Do-It-Yourself or Do-Nothing

Years ago, a young couple in their first house, they noticed that the tree in front of their house was dying. In fact, all of the trees on the block were dying. Some beetle or fungus or something.

She asked, “what can we do?”

And he had no idea, but that’s no fun, so he made something up. “Oh, we just have to put aloe vera on the tree to protect it, like a sunburn.”

Then he headed to the backyard working on another project for hours.

When he came back to the front, there is Nina with an industrial sized, super-Costco, multi-gallon sized tub of Aloe Vera. Gloved up, patiently lathering her way up the tree with this aloe vera gel… and he just about died laughing.

Hours and hours she had been working to save this tree.

Be Perfect

Jesus has said a lot of hard things so far. Some crazy things.

Matthew 5:20 ESV

For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

And then he paints a picture of this “better righteousness” with clothes on. It goes beyond “don’t murder” and lets go of anger and contempt entirely.

It goes beyond “don’t commit adultery” and lets go of fantasized objectification of others all together.

It goes beyond divorce, beyond verbal manipulation, beyond retaliation… it presses in to creative and active love for others… even to enemies.

And that, full and complete love for others, that’s the destination, that’s the fulfillment, that’s the “perfection” of righteousness in you. In that context Jesus ways:

Matthew 5:48 ESV

You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

How do we do it, then?

Jesus shows us that it’s possible. He lived a perfect righteous human life.

Jesus commands us to it, and his commands create possibility.

Is this possible? Is this rhetorical? What is this?

The Question - How do we navigate between Do-It-Yourself futility and Do-Nothing poverty.

If you’ve been following our series in Matthew, this is a familiar dichotomy.

There are two errors we tend to make in our Christian walk, and by avoiding one extreme we often tend towards the other. Here is the dilemma. We all want to be good Christians, to be better people, to grow into Christ's likeness... but many Christians feel like they never actually get anywhere. Or they are even moving backwards.

DIY: Try Harder

One option is to look at ourselves as a Do-It-Yourself project. We will make some resolutions, and by sticking to them rigorously, by exercising self-control and strong will, we can stop a sinful behavior, bad habit or pick up some new virtue.

There is a logical argument here. We realize that God is righteous, and he calls us to be righteous. “Be holy, because I am holy.” 1 Peter 1:16

We try to become better people by our own will, our own strength, our own might. Here is where it gets really nasty. Mostly we fail, and when we do succeed, our self-satisfaction and pride are as much sin as whatever it replaced.

Paul wrote to the church in Colossi in Colossians 2 about just this sort of thing. Speaking about these rules and laws we make for ourselves about what we will touch or taste or see, based on merely human commands and teachings in order to improve ourselves he says:

Col 2:23

Colossians 2:20–23 ESV

If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the world, why, as if you were still alive in the world, do you submit to regulations— “Do not handle, Do not taste, Do not touch” (referring to things that all perish as they are used)—according to human precepts and teachings? These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh.

self-made religion.

That “self-imposed worship” can taken literally be will worship, or worship of one’s own will. So even when we appear to succeed by effort of our own will and effort, it lacks any true value, we exchange one sin for another.

Okay, now we all recognize that. We call it legalism, we call it moralism, we call it being-like-those-Pharisees, and we know it’s bad news. In fact, legalism strangles the joy out of life.

We simply cannot Do It Ourselves.

Do Nothing

The great news, the good news, the gospel, the gift of grace, is that we cannot strive for righteousness, righteousness is a gift from God, it is a free gift, salvation because Jesus paid the price.

So salvation is free! We do not have to strive for righteousness. We cannot strive for righteousness. Really there is nothing the Christian has to do, because Christ has done everything. So the Christian is just supposed to sit there and be happy. Or better yet, go about their lives doing whatever is easy or convenient or enjoyable, and just cuddle that warm cozy “saved” feeling. For God, one day, will just zap us and make us perfect!

There’s some truth in there, so it’s sneaky. But it throws out SO much of Jesus’ teaching and the following application to life in the early church that makes up our whole New Testament. So much “go and do” or “go and be” or “repent from this and turn to… what?”

And we have wandered into another danger, the polar opposite of striving for salvation by our own effort is total idleness and passivity. If human striving and effort is doomed to fail and salvation is a free gift, it does seem logical to just wait for God to reach down and change us.

We call this laziness, idleness, or antinomianism, the idea that there is no law that Christians must obey or follow. This denies the deep abundant life God has for us, the growing relationship with God and each other.

In fact, right after saying that human effort, will worship, is without any value, he goes on into Colossians 3.

Colossians 3:1–2 ESV

If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.

And it goes on… put this kind of stuff to death… Put on this other kind of stuff, like a new set of clothes. How do we do that?

So it cannot be that Christians are just supposed to sit back and do nothing. Why would Paul, Jesus before him, give all these commands to change and grow, as if we were supposed to take an active role in growth?

We cannot Do It Ourselves. And we cannot Do Nothing.

The dilemma

You may identify with one or both of these tendencies. I think we often veer between these two extremes.

We get really motivated to change and we set up the Do It Yourself project, we have a plan and we just try really hard, but we soon realize we can't just be better by trying really hard to be better. We exhaust ourselves, and then sit back and do nothing for awhile, until we are dissatisfied or motivated enough for another burst of Do It Yourself energy.

Both of these "errors" are built on a kernel of truth. These two things are true:

We are called to be holy, to be righteous, to good works. There is some active component on our part.

It is God who changes us. True change comes only by the hand of the Potter.

The Tree

Years later, my friends drove back to see their old house. Every tree on the block is dead from whatever that fungus was. Except for the tree in their frontyard, which is huge and beautiful and growing strong.

So I looked up this aloe vera thing.

Turns out. Aloe Vera has some natural anti-bacterial and anti-fungal properties and horticulturists will actually use it as a natural root growth hormone.

What Jeff meant for mischief… God meant for good :D

Can you make a tree grow? I have a dead tree

Everyday I water that tree. Every day it gets sunshine.

If the tree is dead, it’s never going to grow. And I can pretend like it’s a tree all day long… it’s dead.

We were dead in our transgressions. There was no righteousness there at all. That’s what Jesus pointed out in the Pharisees, called them white-washed tombs. Clean and pretty on the outside, full of death.

It is Christ-alone, by faith-alone, His work alone to bring you from death to life. He gives you His righteousness, creates it in you, that you are now a living tree. Or, the Scriptural language, a living branch, grafted into the vine. “I am the vine and you are the branches… His banner over me is Love.”

Life comes from God. Growth comes from God.

Can I make that tree grow faster? The “try hard” is like walking out and pulling on its branches. I can do that every morning, wake up early, before the dawn, and pull on the branches. Every night before bed, pull up. I might even trick myself that my efforts are working… but I’m just wasting my time and fooling myself.

That isn’t how this works.

Actually, we know a bit about how to help a tree grow. The real secret is what God has created within the tree, a mysterious process by which the tree soaks in light and turns it to energy, draws up water and nutrients from the soil, and uses that to multiply and sustain its own cells, sending out new branches and buds and leaves and fruit, all according to this Divine plan… but you can help. Diligently watering, removing the weeds, fertilizing, your standard aloe vera massage. All the things.

Cooperation with the Divine

I love this passage in Philippians 2, the whole chapter really, which talks about imitating Christ in every way. Verse 12 and 13 capture this dilemma, this tension:

Philippians 2

Philippians 2:12–13 (ESV)

Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

First, there is this active component: “work out your salvation with fear and trembling.” It is important to see Paul is not saying “work for your salvation” for salvation is still the free gift of God. But we are called to “work it out” whatever that means. Salvation is a process not just a one-time trick. Salvation is believing Jesus, remaining in Jesus, being transformed into full abundant, Christ-like persons, being resurrected into perfect new bodies to eternal life… the word “salvation” captures all of this. And we are active participants somehow in “working out” this salvation, there is stuff we get to do.

But, lest we fall into that trap of legalism, the trap of trying to “be better” by our own will and effort, Paul continues: “for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.” It is still God who is ultimately changing us and it is to fulfill his purpose, not our own desire and ambition.

I find this principle here. God changes us and He delights in cooperating with His creatures. He invites us into it.

We cooperate with the Divine.

God changes us and He delights in cooperating with His creatures, in letting us take part in our own transformation, working out our salvation.

Spiritual Disciplines

But how are we supposed to cooperate without falling into the error of either legalism, trying to do it all ourselves, or idleness, waiting for God to give us easy and instant transformation? When it comes time to get practical, to get down to what we will do, this is where we find ourselves slipping into one of those errors.

Why are we picking this up next? This is where Jesus goes next in his Sermon.

Many of these practices Jesus’ hearers knew in one way or another. But twisted, distorted away from their purpose. And Jesus brings them back into line.

No, here is how you give sacrificially. That the next sermon.

No, here is how you pray. We’ll spend some good time in the Lord’s Prayer.

Here is how you fast.

Here is the principle of simplicity… the principle of poverty… meditation… Jesus is teaching us these things.

And so, in parallel to hearing Jesus teach about them, we want to practice them.

We find ways to place ourselves in active submission to God’s purposes. Ways to listen for His purpose. Ways to prepare ourselves for change. Ways to encourage and guide one another in that process.

We can get more specific. Sometimes “spiritual language” is vague language. Someone once called this work of submission “active passivity” which sounds awesome… until you try to do it. We can get very practical.

We call those ways Spiritual Disciplines, and we don’t have to make this stuff up. The great men and women of Scripture practice spiritual disciplines, Christians throughout church history have practiced and written on the Spiritual Disciplines, and even if you haven’t heard the term before, many of these practices will be familiar to you.

Prayer, fasting, Studying the Bible, these are Spiritual Disciplines. Service, Worship, Confession, these are Spiritual Disciplines. Perhaps less familiar might be disciplines like Christian meditation, Simplicity, Solititude or Guidance… but none of these are new.

What are Spiritual Disciplines?

Spiritual Disciplines is the collection of Disciplines, things that take effort, practice, intention to do, that nurture and feed and grow our Spirit, the growing part of ourselves that is alive to God, ultimately all that we are.

God changes us… but he uses means… and through these and other Spiritual Disciplines He delights in cooperating with His creatures.

“Our work is to place ourselves in the way of Christ and invite Him to work in our lives, individually and collectively. The Spiritual Disciplines are merely an attempt to describe how we can accomplish that work.”

Celebration of Discipline

We are going to learn about some of them from Jesus here in sermons. He doesn’t cover them all, just as he isn’t giving a comprehensive list of every aspect and dimension of righteousness… or every way people of the Kingdom are blessed.

But in parallel to continuing to study Jesus’ teaching in the Sermon on the Mount, we have an opportunity to learn about, but most importantly, to practice these things together.

We will be starting a 13-week study through this book, “Celebration of Discipline” by Richard Foster. The book is a couple years older than me, and it’s been a classic since it’s publication… and for good reason.

Named by "Christianity Today” as one of the top 10 books of the 20th century. It walks through 12 spiritual disciplines. 4 inward practices, 4 outward practices, 4 corporate practices. Many will be familiar to you… but there are always new things to learn there.

But I expect many of you will find something new.

More important than learning something new, is that we encourage and equip one another to be in it, to be growing, to take up God on His invitation to thrive.

So we can get even more practical than a list of Spiritual Disciplines. Learning about the Spiritual Disciplines, focusing on one at a time, is a good start. But of course, learning about a discipline is not practicing that discipline. Better yet, as a fellowship of believers, we can take a Spiritual Discipline, learn how it is practiced in Scripture and in the Church throughout history… and then commit together to making that discipline a part of our lives.

So...

I’ve sent out this interest form this morning. I want to make sure we offer opportunities where you can participate.

Saturday afternoons. 2-4pm.

Friday evening 7-9pm?

Wednesday evening 7-9pm?

I am eager for God to change me, to change us... and for millennia He has encountered His people in and through the Spiritual Disciplines.

I want to grow… and I want to see you grow. To understand and receive His gospel, His love, His forgiveness, His righteousness.

To receive the sunlight, to draw up the water, the richness, to soak in the aloe.

God changes us, but he uses means, and He delights in cooperating with His creatures. It isn't quick. It isn't easy. It is, as Eugene Petersen calls it, a “long obedience in the same direction.”

It is beautiful and good, and all of them are, in one way or another, time with our Lord and Savior.

Philippians 2:13 ESV

for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

For… it is He who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

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