The Power of Need: Deuteronomy 8:3

             The verse for today's blog post is from an interesting find: it's what Jesus uses as one of his responses to Satan during the temptations in the wilderness. Here is where we find it in Matthew 4:1-4:

1 Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil. 2 After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. 3 The tempter came to him and said, “If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread.” 4 Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”

          Jesus here responds to his physical need by pointing to his greater need, God, even after having fasted for 40 days in the universe. I find it interesting that the man who gave food to thousands of people miraculously did not give himself the same benefit that he gave to the crowds. Also, Jesus is not opposed to looking out for his own needs, which is displayed by his taking off time to go and be alone in prayer for hours. His words may sound like spiritual snobbery or an ideal beyond our achievement; Jesus looks awful legalistic here. After all, how am I to apply this passage to my life? Do I respond to any need in my life by filling it with something spiritual? That's what Jesus words seem to portray, but I am struck that we don't allow ourselves to process Jesus' words on a deeper level. Jesus was one who understood that our hearts had to be right; this is even more important than any law that we should obey. So what heart condition is driving Jesus' response? Here, we see that Satan is trying to get Jesus to perform a miracle in order to make his trial easier on himself. What would be wrong with this? This is where our confusion with the passage begins. Since we know that Satan is trying to trip up Jesus, we immediately flip back into the Old Testament and desperately search for a law that makes what Satan suggests a sin. However, no matter how hard we try, there is nothing there to find.
           I think the key to finding out what was wrong in the action lies in Jesus' response to the temptation. His response comes from Deuteronomy 8:3:

3 He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your fathers had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.

          Here, we see where Jesus is pulling from in the second half of the verse about living on the word of God instead of just bread alone. We see that physical needs are still honored by God because we do not live on bread alone, which means we still need bread, but we need God more. So, when the Spirit drives Jesus into the wilderness, the need for food is not diminished; Jesus is not "too spiritual" for food. So, we see that Jesus is hungry and that he can feed himself without sinning. So why does he not eat? Since the point of Jesus' temptations are to make him stronger, we see that Jesus is embracing his hunger as an opportunity to draw close to God. This is the point of any fast. Jesus isn't putting his life in danger by not eating. Jesus disproves this idea with his subsequent temptation. If risking starving to death to prove his reliance on God was the point of this trial, then Jesus would have risked his life by jumping off the top of the temple later in the chapter in Matthew 4:5-7:

5 Then the devil took him to the holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. 6 “If you are the Son of God,” he said, “throw yourself down. For it is written:
“‘He will command his angels concerning you,
    and they will lift you up in their hands,
so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’”
7 Jesus answered him, “It is also written: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’”

          So, here, we see that Jesus does not refuse food to put the Lord his God to the test. Instead, we see something in Jesus' heart that is very powerful. To see this, we need to turn back to Deuteronomy 8:3:

3 He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your fathers had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.

          I want you to focus on one word: "causing". God "caused" the Israelites to hunger. If you don't sense what is strange about this word, take a minute to reflect on it. God caused their hunger. Intentionally. It wasn't an accident or mistake. He caused them to feel a need. Let's bring this closer to home: if you have ever felt the need for a spouse, God created that need inside of you. The same thing applies for need for rest, comfort, assurance, etc. However, let us camp on the spouse analogy to get our point across. This need is affirmed throughout scripture. Three great verses for this are Genesis 2:18:

 18 The Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”

           Proverbs 18:22:

 22 He who finds a wife finds what is good
    and receives favor from the Lord.

           and Proverbs 19:14:

 14 Houses and wealth are inherited from parents,
    but a prudent wife is from the Lord.

            Every human has a God-given desire for a spouse, but you'd be quick to notice that not everyone is married. People who encounter these verses can sometimes get into a circular trap of logic that I like to compare to a jack-in-the-box. You think 1. God loves me. 2. God wants good things for me 3. God tells me that a spouse is a good thing. 4. If I don't have a spouse, it's my fault, not God's 5. I need to earn this through prayer and increasing my faith. This is where the pain hits because the increase in faith and prayer often don't earn you that significant other. This is like leaning over a jack-in-the-box and spinning the wheel until the jack hits you in the face, stuffing the jack back in, and waiting until the pain of the last experience fades away before trying again with the initial question: "God loves me, right?"
            However, what we need to realize is that our hunger and need are opportunities to draw close to God. Fasting, which is just creating a need for yourself rather than letting God do it, is a great way of recognizing our need for God and drawing close to him. However, we need to, like Jesus, go beyond simply fasting. We need to recognize all times of need as opportunities to draw close to God. Jesus' didn't necessarily choose his forty day fast. The Spirit forced him to do it. In the same way, a need that God allows into our lives is a forced fast. Just because you didn't choose to fast does not mean it is not a fast. So, if you have a need for food, money, a spouse, rest, or a vacation and you wish the desire for any of these things would go away, you need a change of perspective. Rejoice in the trial because it will help you to recognize your first and foremost need: God. Oh, and by the way, He does love you. Remember what I have just told you and reflect anew on Psalm 37:4:

4 Delight yourself in the Lord
    and he will give you the desires of your heart.

Peace of Christ to you,
Simeon

Guard Your Heart: Proverbs 4:20-23

            Proverbs 4:20-23 is a very beautiful peace of scripture. Originally, I had thought of it speaking on the need to guard one's emotions and more intimate self from risk, but I've learned through books and commentaries about how this passage is instead about how one invests in one's relationship with God. Here is the passage below:

20 My son, pay attention to what I say;
    listen closely to my words.
21 Do not let them out of your sight,
    keep them within your heart;
22 for they are life to those who find them
    and health to a man’s whole body.
23 Above all else, guard your heart,
    for it is the wellspring of life.

             Here, we see that guarding our heart, in this context, is about listening to the words of the wise Father. Additionally, we are told that treasuring these words will bring health to our whole body. I think we should take this to mean that spending time in the Word will have benefits for our physical, emotional, spiritual and mental health. It even goes so far to say that, in doing so, we are guarding our heart, which is our wellspring of life. Thus, in order to live a fulfilled life or to pour life into those around us, we need to guard our hearts, which starts by spending time in God's Word.
            A lot of people look at ministry as if they are pouring God's energy into their own cup and then pouring that cup into the lives of other people until the cup runs dry. Then there is burnout followed by a spiritual retreat that refills the cup before the cycle begins anew. However, this cycle of ministry is debilitating and self-defeating, for not only do you waste a lot of time and energy, but you also lose quality in ministry whenever you are feeding people out of your energy and enthusiasm rather than from God's power.To minister differently, you need to look at ministry like your cup is stacked on top of the cups of the people you are ministering to. Then, you learn that you are constantly letting God pour into you every day and that, when your cup fills up, the overflow goes into the lives of the people you are serving. This way, not only do you not burn out, but you are also pouring fresh water into the lives of others rather than the stagnant water you give whenever you are pouring yourself out to the last drop.
           So, how does this play out practically? Look at John 15:5:

5 “I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.

         Jesus tells us that we can get nothing done if we are not abiding in him. Here, abiding would be best understood as spending daily time with him. This is done in Bible reading, prayer, meditation, and other spiritual disciplines that give you and God time to spend together. Another verse echoes a similar warning about one's relationship with God. After discussing a model of maturing in the faith, Peter continues in 2 Peter 1:8-9:

 8 For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 But if anyone does not have them, he is nearsighted and blind, and has forgotten that he has been cleansed from his past sins.

          If we don't spend time developing our relationship with God, we will be ineffective and unproductive in affecting the lives of others. We might pour as much effort as we want into ministry,  but it will be for naught if God is not in the equation every day, moving in our heart and, thus, moving through our heart into the lives of those around us. This is the wisdom behind the first passage from Proverbs: we need to guard our heart, for it is the spring from which we draw life for ourselves and for those around us.
          In conclusion, reflect on Joshua 1:8:

8 Do not let this Book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.

          and Psalm 119:9-11:

 9 How can a young man keep his way pure?
    By living according to your word.
10 I seek you with all my heart;
    do not let me stray from your commands.
11 I have hidden your word in my heart
    that I might not sin against you.

Peace,
Simeon Snow

Godly Sorrow and Confrontation: 2 Corinthians 7:10-11

          Godly sorrow is a concept that appears often in scripture; you'll see it in the Proverbs whenever the author is discussing discipline and how it brings life. In the same way, there are several situations within which we are able to grow mightily by the influence of sorrow in our lives. To start out with, let us go to 2 Corinthians 7:10-11:

10 Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death. 11 See what this godly sorrow has produced in you: what earnestness, what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what alarm, what longing, what concern, what readiness to see justice done. At every point you have proved yourselves to be innocent in this matter.

          When I hear this verse, I immediately think of classes I've been in where I needed pain or punishment in order to continue forward. I would keep making one small grammatical error on every assignment and I continued to do so until I lost a point for it. Afterwards, I never made the same mistake again. It was because I had experienced some kind of loss and it stuck with me.
          I think we realize this when it comes to disciplining children: we know that the child will never improve in his behavior or attitude unless he experiences some kind of loss to connect with the lesson. As hard as we try to explain why good actions are their own reward, there come appropriate times when we need to use negative reinforcement to show the lesson since they cannot see what we can.
          Everything up to this point has been very simple and without needing much to expound on. However, the application for this verse goes a little farther. Have you ever needed to confront someone? There is a good that you want to achieve in someone's life that they cannot see on their own. The only downside is that the person might be hurt or offended by our piece of advice. Certainly, we are to survey whether someone is open to receiving advice or not. We see this in Proverbs 26:4-5:

4 Do not answer a fool according to his folly,
    or you will be like him yourself.
5 Answer a fool according to his folly,
    or he will be wise in his own eyes.

           Also, we are told in 1 Peter 3:15b-16 that we are told to offer words of righteousness with gentleness:

 15b Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, 16 keeping a clear conscience, so that those who speak maliciously against your good behavior in Christ may be ashamed of their slander.

          However, the general response of most people to verses like these and their desires to preserve the self confidence and happiness of the person needing change leads them to say nothing at all. The fear of hurting the person is weighed against how much good the change will make. Obviously, even a raging madman should be advised to stop killing people, but most of the time it is very hard to tell if the change is worth the pain, find ourselves unable to balance the two, err on the side of caution, and say nothing. However, if you look at the previous passages, you will see that you are not actually balancing a pro versus a con. Instead, you have two pros. Both the desired change that you want to bring in the person's life and the little bit of pain that will come with this information are both positive things! That small bit of pain will help the lesson to stick and, according to our first passage, will produce earnestness, eagerness to clear themselves, indignation, alarm, longing, concern, and readiness to see justice done. You are doing the person a favor by bringing godly sorrow into their lives. On the other hand, you do not set out to produce sorrow for sorrow's sake alone. That is to rely on the sorrow of the world, which, the passage tells us, leads to death. Additionally, we should only burden someone with one or two suggestions at a time to prevent burdening someone with too much sorrow. We see this in 2 Corinthians 2:6-8 when Paul is dealing with a sinner in the community:

6 The punishment inflicted on him by the majority is sufficient for him. 7 Now instead, you ought to forgive and comfort him, so that he will not be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow. 8 I urge you, therefore, to reaffirm your love for him. 

          A similar verse appears in Galatians 6:1-2:

 1 Brothers, if someone is caught in a sin, you who are spiritual should restore him gently. But watch yourself, or you also may be tempted. 2 Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.

         These contrasting themes are brought together in 2 Timothy 1:7:

 7 For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline.

         While there is nothing wrong with a shy or introverted personality, God gives us the Spirit to be bold and powerful whenever love demands it. You do not truly love someone if you let them sit in their darkness. If we see darkness in someone's life, then it is our responsibility to warn them of their darkness (or find someone close to them whom they would be more willing to listen to). We see this responsibility in Ezekiel 33:6:

6 But if the watchman sees the sword coming and does not blow the trumpet to warn the people and the sword comes and takes the life of one of them, that man will be taken away because of his sin, but I will hold the watchman accountable for his blood.

         and if we recognize our roles as priests in God's kingdom, we will heed the words of Malachi 2:6-7 when he is discussing priests:

 6 True instruction was in his mouth and nothing false was found on his lips. He walked with me in peace and uprightness, and turned many from sin. 7 “For the lips of a priest ought to preserve knowledge, and from his mouth men should seek instruction—because he is the messenger of the Lord Almighty.

         So, as you go about this week, remember that the Spirit is in you and tap it's power to confront sin with boldness and power.
Peace,
Simeon Snow

Brave Warriors: 1 Chronicles 5:24b-25

             The topic for today's discussion has to do with some troubling men's movements that have been popping up along with a theme in scripture that is getting more attention in recent times. Although there is no official name for it, you can call it the Courageous Warrior or Masculinity movement. The recent spotlight on this idea centers around one theme: men are not what they should be and it is because we have lost a biblical definition for manhood in our churches. To restore this manhood, we need to emphasize the godly qualities that are also masculine, such as righteous confrontation, strength, and courage. The argument goes that real men stay out of church and the ones inside it have been brainwashed into acting like women. This movement blames the deficiency of "real" men in churches today for the church's inability to take a bolder stance on current hot button issues and for the inability of men to be leaders among the congregation. The proposed solution for these problems is to gather groups of men to cultivate these male qualities and, thus, restore the church. This is also to counter the problem of men only maturing in ways that are feminine. The biblical foundation for this movement comes from Old Testament stories about godly men, like David or Samson, showcasing legendary manhood and emphasizing the need to emulate this masculinity. One Bible study I read, called Chase the Lion, focused on the story of Benaiah in 2 Samuel 23:20:

20 Benaiah son of Jehoiada was a valiant fighter from Kabzeel, who performed great exploits. He struck down two of Moab’s best men. He also went down into a pit on a snowy day and killed a lion.

             The moral of the story is that a guy in the Bible did a manly thing. That's it. We don't hear anything more about this man's character or his relationship with God besides going on to be a military leader and executioner for Solomon (see 1 Kings 2), but we do know that he killed a lion in a pit on a snowy day. The Bible study takes this single verse and expands it to mean that God calls us all to take more risks, but it qualifies this by saying that these risks should be calculated. What they fail to mention is how killing a lion in a snowy pit is a calculated risk, but maintains that we must follow this man's approach to life based on this single action. The other verse I see frequently attached to this movement is 1 Corinthians 16:13:

13 Be on your guard; stand firm in the faith; be men of courage; be strong.

            The specific part of this verse focused on is "be men of courage", which is often translated, accurately, as "act like men" or "be men". While this passage does ask men to have godly characteristics that are Masculine, I think it would be putting words in Paul's mouth to say that true Masculinity is Godliness. While the goals of being brave and leaders of our families are noble, these characteristics are not guarantees of righteousness in any way. To start my counterargument, let's turn over to 1 Chronicles 5:24b, which describes an Israelite family:

24b They were brave warriors, famous men, and heads of their families. 

           These Israelites have the same heart as Benaiah! In fact, they do even more! Not only are they brave, they have importance in the eyes of the public and are strong leaders of their families. I could start my own Masculinity Bible study with much further applications, but to do so would be to lie to and mislead you about their character. Now I am going to add verse 25 on to this passage and see what you think of these new role models:

24b They were brave warriors, famous men, and heads of their families. 25 But they were unfaithful to the God of their fathers and prostituted themselves to the gods of the peoples of the land, whom God had destroyed before them.

            Character adjustment is never a guarantee of righteousness. I want to be a spiritual leader in my family and I would like to be courageous and make bold stands for what is righteous, but I need to develop that character out of a growing relationship with God rather than follow a Law of Masculinity. The men in the previous passage were part of the family of God and they met all the demands of the Masculinity movement and more, but they have nothing; their spiritual treasuries are empty. Not only so, but Masculinity is very subjective and changes based on the culture. For instance, the Karo men of Ethiopia prove their Masculinity by how many cows they can jump over; contrarily, the Bunna women of Ethiopia prove their Femininity by how many whip lashes they can endure (See also Global Prayer Digest). Instead of trying to make ourselves more godly by pursuing a subjective Man Law, God gives us the power for life and godliness. 2 Peter 1:3-4 says:

3 His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 4 Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.

          Here, we see that God's divine promises (such as the power for life and godliness) give us the ability to mature towards the divine nature and escape corruption. The passage goes on to describe how to pursue maturity by spending time with God. While there is nothing wrong with Masculinity, we are not called to pursue it. The reasons that we are strong, brave, or courageous are because of our love for God and women are called to be these things as well. In fact, the female heroes of the Old Testament were famous because they were strong, brave, and courageous. They killed people in the Old Testament, too, lol. While the Bible does give a few different instructions to guys and girls and affirms their major differences, the authority of these commands rests on scripture and the differences are to be embraced and celebrated without being enforced as law.
        To close, let me leave you with a passage that shows the continuity between time with God and the resulting Godliness that so happens to be Masculine. Joshua 1:8-9 says:

8 Do not let this Book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful. 9 Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.”

Peace,
Simeon Snow