IF…

My favorite verse in the Bible for the past few years has been Mark 9:24. A father has brought his only son so that Jesus could cast out a demon from him. But when He arrives, He learns that Jesus has gone up the mountain, leaving the disciples in charge. They try over and over to cast out the demon with no success.

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By the time Jesus returns from the mountain, it’s a circus. A huge crowd has gathered, and the disciples are in a fight with the legal experts of the day about the boy’s condition and what to do about it.

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The boy’s father cries out from the crowd and explains the situation. Jesus rebukes the disciples (they failed to have faith that God could or would cast out the demon) and asks that the boy be brought to Him. When the boy sees Jesus, the demon throws the boy to the ground, foaming at the mouth. All eyes are on Jesus to see what He will do.

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Jesus, diagnosing the problem, asks the father for some background information, and the father tells him that the boy has been afflicted since he was young. Often the demon would throw him into the fire or into the water to try and kill the boy. In the next statement, the father’s heart is revealed:

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“But if You can do anything, have compassion on us and help us.”

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“If.” It’s the biggest two-letter word in the dictionary. It often communicates more than we intended to say, showing our doubts and our fears. It might be appropriate when we are talking about the capacity of a friend or a boss or a loved one, but it’s misplaced when talking about the capacity of God. With God, it’s never “if He can;” it’s only “if He will.”

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Jesus’ reply might have included emphasis on His first word:

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“If you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes.”

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“It’s not about My capacity,” Jesus seems to be saying. “It’s about yours. Can you believe? Can you have enough faith? Can you have more faith than these apostles who have been with me these several years?”

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And then, my favorite verse:

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Immediately the father of the child cried out and said with tears,

“Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!”

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It’s so full of love for his son. It’s so desperate. It’s so….honest! I’ve been there. I want so badly to put my total and complete trust in God to help me with problems, to watch over my kids, to provide for my needs… but I just don’t have enough faith. With the child’s father, I cry out, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief!”

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God always has to meet us more than halfway. He doesn’t require that we have 100% faith before He will go to work, but He does want us to want to believe at the very least. Beyond that, I think the official measurement is “as small as a mustard seed.” And if we can muster up that much faith, all things are possible.

Parable of the Hearts

We almost always call it “The Parable of the Sower,” but the Sower isn’t the key focus of the lesson.  The Sower (or farmer) is Jesus in each telling (Mathew 13, Mark 4, Luke 8), and His role doesn’t change.  Likewise, the seed he sows/plants doesn’t change.  It represents the Word of God in each story.  The key focus of the lesson is the soil, and the soil represents our hearts.

So, “The Parable of the Hearts” goes like this.  Jesus entered His field (the world) and scattered His Word.  Literally, He “broadcasted” it (a method of sowing seed), meaning that He sent it out into all directions, so that everything was covered.  He didn’t discriminate about where the truth went; He just allowed it to fall where it landed.

Those who hear it have four types of hearts:

• Hard Hearts – Those who have hearts so hard that nothing could grow in them.
• Shallow Hearts – Those who have hearts where truth can grow but not flourish, because it can’t go deep.  Difficult times make it wither.
• Choked Hearts – Those who have hearts where truth can grow but not flourish, because worry, fear, comfort, wealth, and desire choke it out.
• Fertile Hearts – Those who have hearts where truth can grow and flourish.

Luke makes it clear that those with Hard Hearts are not saved, but I think a strong case can be made that we will see the rest in heaven.  Shallow hearts and Choked Hearts don’t realize their true potential, but the seeds of truth do grow in them for a short period of time.  They are like Christians who allow themselves to be deceived by Satan and settle for less than the abundant fruit that Jesus said was possible.

Now look at the parable from a different angle.  The four types of hearts can really be used to describe just one Christian heart in its different patches of soil.

• Hard Heart – There are places in my heart that are hard to God’s truth.  Like the pathway in the parable, these places have been trampled down by the world.  These are the places I’m not yet willing to trust to His care – places of hurt and fear.  The seeds of His truth can’t even break the surface, so Satan comes and snatches them away.
• Shallow Heart – Other places are quick to receive the seed.  For example, I may fully agree with my pastor that I should love my neighbor…in principle.  As long as I’m not tested in this area, I may seem very godly to those around me.  But if my neighbor mistreats me or fails to meet my expectations, God’s truth will wither in the heat of my anger.
• Choked Heart – Some parts of my heart are choked with a desire for comfort and safety.  I know I should trust God to use me however He sees best, but “please don’t make me a missionary to Africa, Lord!”
• Fertile Heart – Thank goodness there are also places in my heart where I’ve learned to trust God completely, where He is working to produce an incredible harvest.  I’ve got to work hard to keep the weeds out, but if I’ll acknowledge a young weed to the Lord, He will remove it for me.

Our hearts are a garden full of different kinds of soil, and daily we are presented with opportunities to let the great Gardener go to work in them.  If we will let Him, He will break up the hard soil, clear up the rocks that make the shallow soil shallow, pull the choking weeds and continue to fertilize the areas where the soil is rich and deep.

It’s hard work that never ends this side of heaven, but each day, the great Gardener shows up ready to work.  All we have to do is to invite Him into the garden.

The Burden of Proof

The Lord himself will give you a sign: the virgin will be with child and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.  (Isaiah 7:14)

Isn’t it interesting that God chose to make a virgin with child His promised sign of the coming Savior?  Why not something more verifiable?  Why not something more irrefutable?
Gabriel’s first words to Mary after his introduction were, “Do not be afraid, Mary…” but maybe she should have been.  She was visited by an angel, pregnant with the Savior of the world, and looking at the dubious prospect of having to convince her betrothed, her parents, her friends and neighbors that she didn’t do what they all would surely think that she had done.  If that’s not cause for some nervousness, I don’t know what is.

God’s blessings are often burdens, as well.  He asks us to carry truth that cannot be proved with science, facts or figures.  The world calls us foolish and naïve for believing in things that seem so unbelievable, but the power is in the paradox.  If, against all rationality, we live fully confident of the Truth so that our actions match our beliefs, our lives become a compelling testimony.

The proof of the virgin birth is that Mary and Joseph endured the whispers, the disapproving looks, the unkind rumors, the stigma of the promiscuous woman.  The proof of the resurrection is that ten eye-witnesses sacrificed their lives to proclaim it.  The proof of God’s extravagant unconditional love is that we are willing to give it even when it is met with indifference, ridicule, hatred and persecution.

Would our demonstrations of unconditional love over the past week be enough to convince anyone?

They Walked on Water

I teach Bible lessons at a summer camp for abused children in Texas. This year, we were covering Jesus’ life and ministry, but as I wrote my lessons, they really became more about Peter and how God worked through his life.

Day three of the camp was the “Walk on Water” lesson. Peter gets out of the boat and walks on water to meet Jesus on the Sea of Galilee! Amazing! As long as Peter kept his eyes on Jesus, he walked on water, but when he noticed the wind and the waves, he began to sink. There’s a good metaphor in that for helping us to deal with our problems in life.

Many of us give Peter a hard time, because he started to sink beneath the waves. He should have kept his eyes on Jesus. And even Jesus chided him for his “little faith.” But let’s not forget….Peter got out of the boat. He only had a little faith, but at least he had more than those eleven boat-huggers. No one else was even brave enough to get their feet wet.

I asked the kids how many of them wanted to be “water-walkers” for Jesus – to do the scary things He asks us to do sometimes – and they all said they did. Each child got a “Water-Walker” sticker…

…and some ice-cold water to remind them of their commitment, but that wasn’t the end of lesson.

This lesson came with a test. Would they really be willing to “step out of the boat?”

Their test really started out as a test for us as a teaching team. How could we give them a safe and fun object lesson that would simulate walking on water? Inspiration came from a YouTube video segment about Steve Spangler on the Ellen Degeneres show.

Corn Starch + Water + Hours and hours of manual labor = Walking on water!

Corn starch and water make a funny liquid-solid. Hard when you put pressure on it; soft when you don’t. The official term is “non-Newtonian,” and it’s plenty cool!

I knew we had to try! Through a friend, I made contact with a wholesale food distributor that sourced and procured 300 lbs of corn starch for us. To that I added all that I could clear off the shelves at Kroger, Wal-Mart, Super Target and Albertson’s. We ended up taking approximately 400 lbs to camp.

On Day 2 of the camp, we began mixing 200 lbs of the corn starch and 12 gallons of water in a 90 gallon swimming pool. That was a mistake. In that large an amount, it doesn’t mix easily. We did our best imitation of the “I Love Lucy” grape-squashing episode, but a day and a half later, we had made little progress. Someone suggested we try mixing smaller amounts and then pouring them in, and that made all the difference.

Within a few more hours, we mixed up 167 more pounds to the right consistency and added it to the top of our earlier mistake. Water sports day was almost over, so we invited the kids to come walk on water before we even tested the mixture.

While the teaching team mixed up the last batch, we allowed the first group of girls to get into the goo up to their elbows.

Then, we lined them up and had them get a running start. The first girl to go across hesitated before she reached the other side of the pool and stopped dead in her tracks. The goo at the bottom was like cement. It would pull a toe off your foot if you tried to extract yourself too quickly. Several times while mixing, I got so stuck that I couldn’t get out and ended up falling rear first into the mix.

With the help of several adult camp guides, we got our brave pioneer out of the mire, and I’m happy to say that the second tester actually did walk on water! Once they saw how it was done, the rest of the girls and then the boys had no problem following in Peter’s footsteps, though half of them would allow themselves to get stuck just for the fun of having their camp guides struggle to extricate them.

In the end, 56 campers and a few dozen adults were brave enough to “get out of the boat.” The most courageous danced in the middle of the pool or did cartwheels across it. We still had a few boat-huggers, but you’ll find them in any group of any size.

The experiment was fun, but it begs the question….how many pounds of corn starch did Jesus use when he let Peter walk on the Sea of Galilee?

Here’s our some video clips and pictures from the object lesson.  Because of the nature of this summer camp, I can’t show you any of the kids’ faces.

About to Pass By

I found something scary in my Bible recently. The first time I noticed it was in Mark 6:48 in the story about Jesus walking on water.

He saw the disciples straining at the oars, because the wind was against them. About the fourth watch of the night he went out to them, walking on the lake. He was about to pass by them…

What? Jesus saw them struggling, walked all the way out to them and then had intentions of passing them by? Really? But then, I remembered that I had seen this somewhere before….when Jesus was walking with the two men on the road to Emmaus.

As they approached the village to which they were going, Jesus acted as if he were going farther. (Luke 24:28 )

Then, I got curious, and I began looking up other references to Jesus passing by (or intending to pass by) someone in need. I found that Jesus passed by his first two disciples:

The next day John was there again with two of his disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, “Look, the Lamb of God!” (John 1:35-36)

…passed by poor Blind Bartimaeus…

Then they came to Jericho. As Jesus and his disciples, together with a large crowd, were leaving the city, a blind man, Bartimaeus (that is, the Son of Timaeus), was sitting by the roadside begging. (Mark 10:46)

…passed by two other blind men…

As Jesus went on from there, two blind men followed him, calling out… (Matthew 9:27-34)

…passed by the woman who had been bleeding for twelve years…

As Jesus was on his way, the crowds almost crushed him. And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years, but no one could heal her. (Luke 8:42-43)

Just think about it! To be so close to Jesus, to be so close to His truth and His touch and His healing power, and to almost miss it! But we only know these stories, because these people didn’t miss Jesus. How many hundreds or thousands of others who were in need did Jesus pass by? He certainly didn’t heal everyone in Israel or let everyone participate in miracles (like when Peter walked on water).

So why did Jesus do for these what he didn’t do for the rest? If you study each example, I think you’ll find at least one of two common denominators – faith and persistence.

Peter got to walk on water, because he was impulsive enough to ask and because he flat out believed that Jesus could do anything He wanted to do. Jesus revealed Himself to the men on the road to Emmaus because they “urged him strongly” to stay with them. Andrew and the other of John’s disciples got to be Jesus’ first disciples, because they were willing to run after Him and spend time with Him.

Blind Bartimaeus, and the other blind men and the woman with the issue of blood all had to call after Him or chase Him down. They had to believe that He could do something about their infirmity, and then they had to act on that belief. Their faith is implied by their action and their persistence.

If you believe that God is good, you have to believe that Jesus never passed anyone by because He didn’t want to help them. He passed them by as a test to see who they really thought He was and is. If they truly believed that He was God, there’s no way they would allow Him to pass without grabbing hold of Him and pleading for Him to do a miracle.

I said that this was scary, because I wonder how many times Jesus has been near to me when I had a need but failed to call out to Him. How many times would a little persistence or a little more faith have made the difference?

I think I’m often too polite with God. I pray, and nothing happens, so I let it go. But in light of these Scriptures, I now think I’ve often settled too soon. God will forgive our rudeness if we grab hold of Him and won’t let Him go until He blesses us. (Genesis 32:26) He wants to see the depth of our need and the depth of our faith that He can meet it.

And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him. (Hebrews 11:6)

The Wheelbarrow

Jean Francois Gravelet, “The Great Blondin,” was famous for his death-defying tightrope acts.   In 1859, he was the first person to walk the 1,100 feet (335 meters) across Niagara Falls.  Ever the showman, he performed the walk several different times, adding variety by walking the tightrope blindfolded, with his manager on his back, with his hands and feet manacled, while balancing on stilts and while on a bicycle.  He even once cooked and ate an omelet in the center of the rope.

 

On one occasion, he asked the crowd, “How many of you believe that I, The Great Blondin, can walk across this tightrope to the other side?”Unanimously they responded, “We believe! We believe!”

 

So he walked across the tightrope and came back again. Then he asked them, “How many of you believe that I, The Great Blondin, can not only walk back across that tightrope, but this time do it while I push a wheelbarrow?”“We believe!  We believe!”

 

Then he asked, “How many of you really believe it?”“Oh, we really believe it!” they shouted back. One man, a little more enthusiastic than the others, caught The Great Blondin’s eye.  Pointing to the man, he said, “If you really believe, then get in the wheelbarrow.”

 

The man quickly disappeared.

 

The difference between what we say we believe and what we really believe will always show up in our actions.  Jesus hears us say, “We believe!  We believe!” but if we don’t do what He asks us to do, it’s not really faith, is it? 

If we’re going to be honest, we share the duplicity of the man with the demon-possessed son.  He tipped his hand when he asked Jesus to heal his son, “if you can.”  But the Lord of heaven and earth wasn’t going to let that slip slip by.

 

“’If you can?’” said Jesus.  “Everything is possible for him who believes.” (Mark 9:23)

And the father, God bless him, gave one of the most honest responses in all of Scripture:

 

Immediately the boy’s father exclaimed, “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!”  (Mark 9:24)

 

Yes!  That captures it!  “We believe!  Help us overcome our unbelief!”  Where else are we going to go with our doubts and our fears?  The Lord is the only one who can help us with those.

 

Jesus wants us to get into His wheelbarrow.  What that wheelbarrow represents is unique to what God wants to do in your life.  Of course, it’s scary!  It’s not faith unless there is risk and uncertainty involved.  But if you’ll get in His wheelbarrow and let Him take you where He wants you to go, you are in for the ride of a lifetime! 

(S – Greg Laurie – Harvest Daily Devotional, 2/27/06)