"Safety is a mirage. Security is not a home for the Christian." - John Piper


I've been thinking a lot about safety lately. Maybe it's because I see my own sins of apathy played out before me in the lives of the guys I have been ministering to this past semester. We all (the guys and I) suffer the same, debilitating consequences of a sin most of us (Christians) are more than willing to ignore, tolerate, or even feed. This sin is our doing everything we can to remain safely secure in the lives of ease we've constructed. We want discipleship without the cost. We want glory, but we balk at the idea of a cross...of denying ourselves daily, of pouring ourselves out, and following Jesus even when it hurts really bad. We want the god who will remove the thorns in our flesh after we petition him, not the God who often leaves the thorns in place and supplies the grace to endure and believe and honor Him amidst the confusion.

It should be no surprise to you to know that often I am more interested in building my own kingdom than building Christ's. It is shamefully seldom that I look down and see the tools in my hands...tools that are all too familiar, that are worn down by years of skilled and frequent use. They are the tools I use to build my kingdom; the tools that lay the brick and mortar of walls that keep me safely removed from the poured-out life Christ calls me to live.

I want to minister to people from within the safe confines my comfort zone. This, of course, excludes 99% of the people the Lord calls me to love, to care for, to lead. As I learn more and more in the course of this internship...as the Lord increasingly opens my eyes to His Word, I am struck by the danger that accompanies every Christian's calling. Don't get me wrong...I'm not drinking the 'Wild at Heart' Koolaid (I promise!). I'm not so much talking about the danger of being martyred or persecuted or laughed at or vulnerable. I'm talking about the danger of submitting your life to a Lord who promises He will lead you through the furnace of a chaotic life, rejection by men, and being misunderstood by friends and family.

I confess with my mouth that I serve the Lion of Judah...but I confess with my living that I secretly want that Lion to be domesticated...His claws clipped and His wild ways tamed. I seem to want a predictable Jesus who lets me in on His plans for my short terrestrial life. I often want a pet Jesus, not the Jesus who raises dead men from the grave and orders the gale winds to stop with a single word.

But as I sign off tonight, by God's grace seeing more clearly my need to repent of my love-affair with a safe, certain, and manageable life, I cling by faith to Jesus all the more tightly; knowing that I desperately need my sanctification to be as miraculous and radical as my justification and conversion were. I need to be broken of my self-deification and life of ease. Because our God is Mercy and Love, He pours out streams of grace before every command He gives. Only the Triune God can provide the grace necessary for obedience...Only He can gird our trembling knees with the sweetest of promises for us to bank on...promises of His presence, of His faithful love and fatherly care, of His making all things (even the scary things that launch us into an ocean of discomfort and uncertainty) subordinate to our salvation, sanctification, and glorification.

Looking through the eyes of faith, I want to follow this Jesus, who is sovereign and untamed...and whose Spirit works in me all the faith I need to heed the hard calls of the One who loved me...when I was utterly unlovable. I want to change not simply so I will feel better about myself for being a "more spiritual" guy, rather I want to change because I know that my God is infinitely worthy of my wholehearted trust. Time and again, He's won my wandering affections by letting me see Him as He is. And as I continue to fall (seemingly hourly) and revert back to my selfish desires for an easy sanctification, I've seen Him prove over and over that He is faithful again to woo me...or discipline me...or break me...in order that I might be reminded of Reality and look again to Christ by faith.

>"And I am driven DAILY to the foot of the cross, by my own inability to be all that I need to be..."<

Beautifully said...I feel the same way about my own inability to be all that i need to be as someone in 'ministry'. Blessed are those who "hunger and thirst for [His] righteousness" because they recognize they are "poor in spirit" apart from Him. All by the grace of our God!


...AND Joel, thanks for the book recommendation. I've (started to) read "Inside Out" by Crabb...but hadn't heard of "Connecting"...will have to take a look at it.

"how thankful I am that God is more committed to my sanctification than I will ever be!!"

Amen! See you in a few days in Dallas...until then!