had saved her. Others looked on, probably shocked that Jesus allowed ‘such a sinner’ near him and also appalled at the apparent ‘waste’ (which, incidentally is how the disciples responded to a similar incident later in Jesus’ ministry – see Matthew 26:6–13 for example).

Before we side with the onlookers, condemning the sinner as inappropriate and her actions too ‘showy’ (do we do the same in church?), think about how she truly understood the depth of her sin. She wept enough tears to clean Jesus’ feet! She knew who she was and her dire need of Jesus. As she poured out her love extravagantly, He forgave her extravagantly, extending His love and forgiveness to her.

Extravagant means ‘excessive’, ‘lavish’, ‘wasteful’ and I think worship that can be described like this comes in response to how much we truly understand what we’ve been saved from. I am enjoying listening to a song by Kim Walker Smith at the moment, which has a line in it ‘I wanna waste myself on you’. It seemed like a strange line at first, but it has been hitting my heart each time I listen to it, and, looking at this passage, I can see exactly what it means. Just as in any other love relationship, God enjoys it when we show Him how much we love Him. This woman poured out something so precious that others called her wasteful, yet Jesus understood her extravagant act – and praised her for it. Can He do the same to you?

Question: What extravagant act can you do today to show God how much you love him?

Advent remembering

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I was so moved and challenged by Lucy Mill’s guest post on my site a couple of years ago, that I asked her whether I could use an updated version this year. She kindly obliged…

I often forget about Advent until I’m in it. More accurately, I don’t realise how fast the time has gone and suddenly it’s mid December and – oh. I feel irritated; as if I’ve missed out on something. Is it worth it, now? Or have I missed the Advent bus?

This year I did at least notice when December began, which has helped. I had already made a note, in fact, that I needed to prepare myself for Advent. I know that sounds odd, as Advent is itself a preparation.

Yet I forget to make time and space for that preparing to take place.

I forget a lot of things.

2013 and 2014 were quite significant for me. We’d moved to a new area and a new church (my husband is a Baptist minister). I made new friends as well as trying to nurture the old. The editing role I already had shifted to one with more responsibility and oversight. And it appeared I had created a book. In April 2014, it was published.

How odd! How extraordinary! I was a first-timer, poking it to check if it was real. I’m also a little shy of it now. After years of pouring myself into it, I feel a bit self-conscious. Reading it makes me squirm a little, like watching myself on screen.

I’m tempted to leave it on the shelf, to draw a line under it.

But that would make a mockery of what it is about. Because the book is a confession: of my own forgetfulness. My tendency towards distraction, every day and any day. And it’s also a reflection on the importance of remembering God in our daily lives – what this means.

I can’t draw a line under it; it’s part of my continuing journey and it’s as relevant to me now as it was when I started it.

Because my condition is chronic. I neglect my faith. I don’t open my Bible. Then I feel guilty about how long it’s been since I opened it. So I don’t think about it, and the pages remain unread. I pray occasionally rather than continually. I reach a point where I feel empty, and I am blind enough to wonder why.

I’ve forgotten who I am. I’ve forgotten who I am because I’ve ceased remembering who God is. As a Christian, my identity is in Christ. Yet instead of focusing on Him, my eyes drift. When I squint towards my faith, I do so through a fog of my own distractedness. I don’t allow times for rest and reflection – I fill them up with mediocre diversions. I’m a little scared to face myself and admit my forgetfulness. So I embrace the forgetfulness even more.

It takes discipline to pull myself back, and often it’s the tug of the Holy Spirit – not my own strength. God, in all patience, woos me into returning. I come understanding: whom have I but you? To whom else would I go?

The seasons of the Church are, in many ways, tools for remembering. Advent, focusing on the coming Christ, can be a great antidote for forgetfulness, if we dare to take more than a cursory sip of it. The incarnate Christ came as a fragile baby into a dark world; the resurrected Christ is still present with us now by the power of the Spirit. And the glorified Christ will come again.

Today, in spite of my busyness, in spite of the distractions, I choose to take a breath. I allow myself to remember. A mere moment, perhaps, but it births more moments as I form a habit of pausing.

In these final days of Advent, take a moment to pause. Breathe. Allow yourself to take a handful of stillness. It will help you get perspective on the rest of it – the hurly-burly, the ever-changing, the tugging cords of life.

Reflect on the light that came into the darkness, the light that cannot be put out. And ask for that light to shine on all your distractedness and disrepair.

You haven’t missed the bus. It’s not too late to start a new kind of remembering. Every morning is another chance to draw close to our God of mercy and grace. Seek the One who knows every part of you – the shallow and the deep – and who loves you.

I need to hear this, to reflect on it this Advent season.

Do you?

FH high resLucy Mills is author of Forgetful Heart: remembering God in a distracted world, which was published in 2014. Her second book, Undivided Heart: Finding Meaning and Motivation in Christ, is coming in 2017. Both books are published by Darton, Longman and Todd (www.dltbooks.com).

Lucy writes articles, prayers, poems and worship resources. She’s also been on the editorial team of magnet since 2011 and now works in a freelance capacity as their editorial coordinator, overseeing the team and editorial process.

Lucy’s own website is www.lucy-mills.com

Worshipping through suffering

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Reflections based on Acts 16:16–38.

‘After they had been severely flogged, they were thrown into prison, and the jailor was commanded to guard them carefully… About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God.’

One of the Christian women I admire most is my mum. She suffers from lupus and also has rheumatoid arthritis. She finds it hard to breathe and is in constant pain. But nothing makes her faith waver – it may dwindle to a tiny flicker at times but it is always there. I find that incredible. So I don’t write about this subject lightly.

Imagine how much Paul and Silas must have been suffering, and yet they choose to praise God despite their circumstances. The result: their chains were loosed; they showed integrity to the jailer by not running away and led his whole family to the Lord. I’m not saying there will always be such a positive outcome to your pain – just that there could be. My mum has been to hospital countless times, and is usually desperate not to go in. Yet often she testifies to some ‘God-incidence’ where she was able to share with someone who was dying or suffering badly. Each time she is able to say that if she was admitted simply to speak to that person the pain was worth it. Wow. I wish I could lift my head above my circumstances more often. That is what I think the crux of the matter is. It’s a choice we make – to look at our circumstances and the physical reality and allow ourselves to slide downwards, or to acknowledge the suffering, but also choose to remember God’s sovereignty doesn’t change in the light of it.

God knows how you are feeling so be honest – but don’t stay there. The Psalms are made up of 70% laments; take a look at some. Note how, even in the depths of despair, the writers lift their eyes heavenward, speaking out truths of His greatness. For your own sake, ask God to help you learn to do the same.

Prayer: Use what Habakkuk said, even in the light of impending starvation and devastation, as a starting point for your own prayer: ‘yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will be joyful in God my saviour’. (Habakkuk 3:18)

Sing your song!

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Reflections based on Exodus 15:1–20.

‘I will sing to the Lord, for he is highly exalted. Both horse and driver he has hurled into the sea. The Lord is my strength and my defense; he has become my salvation. He is my God, and I will praise him, my father’s God, and I will exalt him.’

Here Moses and the people sing a song of great victory, giving glory to God for the miraculous crossing of the Red Sea. At the end of the reading we are told that Miriam took up her tambourine and led all the women into their own song and dance.

I just wanted to encourage you today to recognise that we all have a song. Psalm 40:3 says that ‘He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God’ so allow your song to bubble up and sing it out! Too often we can allow ourselves to be silenced, but not so Miriam – and we should be the same.

There will be specific songs for specific times – look in this passage at how their song directly responds to what God has just done for them. When was the last time you sang out a song of thanks to God for an answer to prayer?

Whether you have a good voice or not doesn’t come into it. The Bible refers to incense as ‘sweet smoke’ and it is used to describe our prayers, worship and praise. Indeed 2 Corinthians 2:15 says that ‘we are to God the pleasing aroma of Christ’.

Just as Christ’s death on the cross washes us clean of our sins and allows us to come close to our heavenly father, so I believe it turns any out-of-tune, ear-piercing songs into a delightful sound! If you aren’t too sure you agree with me, think about a child doing something for the first time. Whether they have perfected it or not isn’t important – their parents still well up with pride. God is longing to hear your voice today, so won’t you sing to Him with the words He has already placed on your heart?

Meditation/prayer: Spend some time thinking back over what God has done for you in recent months, then let your thankfulness bubble out of you as a song.

Undignified

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Reflections based on 2 Samuel 6:12–22.

‘Wearing a linen ephod, David was dancing before the Lord with all his might…
I will become even more undignified than this.’

Now. Be honest in your response to the question I’m about to ask you. Who did you relate to most when you read today’s passage? The carefree king, totally wrapped up and worshipping his God, or his wife, embarrassed by his ‘show’, who felt his behaviour should have been more befitting of his position? To put it in a modern-day context: how often have you looked at the slightly strange dancer in church, the flag wavers or ‘groaners’ and wished they weren’t in your congregation? Or been upset by something your church leader has suggested, or allowed, as it didn’t seem ‘respectful’ enough for church?

I want to challenge us all to consider whether we are too busy thinking about how others view us to worship freely – and whether we are impinging our notions of what worship should look like onto others. David wasn’t worried about anyone around him because he was concentrating on an audience of one – his Lord. Even when Michal challenged him over his actions he said that he’d be even more undignified, given the chance. What a great retort!

So when was the last time you felt abandoned in worship? As it should be out of the overflow of our hearts that we worship doesn’t it follow that sometimes we should get a little ‘crazy’, doing something out of our normal comfort zones?

Now I know that many of you reading this will be British, like myself, and I also know that I’m quite a reserved person (and enjoy the fact that I’m usually standing behind my keyboard in corporate times of worship!). But I think there is more to it than that. God wants our hearts so captivated by His truths, which transcend race, gender etc, that we can’t help but worship Him fully.

Prayer: I am sorry Lord that I can allow insecurities about what others may think of me to hold me back. Help me to learn how to be abandoned to You in worship.

Worship is service

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Reflections based on Romans 12:1–21.

‘Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering.’

This passage focuses on the fact that our everyday lives should be about keeping in step with God. The Message translation is great at putting this point across. I like the challenge it gives us right at the start not to be moulded by our culture, as I think that is a danger we can all slip into so easily – without realising it.

The richness of truth in today’s reading is amazing. But much of it is so simple: if we put our focus on God, simply doing what He asks us to, He will change us for the better. It puts it in such a matter of fact way. We should find out what it is God wants us to work at then focus on just that. The image of the body used in verses 4–6 is a vivid picture of how each of us has a God-ordained function.

So worship is not just about what we say but also about what we do. Colossians 3:23–24 sums up how we can worship through daily tasks: ‘Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, since…it is the Lord Christ you are serving.’

The second part of our passage today covers so much of what we can do within a life of worship (loving each other, helping those in need, living at peace, looking after ourselves so we don’t burn out). Each one of these is an important aspect of worship. 1 John 3:17–18 goes so far to say, ‘If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.’ Sobering stuff…

Question: Have you considered helping the poor, or fulfilling your role within the church family, to be an act of worship before? How should that change your attitude towards such things?

Costly worship

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Reflections based on Genesis 22:1–18.

‘Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son,
your only son.’

Imagine what is going on between the lines here for a moment. At the start of this passage we are told that God asks Abraham to take his son and sacrifice him on an altar. In the very next verse we are told Abraham set off the following morning, early, to do just that.

I am curious about what must have been going through his head during the night, but what an incredible act of obedience to get up and prepare to do what God has told him to! He doesn’t know that God is going to step in and provide a different object for the offering – even if he does say in faith when Isaac asks him where the lamb is that God would provide (oh how deeply that question must have cut him).

And how must Isaac have felt when his father then bound him to the altar!? He must have thought he was crazy! And yet he then sees how God steps in in his sovereignty and listens as God makes a promise about Abraham’s descendants. Of course, this episode also gives us a beautiful picture of how God would, in the future, give up his own son to death. While he stepped in and saved Isaac from the altar he had to allow his own son to suffer in order to save humankind.

We may never be asked to pay such a high price as Abraham, or indeed be tested as much as he was, but, when we hear God’s clear direction, it is an act of worship to be obedient – whatever the cost. Interestingly, in 2 Samuel 24:24 David says, ‘I will not sacrifice to the LORD my God burnt offerings that cost me nothing’. In a way, worship needs a cost – as it then reveals how much God means to us.

Question: When was the last time that you offered God something that cost you greatly in terms of personal sacrifice?

How praise is made possible

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Reflections based on Hebrews 13:11–16

‘Through Jesus, therefore, let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise—the fruit of lips that openly profess his name.’

I believe that this passage is a great reminder of our need for a saviour, and the ultimate sacrifice that he had to pay. Before He came, communion with God was only possible through a hugely complicated set of rules and animal sacrifices. Jesus’ death did away with such rituals and opened up the way to the Father.

Let’s ponder Jesus’ sacrifice a little more. Remember the agonising struggle that He had in Gethsemane when he thought about what was about to happen to him? Take a look at Matthew 26:36–46. ‘My soul is overwhelmed’ seems like a very apt description but somewhat inadequate too! Thinking about His humanity, Jesus must have been petrified at this point and yet He was still able to pray: ‘Yet not as I will, but as you will.’ Wow. But thank goodness He was able to do that, as it is only through what He suffered and endured, and then fought and conquered through His resurrection, that we are able to have a relationship with God. Today we are able to worship God freely, without needing to go through a priest.

While Jesus paid the sacrifice for our sins in a way we are totally incapable of doing for ourselves, God does still ask us for sacrifice. We are told to take up our cross on a daily basis (Luke 9:23). We are also asked to put others before ourselves (Philippians 2:1–4). But when each of these things is done from an attitude of thankfulness and remembrance of what Jesus has done for us, they don’t seem like so much of a sacrifice do they?

Prayer: Thank you Lord for paying the price that I could not for my salvation. Help me to live in the light of what you’ve done, remembering to take up my own personal cross daily as well as put on an attitude of thankfulness and praise.

Lips that praise/lips that curse

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Reflections based on Matthew 15:1–20.

‘What goes into someone’s mouth does not defile them, but what comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them.’

Here Jesus is challenging the Pharisees and teachers of the law that had come to Him to try to trip Him up. He closely reflects what is said in Isaiah 29:13: ‘These people come near to me with their mouth and honour me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. Their worship of me is made up only of rules taught by men.’

What Jesus was trying to get across to them was that worship is not about just paying lip service. He explains that it is what comes out of a person’s lips that makes them unclean because it is out of the overflow of his heart that a man speaks. This is a sobering thought and prompts me to ask – what are you like when no one is looking? In church, even at work, we can put on a show of behaving like Christians and yet, behind closed doors, the reality can be very different. Ironically, the one that we profess to follow and worship sees it all – and knows us to the very depths of our beings. What He wants from us is a walk of worship that is full of integrity day in day out.

‘Out of the same mouth come praise and cursing. My brothers, this should not be.’ (James 3:10) This verse reveals to me that part of our daily worship is to keep a check on our tongues, possibly because I know it is an area that I need to work on further! Words of healing but also words that cut and hurt can come out of the very same mouth at various times in a day, but here we are being reminded that there is something vitally wrong with this.

Prayer: Use the following psalm as a prayer. ‘May these words of my mouth and this meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer.’ (Psalm 19:14)

 

In Spirit and in truth…

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‘Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshippers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshippers the Father seeks.’

Reflections based on John 4:1–26

There is so much that I could say about this passage – including how Jesus crossed cultural boundaries to reach out to this woman – but today I want to focus on what He teaches us about the importance of attitude over place in worship. The Samaritan woman is bowled over by how much this man knows about her and recognises the fact that He must be a prophet or some such person. So, feeling uncomfortable, she changes the subject and asks Him about a popular theological question of the day – where the correct place to worship was: ‘Our fathers worshipped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem’.

Jesus’ answer is one of the most important teachings on worship that He gave: ‘believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem… God is spirit, and his worshippers must worship in the Spirit and in truth’. In this statement Jesus was revealing the importance of attitude rather than location when we worship. He also spoke of the importance of the Spirit as well as truth, as it is through the Spirit that we are able to really connect with God and celebrate the truths that we know about Him. And the Bible clearly teaches that we are all born of the Spirit when we become Christians. That means we can each draw on His wisdom and strength day by day (Ephesians 1:13–14).

Sadly, sometimes our Westernised ‘worship culture’ can actually be a smoke screen if we get too caught up in it, and it can actually end up hiding us from God rather than drawing us nearer to Him. The means by which we worship should always remain that – the means, not the end. It is not about the latest songs, or the ‘best’ worship leader. While I enjoy singing new songs, putting too much emphasis on them causes them to be a distraction.

Question: Do you have a tendency to focus on the songs and musical arrangements rather than God when you take part in corporate worship? Ask God to help you to focus on Him alone, and to teach you more about what it means to worship Him in Spirit and in truth.