When God Wants to Drill a Man

I first came across this poem shortly after I came to Christ at age 14. I read it almost daily as I kept it posted on the basement wall where I lifted weights and worked out to stay in shape for wrestling. I was reminded of it last week when Shirley and I heard a speaker at Baptist Bible Colelge quote it. Perhaps it will minister to you the way it has to me.

When God wants to drill a man,

And thrill a man,

And skill a man

When God wants to mold a man

To play the noblest part;

When He yearns with all His heart

To create so great and bold a man

That all the world shall be amazed,

Watch His methods, watch His ways!

How He ruthlessly perfects

Whom He royally elects!

How He hammers him and hurts him,

And with mighty blows converts him

Into trial shapes of clay which

Only God understands;

While his tortured heart is crying

And he lifts beseeching hands!

How He bends but never breaks

When his good He undertakes;

How He uses whom He chooses,

And which every purpose fuses him;

By every act induces him

To try His splendor out-

God knows what He’s about.

Author Unknown

Tags: Christlikeness, Discipline, Sanctification, Suffering

I Long to Live Well 

Yesterday I blogged about how I awoke Longing to Love Well. Today I awoke longing to live well.

The Greatest Sermon Ever Preached

By “well” I mean that I long to live a pure, holy, Christlike life. Here’s how Jesus said it in the greatest sermon ever preached:

“But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well” (NIV).

“But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you” (KJV).

The Greatest Exchange Ever Made

I am eternally grateful that Christ lived well—perfectly righteously—on my behalf.

“God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor. 5:21).

The Greatest Power Ever Experienced

We don’t have to live a righteous live to be saved—Christ lived that life for us. However, once we are saved, the new person we are in Christ longs to live a righteous life. And, God’s Spirit who indwells us, empowers us to live an increasingly Christlike life.

“Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit” (2 Cor. 3:17-18).

Just as I was struck by the fact that I have a lot—a LOT—of growing to do regarding loving well, so I know I have a lot—a LOT—of growing to do regarding living well. I want to decreasingly long for that which is impure, worldly, fleshly, selfish, and ungodly. I want to increasingly long for that which is pure, holy, spiritual, selfless, and Christlike.

The Greatest Changed Ever Made

Finally, I was struck by the realization that longing to live well is what separates the person with a new heart (the regenerate person) from the person with an old heart (the unsaved person). Apart from Christ we awake each morning longing to be happy, not holy. Without Christ, we long to satisfy our flesh, not glorify the Father through the Spirit.

The Greatest Testimony Ever Known

The greatest argument for Christ is the new nature of the Christian. Rather than awakening each morning with a longing for self-centered satisfaction and selfish pleasure, God’s Spirit empowers us to awaken each morning with a longing to love others and to glorify God.

No one can awake longing to love and live well unless that longing has been awakened by Christ.

Join the Conversation 

What did you awake longing for this morning? Tomorrow morning?

Tags: Christian Living, Imputed Righteousness

I Long to Love Well

I awoke this morning with a deep longing to love well. It struck me that this is how I should awake every morning.

When Jesus was asked the purpose of life, He responded without hesitation: to love well (Matthew 22:35-40). The greatest commandment, in fact, the command that sums up all commands and identifies the purpose of life, is to love God well and to love others well.

I was also struck by the fact that I have a lot—a LOT—of growth to obtain in movement toward my goal of loving well. I love inconsistently, when I long to love consistently. I love conditionally, when I long to love unconditionally. I love based upon performance, when I long to love based upon Christ’s grace. I have a LOT of growing to do—through Christ.

I was further struck by the fact that I am so thankful to Christ that I long to love well. It’s not a natural longing—it’s supernatural. In myself, in the flesh, life is all about me. In Christ, through the Spirit, life is about sacrificial love.

Finally, I was struck by the realization that longing to love well is what separates the person with a new heart (the regenerate person) from the person with an old heart (the unsaved person). Apart from Christ we awake each morning longing to be loved well by others. We awake each morning longing for success, longing for ease, longing for happiness, longing just to survive. Apart from Christ, sometimes we awake longing for ill to happen to those who have caused us ill.

No one can awake longing to love well unless that longing has been awakened by Christ.

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What did you awake longing for this morning? Tomorrow morning?

Tags: Christ's Love, Christian Living, Love, Matthew 22:35-40

Six Prayers of Renewal 

Note: Read Part One, Six Prayers of Repentance. 

In chapter twenty-seven of Soul Physicians, I outline a biblical theology of putting on the new person we already are in Christ (compare Romans 6:1-14; Ephesians 4:20-24; Colossians 3:1-11). I embed within that theology a “Prayer of Renewal” related to each of six areas of our spiritual life:

• Our Relationship to God

• Our Relationship to Others

• Our Relationship to Ourselves

• Our Rational Beliefs/Mindsets

• Our Volitional Behaviors/Motivations

• Our Emotions

Today’s post shares these six prayers.

A Prayer of Relational Renewal: My Spiritual Relationship to God

“Father, I long for You more than gold or silver. Nothing else could ever satisfy my soul. Reorient my affections toward You and what You choose to provide. May my nearness to God be my Chief Good. Show me the beauty of Your holiness so that in worshipping Your loveliness, I exalt You. Empower me to enjoy You so that the universe marvels in amazement at how fulfilling You are. Silence all the clamoring of false lovers of the soul who would seek my attention. I want to worship You with everything I am, with undivided adoration. Give me a heart for You. A constant longing after you. Incite within me a deep passion for You.”

A Prayer of Relational Renewal: My Social Relationships to Others

“Father, Oh to be like You. Oh to be like the Trinitarian community. Mold me and make me, scour and shape me. Empower me to love like Jesus. Spirit, empower me to shrink not from the scars of death-to-self relating. Through my communion with You, enable me to give others a taste of Your grace love. More than anything, I want to give sacrificially like Jesus. You made me, recreated me, to give—to love with agape love. Thank you!”

A Prayer of Relational Renewal: My New Identity in Christ

“Father, I choose to live according to the peace that I have with You in Christ. I recall that one of Satan’s primary tools is the power of his false accusation that You are not generously accepting and that, therefore, I am Your enemy. The power of the Gospel renews my mind to the assurance that I am Your child, Christ’s bride, and the Spirit’s best friend! I put on wholeness, consciously reflecting on and resting in who I am in Christ. I put on my new identity in Christ. I enjoy who I am in Christ and who I am becoming through Christ as I become like Christ. I renew my mind to my new core identity in Christ. I reckon on this, and I reignite and fan it into flame. I clothe myself in my new peace. I cover myself in my new cleared, cleansed, and good conscience. I envelope myself in contentment with who I am in Christ.”

A Prayer of Rational Renewal: Putting On My New Beliefs and Mindsets

“Father, I surrender my mind to You. I consent to the truth of Christ’s grace narrative. I allow You to transform me by the renewing of my mindsets. Moment by moment fill my thought life with images of God-reality. Enlighten me to know You and the power of Your resurrection and the fellowship of Your suffering. Enlighten me together with all the saints to grasp how high and deep and wide and long is Your love. I commit to being a spiritual mathematician, adding life up from Your perspective. When I face suffering, I promise to believe that though life is bad, You are my Supreme Good. When struggling against sin, I promise to believe that even when I am sinful, You are gracious. And I promise not to take Your grace for granted, for though I know that it is wonderful to be forgiven, I understand that it is horrible to sin. Empower me to gird up the loins of my mind, to aim my mind toward heavenly things, to reckon on my new mindset, and to rest in my new mindset in Christ.”

A Prayer of Volitional Renewal: Putting on My New Behaviors and Motivations

“Holy Spirit, I yield to You. I consciously choose to admit that I’m a coward without You. With You, I can do all things. With You, no purpose of Yours can be thwarted. I put on choosing to depend upon You. I put on choosing to live for You. I put on seeking not only Your power to do right, but also Your guidance to know what is right. Step by step please lead me, all of the days of my life. In each relational interaction, empower and enlighten me to know what other-centered living looks like. Flow through me so that the disciplined, habitual passion of my soul reflects Your fruit. Show me how to connect to You, how to depend upon You, how to be nourished by You. Then let my greatest purpose be being like You, like Jesus.”

A Prayer of Emotional Renewal: Putting on My New Mood States 

“Father, thank You for feelings. Thank You that You have them. Thank You that I have them. Sometimes, many times, I feel like wishing them away. But then I would be a shell of a person. A Stoic, not a Poet. I don’t want that. What I want is heaven—no more cryin’ there. No more tears. No more looking in the eyes of a hurting loved one and feeling more pain than I ever thought possible. But until heaven, I want to be real. Raw. Honest. I want emotional integrity. I want emotional maturity. Help me to bring spirituality, rationality, and volitionality to my emotionality. Help me to be as emotional as King David, as Jeremiah, as Job, as Asaph, as Jesus, as You, as the great saints throughout Church history. Help me to feel life fully. Fortify me to feel the feelings of others. Deeply. Sincerely. Accurately.”

Join the Conversation

Which of the six prayers hits home the most for you today? How would you word your prayer in that area?

Tags: Christian Living, Prayer, Soul Physicians

Six Prayers of Repentance

In chapter twenty-six of Soul Physicians, I outline a biblical theology of putting off the old manner of life (compare Ephesians 4:17-19). I embed within that theology a “Prayer of Repentance” related to each of six areas of our spiritual life:

• Our Relationship to God

• Our Relationship to Others

• Our Relationship to Ourselves

• Our Rational Beliefs/Mindsets

• Our Volitional Behaviors/Motivations

• Our Emotions

Today’s post shares these six prayers.

A Prayer of Relational Repentance: My Spiritual Relationship to God

“Father, I come home to You. I confess as sin my false lovers. I confess as sin living like the old person that I used to be. I confess as sin my spiritual adultery. I acknowledge to You and to myself that my false lovers are horrible lovers and that my pursuit of them is ugly and putrid. How foolish of me to ever believe that anyone but You could ever satisfy the longings of my soul. How shameful. How disrespectful. Forgive me my relational sin. I acknowledge that You alone are my Supreme Good. I acknowledge that You alone are gracious and compassionate. I return to You as my Forgiving Father. I return to Your Son as my Worthy Groom. I return to Your Holy Spirit as my Inspiring Mentor. I love You, Lord. Renew my vision of You as a totally competent and totally good God—boundless in holy love.”

A Prayer of Relational Repentance: My Social Relationships to Others

“Father, I confess as sin my living for self, loving self. I will put off shepherding myself and focus on shepherding others. I reject all the self sins: self-sufficiency, self-promotion, self-protection, selfishness, self-centeredness. I confess as sin my cruel, harsh, manipulative, demanding, shaming, blaming, maiming way of treating others. Most of all, I confess as sin how far I’ve moved from reflecting You and Your radically other-centered Trinitarian existence. I am putting off the flesh, the characteristic ways I used to relate and I’m putting on the Spirit, the new me created to relate like You.”

A Prayer of Relational Repentance: My Identity in Christ

“Father, I’ve been so like Adam and Eve. Running. Hiding. Defensive. Playing dress up. All because I don’t believe You are who You say You are—the Forgiving Father. What sin! I put off my shame identity. I reject my sense of abandonment, ruin, rejection, and condemnation. I put off my futile attempts to quiet my inner restlessness. Instead, I rest in You. I rest in who I am in Christ and to Christ. It’s ugly of me to try to beautify myself. It’s a slap in the face to Your Son, my Savior. Forgive me. Cleanse me. Enlighten me by Your Holy Spirit to grasp how much You love me and how loving You are.”

A Prayer of Rational Repentance: Putting Off My Old Beliefs and Mindsets

“Father, I’ve finally come to my senses. I confess as sin my foolish belief that I can make life work apart from You. I’ve arrogantly suppressed the truth of how perfectly well You care for me. I’ve denied Your fatherly love for me. I’ve sinned against You by believing Satan’s (the False Seducer) smaller story, fleshly mindset that You are not my Supreme Good. I’ve allowed my view of reality to become filled with contemptuous images of You. I’ve allowed my mind to be squeezed into the mold of this temporal world, living according to the dominant plot theme of the earthly story. I’ve been like a deaf man straining to hear the Gospel story. I’ve denied the Cross. I return to You now repenting of these idols of my heart. Though I am not worthy in myself to be called Your child, by faith I claim my adoption in Christ. Thank You for forgiving me.”

A Prayer of Volitional Repentance: Putting Off My Old Behaviors and Motivations 

“Father, I’ve sinned against You by walking in the way of the sinner, by following the self-centered pathway of _______. I must put off choosing compulsively and put on choosing courageously. I must put off the old enslaved pathways and put on my new free, empowering pathways. Help me to quit coddling, cuddling, pampering, and spoiling my flesh. Empower me to be ruthlessly fierce in rejecting it and nailing it to the Cross. Reveal my secret sins, show me the patterns that I’m blind to, help me to detect my fleshly pathways. I reject my fleshly inclinations, patterns, and character. I put on the new characteristic of _________. I reject my characteristic approach to life of _________ and by Christ’s resurrection power I replace it with my new manner of life.”

A Prayer of Emotional Repentance: Putting Off My Old Mood States

“Father, I’ve sinned against You by worshipping feelings instead of worshipping You. My current mood state of _______ exposes how desperately I’m trying to live without You. My failure to face my feelings expose my distrust in Your ability to care for me. My refusal to soothe my soul in You exposes my doubts about Your goodness. I put off my emotional duplicity replacing it, in the power of Your Spirit, with emotional integrity. I will face whatever I feel and bring it to You. I put off my emotional lasciviousness. I put off indulging my fleshly passions. I confess as sin my addiction to ___________. I recognize it for what it is: a symptom of the deeper disorder within me, a spiritual, relational, mental, willful disorder. Forgive me. Empower me to manage my moods for Your glory and the good of others.”

The Rest of the Story

The Bible never tells us to put off without also telling us how God empowers us to put on the new person we are in and through Christ. Tomorrow we share six prayers of renewal.

Join the Conversation

Which of the six prayers hits home the most for you today? How would you word your prayer in that area?

Tags: Christian Living, Mortification, Prayer, Putting Off, Repentance, Soul Physicians

How Do We Relate?

What were relationships like in the culture of the Roman Empire when the New Testament was written? Relationships were decidedly one-sided.

Persons with power ruled with an iron hand over those who were powerless.

“You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant. And whoever wants to be first must be your slave—just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and give his life as a ransom for many” (Mt. 20:25-28).

Persons with money abused the poor.

“Is it not the rich who are exploiting you? Are they not the ones who are dragging you into curt? Are they not the ones who are slandering the noble name of him to whom you belong?” (James 2:6b-7).

Fathers dominated, exasperated, embittered, and discouraged their children with harsh, dictatorial mistreatment (Eph. 6:4; Col. 3:21).

Husbands were inconsiderate of their wives, disrespectful, unloving, and acted in self-centered ways (1 P. 3:7; Eph. 5:25-33).

To use a technical term, relationships were perceived to be hierarchical. People ranked one another in a tiered system. The culture of the day classified and categorized everyone from top to bottom. If you were graded and ordered as below someone else, you had to give total allegiance and due deference. Those ranked on top demanded and enjoyed every privilege that rank allowed. They gave those lower on the totem pole no respect because the worldly culture of the day said none was deserved.

Instead

I love the Bible. I love statements like “but God.” And I love “instead” statements. We read one earlier. “Instead whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant (Mt. 20:26).

Peter picks up this same counter-cultural concept of servanthood when talking about elders and shepherds.

“Be shepherds of God’s flock that is under your care, serving as overseers—not because you must, but because you are willing, as God wants you to be; not greedy for money, but eager to serve; not lording it over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock” (1 Pt. 5:2-4).

James emphasizes the same counter-cultural concept of servant relationships when talking about the rich and the poor.

“Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in shabby clothes also comes in. If you show special attention to the man wearing fine clothes and say, ‘Here’s a good seat for you,’ but say to the poor man, ‘You stand there’ or ‘Sit on the floor by my feet,’ 4 have you not discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts? Listen, my dear brothers: Has not God chosen those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom he promised those who love him? But you have insulted the poor” (James. 2:2-6).

Paul, in addressing fathers and husbands exhorts them to live counter-cultural lives of Christ-like sacrificial, agape love for their children and wives.

Hierarchical or Sacrificial?

How do we relate? Do we relate in a hierarchical way or a sacrificial manner? Do we live counter-cultural to our self-centered world, or do we allow our minds to be conformed to our hierarchical world?

When church leaders demand deference and respect rather than demanding of themselves sacrificial relationships, they are modeling the world and not Christ.

When those who have lord it over those who have not, they are modeling the world and not Christ.

When fathers and husbands exasperate their children and dominate their wives, they are modeling the world and not Christ.

If anyone could have claimed the right to hierarchical relationships it would have been Christ Jesus, the Lord of all. Instead…

“Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death—even death on a cross!” (Phil. 2:6-8).

How does this relate to us?

“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus” (Phil. 2:3-5).

Join the Conversation 

How do we relate: hierarchical sacrificial?

Tags: Christian Living, Humility, Pastoral Ministry, Relationships