Today, if You Hear His Voice (Hebrews 3:7-15)

Trying to discern the voice of God is often difficult. We yearn for a present voice, something tangible to assure us that God is indeed alive. In the history of Christian thought and practice, discerning the voice of God has been conceived of as starting with the present, dynamic voice of Scripture. In Hebrews 3:7-19 the author begins by indicating “As the Holy Spirit says…” then he quotes Psalm 95:8-11. The writer of Hebrews envisions Psalms being a living word in which the Spirit speaks in the present moment. This is the unique feature of Scripture…the breathing, alive word of God.

But, today we need to hear his voice and soften our hearts. The writer says, “Do not harden your hearts.” I suspect that none of us can ever conceive of ourselves as having a hardened heart. I am sure that none of the people of Israel thought of themselves that way. However, when we do not believe that God will take care of us, and we go off on our own highways paved with personal agenda and lack of trust in God, then it puts the Lord to the test and it makes him angry. I wonder how many times I have made God angry?

This is specifically with reference to Israel’s day of testing in the wilderness at Meribah and Massah. Water and bread were promised and Israel did not believe it, and griped when it came! God’s provisions were thrown back in his face. No wonder he became angry!

This was in spite of the fact that they had seen the Lord’s works for forty years. During those forty years they experienced God’s guidance, care, love, faithfulness, provisions, etc. But this background of God’s relationship with Israel was forgotten. I wonder how many times we tend to forget the background God has with us? We forget our own forty years of provisions, and begin to fret, complain and forget God is in the picture.

If I believe I hear God’s voice, then I need to be faithful to responding to His call through the Holy Spirit in Scripture to trust God implicitly and deeply. God promises me today that He will provide all I need. Bread, water, a place to live, a purpose to pursue, and a God to obey provides the simple parameters of faithfulness. I need to be courageous enough to ask my own self, am I in danger of hardening my heart against the Lord God because I have come to the place of lack of trust in Him?

Let us take care, brothers and sisters, that none of us live with an evil, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God! Today, if you hear His voice, open your heart to Him and to others!

This injunction to hear the voice of God has a very pertinent application for God’s church leaders, ministers, pastors and priests. Too often we leaders make it about making sure that others follow what we perceive to be the voice of God precisely because we are the leaders. This pericope in Hebrews calls that paradigm into question. It is so easy for leaders to harden their hearts—toward God and toward others. We create the ministry or the church in our own image, thereby losing the ability to see and trust in God’s provisions. We then rely upon our own strength, understanding, savvy, power and position to get accomplished what we want.

We fret, we complain, and we forget that the kingdom is about God, not about us! We also forget how God has provided our own “forty years” of provisions to remain in ministry. I think all of us leaders would be shocked if we could actually know many times we have made God angry because we produced our own experiences of Meribah and Massah all in the name of faithful ministry. When in reality, all we did was to turn a blind eye to God’s provisions of water and bread, and guidance.

Take care, ministers/pastors/priests/leaders, that none of you may have an evil, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God!

In Christian love, Curtis 

GARDENER OF MY SOUL

Many of you reading this article have already begun early spring garden preparations. I have learned many things through the years in a garden. In addition to the hard work required for a garden to produce, there are many spiritual lessons and connections to be made while one is getting their hands in the dirt. I want to briefly point out some. No doubt, you could contribute additional perspectives from your own experience.

            First, the conditions have to be right in order for the seeds and bulbs to grow. For example, if the soil is too damp and too cold, tomato plants will just sit there and their leaves will turn yellow. They need the warm days, and the humid nights to take off and grow. On one occasion Jesus likened the human heart and its receptivity to his divine lessons to conditions of the soil. There was the good soil. There was the rocky soil—giving opportunity for quick growth, but the plants wilted because there was no depth. There was the hardened path that had been walked on—the seed lying on the surface just right for the birds to pick up. And there was the thorny, weedy soil where the plants couldn’t grow because they were choked out. So, the preparation of my heart to hear life-changing messages needs constant attention against shallowness, hard heartedness and carelessness.

            Second, seeds need to be planted. The colors of flowers and vegetables that will eventually come later in the spring, summer and fall are pictured on the package. Whoever puts the picture on the package is sending out the message of hope for a harvest: “If you plant these seeds, this is what it will look like.” In my life, seeds will be planted in two ways: my seed-thoughts that affect my life and behavior; and golden-thoughts planted in the hearts and minds of young people. The thoughts and deeds we implant in the hearts of young people are offered with an incredible belief of hope in the future!

            Third, have you noticed the difference between a fertilized plant and a non-fertilized plant? Try an experiment this spring and fertilize one and leave the other one next to it untreated. You will be amazed at the difference! Fertilizing and caring for plants means watering, cultivating, and feeding each plant what it needs. When fertilizer is properly applied with right timing, amazing growth occurs. In our own lives we need God’s fertilizer for our very souls. I am referring here to His Holy Spirit and His Holy Word, Scripture, that is given for the nourishing of the soul. Without this proper nourishment and timing, there is no way I can mature and grow in my character, and live a soul-ful life full of meaning and purpose that honors God and serves others.

            Fourth, and this one follows on the heels of fertilizing, there is the ongoing task of weeding. For some reason weeds just grow naturally! Some are so pernicious and plaguing and maddening that the only way to deal with them is to pull them completely up from the deep root systems. Have noticed that bad habits in life are that way? Negative, self-destructive and relationship-denying habits are hard to break. I remember one time letting a particular weed grow to an immeasurable height and depth just because I wanted to see how it would look full grown. Needless to say, I had to use a pick axe and a shovel to dig it up and remove the root system. Long gone was the day for that plant when I could just reach down and quickly pluck it up. If I let bad habits, even wrong moral decisions, go too long, long-gone will be the day when I can just reach down in my heart and easily get rid of them. When I see a weed in my heart sprouting, I have to deal with it now! Otherwise it becomes a monstrous, negative growth that is almost impossible to root out.

             And finally, patience for the final harvest is necessary. I cannot go to my pepper plants in March and expect full grown jalepenos. I cannot go to my cabbage plants in April and expect full grown heads of cabbage. I cannot go to my tomato plants in May and expect big, round, red tomatoes ready to be sliced for my BLT sandwich. Patience for the harvest is a non-negotiable. I have to wait for the flowers to bud, blossom, and produce fruit. It is hard to wait. That is counter-cultural right now. We want everything instantly: communication, our lunch sandwiches and our travel destination. But a garden teaches patience. We have to fight the deer off of tender shoots, we have keep the bugs away, we have to wait for the spring and summer rains, we have to endure the dry heat, we cannot force fruit and blossoms and ripe vegetables before their time. I have to be very patient with myself and with others when I look for the fruits of maturity and growth. A harvest of character takes the patience of a lifetime. And, we are all at different stages of our growth. As the Christian classic writer Hannah Whitall Smith reminds us, we cannot go to the apple tree in the spring and expect a ripe apple. The farmer’s seasonal patience becomes a model for patience in character maturation.

            Several years ago, I came across a prayer by Richard Foster in his book entitled Prayers from the Heart. This is where I first heard of the metaphor of “Gardner of My Soul.” I want to close this month’s article with the following prayer with that same title. Listen now to Foster’s insightful prayer taken from garden metaphors:

“Spirit of the Living God, be the Gardener of my soul. For so long I have been waiting, silent and still — experiencing a winter of the soul. But now, in the strong name of Jesus Christ, I dare to ask:

Clear away the dead growth of the past,
Break up the hard clods of custom and routine,
Stir in the rich compost of vision and challenge,
Bury deep in my soul the implanted Word,
Cultivate and water and tend my heart,
Until new life buds and opens and flowers.

Amen.”

CAN ANYTHING GOOD COME OUT OF SUFFERING?

Suffering is quite painful and appears to be non-productive. We live in a culture where suffering is to be alleviated at all costs. Because it appears to be non-productive, untold millions is spent on trying to alleviate what seems to be senseless. And we are not just talking about physical suffering, there is also emotional and mental anguish than can almost trump anything physical. What does the Christian make of this?

The apostle Paul gives us another perspective on suffering that is not defined by a negative reaction because pain is ONLY perceived in a negative way. Paul answers very plainly the question, “Can anything good come out of suffering?”

Before we hear Paul’s answer, we have to ask ourselves, “Are we ready to hear his answer?” Sometimes, being in the middle of pain and suffering, we cannot see or hear Paul’s prescription. Perhaps his answer is more of journey, a journey that stretches out over time in which we are slowly prepared to see and accept the answer. Listen to his perspective:

“Not only so, but we rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us” (Romans 5:3-5).

Notice that Paul goes a step further than what we are often prepared to do. He says “rejoice”!? I think it would have been much easier for us to swallow if he had said, “tolerate.” But rejoice?! Yes, because we are aware of a divine, transformative process that comes about that ONLY suffering can produce: a formation of character that hangs on to hope because it is rooted in the gift of the Holy Spirit whom God has given us. It almost sounds like Paul is saying that suffering makes us aware of and rely on the gift of the Spirit whom God has poured out into hearts which is the medium and measure of His love.

Maybe, then, suffering is the process by which I am made aware of that which is more important than the pressing pain of the moment. It is often ONLY through pain and suffering that I am ready for God to do His greatest work in me and through me. Therefore, “we rejoice in our sufferings.”

In Christian love, Curtis