Setting a way forward

Recap

How do you know someone’s heart?

What’s the most awkward thing that happens to you on a regular basis?

You can’t predict future results from current actions

Righteousness doesn’t guarantee a good future on earth

Wisdom doesn’t either

Revelation matters

You can’t determine God’s goodness from current patterns

Is it love or hate? What is God’s heart?

If God had a Facebook feed, you couldn’t tell what he was thinking.

You can choose to live and find joy and do something meaningful

The cynic is always observing, critiquing, but never engaged, loving, and hoping. R. R. Reno, a Catholic scholar, called cynicism a perverse version of ‘being in the world but not of the world.’” Paul E. Miller, A Praying Life (Colorado Springs, NavPress, 2017), 65

Practices

Practices

attending to God

attending to your body

saying no to say yes

The resurrection means doing things that are eternally meaningful

The resurrection reveals God’s heart of love (:12-17)

You are God’s friend; he wants you to bear fruit (eternal)

The only 2 eternal things in this world are the word of God and people.

In order to be able to discern what is just—to understand “the way things should be”—we must seek answers that unify all that God has revealed about Himself. We must look for a logic that unites nature, Scripture, and Jesus and be prepared to alter and adjust what we believe about each. If we don’t, our “innate” sense of good and bad could potentially lead us in a direction that is completely at odds with Scripture and Jesus Himself. This is particularly important when we’re trying to evaluate things that our culture (or even religious subculture) has determined are just or the way things should be. Because the way things are is not necessarily the way things should be. One example of how our natural sense of justice can conflict with God’s sense of justice happens in the realm of competition, leadership, and authority. Within the natural world, we observe a kind of “survival of the fittest”—the strongest animals and plants stay alive and eventually are able to reproduce, passing along their genetic information to the next generation. Within the food web, larger, stronger animals prey on smaller, weaker ones. We see the house cat pounce on the mouse and watch as the lion stalks and devours the gazelle; then we call him the king of the beasts. We understand that there is a certain brutality to nature, accept it as “the way the world works,” and celebrate those who can survive. The problem comes when we have to decide whether or not “the way the world works” is the way the world should work. Should the rules that govern animal and plant behavior govern human behavior? If we accept that “might makes right,” we will quickly translate it to our interaction with human beings. We will excuse aggression and predatory behavior as normal: the salesman that tacks on hidden fees is simply “smart,” and the pastor who berates and pressures his congregation is simply a “good leader.” We can also begin to believe that being on top of the heap somehow means that you inherently deserve to be there. After all, in the natural world, the buck with the largest set of antlers is prized because he’s been able to elude hunters and predators for years, long enough to grow his 14-point rack. Translating this to human community, wouldn’t that mean that folks at the top of the economic, social, and political ladder somehow deserve to be there? And correspondingly, that folks at the bottom somehow deserve to be there as well? But here is where Scripture adjusts our understanding of what is “natural.” The Scripture teaches us that God, and not our own merit, ordains the course of our lives. None of us can control the family we are born into, the education we receive as children, the social function or dysfunction that we inherit. We do not get to pick our IQ, our personalities, or our gifting. We are responsible to steward these gifts, but at the end of the day, God makes some of us mice and some of us lions. And He does this, not as a reward for our ability, but for His own good purposes.14 Furthermore, Jesus cautions those with positions of earthly authority to use their influence, not for themselves, but for the good of those under their care. “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and those in high positions act as tyrants over them,” He says in . “It must not be like that among you. On the contrary, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first among you must be your slave; just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (vv. 25–28). It’s as if Jesus is asking the lion to protect a lamb. It’s as if Jesus is showing the ball to be a button. It’s as if He’s disrupting the entire game. (all that’s good: recovering the lost art of discernment)

The resurrection encourages us to join in God’s work with all our might ()

Righteousness means focusing on saving people vs being so focused on the law that you can’t do what is righteous

vs. 12 Righteousness means noticing those who don’t get noticed (those who are different from you).

Showing up in Ames

15:1 Righteousness means prioritizing the lost not the found