And You Don't Even Have to Dance Like Fred Astaire

Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters; and he who has no money, come, buy and eat!  Come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.  Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy?  Listen diligently to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food. – Isaiah 55:1-2

We have patent leather, fake fur, artificial flavors, and even imitation bacon bits.  So much of what we see is staged and choreographed and photoshopped.  Next to the dentist my wife goes to there is one of those places where they do Botox injections and other similar treatments which attempt to defeat the forces time and nature.  The other day my wife went to see her dentist, and I decided to wait in the parking lot because they had some television show blaring in the waiting room.  I hadn’t really noticed the “MAACO For Make-overs” place until a reasonably attractive lady got out of her car and, instead of going into the dentist’s office, headed in for a fresh paint job or something.  It left me wondering what she looked like before -- or if this was before. 

Most of us have come to understand that "livin’ on spongecake" is not nutritionally viable, long-term.  Eating things that aren’t really food can be detrimental to our health.  Even more dangerous to our spiritual health is swallowing that which masquerades as truth.  We have direct access to God through His word and through prayer.  We can speak to Him and hear from Him.  It costs us nothing.  The Lord offers us His grace, His mercy, and His forgiveness through Christ.  It is free to us because the price has already been paid on the Cross. 

Yet in our pain, in our hunger and thirst for righteous, in our craving for authenticity, meaning and purpose in our lives, we will waste our time and our resources pursuing illusions and sawdust lies that will no more satisfy us than drinking saltwater will quench a castaway’s burning thirst.  I am as guilty as anyone of letting the world tell me what will make me happy when all that makes life worthwhile cannot be bought with silver and gold. 

Life itself, represented by water in the verses above, is a free gift to us.  Wine speaks of the Holy Spirit which we receive by faith.  Milk and bread remind us of God’s revelation in its various forms, from nature to the written word to the Incarnation, open to all who are willing to accept the truth. 

We work and we strive and we battle.  You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask (James 5:2).  All we have to do is ask.  And I tell you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.  For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened (Luke 11:9-10).  As I have been told regarding the tense of the verbs in the original language, you could say, Ask and keep on asking, and you will receive and keep on receiving.  I do not think it is possible to max out because Jesus Himself said, To the one who has, more will be given (Luke 8:18).  

Why are we trying to live on lies?  Ask.

Charging Station

And rising very early in the morning, while it was still dark, he departed and went out to a desolate place, and there he prayed.  And Simon and those who were with him searched for him, and they found him and said to him, “Everyone is looking for you.” – Mark 1:35-37

Some people follow crowds.  Some follow Jesus.  There may be times and places where Christ and the crowd coincide.  Not always.  We may, though, always find Him as Simon did in the haunts of the lonely, deserted and desolate places. 

The Lord ministered to the needs of the crowds.  He worked miracles, healed the sick, and drove out demons in broad, public daylight.  But the power to do that does not come from the crowd.  Performers say they draw energy from their audience.  Those who came in contact with Jesus drew from Him.  He knew that the woman with the issue of blood had touched the hem of His garment in faith because He felt “healing virtue” flow out. 

It was, however, when Jesus was alone with His Father that He renewed and refreshed His strength and understanding.  Christians often burn out, fail and fall because they are too eager to respond to the cry that “everyone is looking for you.”  Those who spend too much time with the crowds, no matter how well they begin, often end as frauds and fakes. 

We don’t have to retreat to the Mojave or the top of some remote mountain in order to be alone with God.  You can do it in an aluminum tube flying through the air in the middle seat between Mama Cass and Fat Albert, on a busy street, in a cube in a noisy office.  Sometimes you may have to retreat to the shower, the garage, a riverbank, the back of a bike, a woodland trail – whatever suits your nature, your situation, and your preferences.  Jesus is not particular.  He’ll ride in your car, follow you out to the deck, down in the basement or up on the roof.  He’ll run beside you in the park or sit beside you in a tree stand. 

People are always going to put demands on your time, the more if you are in any way wise or skilled.  The claims of family, friends, co-workers, and others are often legitimate.  The Lord does not ask us to refuse those who call to us for help.  He only points out that we need to first hear from Him, spend time alone in His presence, and discern His will.  No power flows from a dead battery.

Feet in Clay

"You will never wash my feet — ever!" Peter said.

Jesus replied, "If I don't wash you, you have no part with Me."

Simon Peter said to Him, "Lord, not only my feet, but also my hands and my head."

"One who has bathed," Jesus told him, "doesn't need to wash anything except his feet, but he is completely clean. You are clean, but not all of you." — John 13:8-11

The scene of Jesus washing the feet of His disciples is a well-known one. Usually we think of the lesson in servanthood demonstrated and the nature of leadership in the Body of Christ. I have attended Holy Week services at a Catholic Church, and I remember the priest's re-enactment of Christ's self-humbling as being an extremely powerful moment. To think that God-in-the-flesh knelt before unworthy humans performing the most menial of task is a poignant depiction of His willingness to be available to us in a relationship.

I want to look at a different aspect, though. While we are in this world, we are not to be of it, not overwhelmed by the day-to-day necessities of functioning in a material world. It's not an easy task for some of us to keep focused on what is real and what is important. It is not unlike an outdoor wedding being invaded by a swarm of hungry mosquitoes. They may not be what the day is about, but they can be awfully distracting. It is not for nothing that one of the chief devils is called Beelzebub, i.e., "lord of the flies". God calls us, enables us, and desires for us to live holy lives, lives set apart to Him. How do we do that in a fallen world?

First we do it by understanding who we are in reality. This is a subject I bring up often -- to remind myself mostly. I am not who my family and friends say that I am — for better or worse. I am not who advertisers want me to believe that I am or that I could be. I am not who the government says I am. I am not who science says I am. I came into this world from God for some purpose, and when I leave it I will return to God with, I hope, that purpose fulfilled. Though I enter as a fallen son of Adam, I will exit as an adopted son of God through my elder brother Jesus, washed clean in the blood of the Cross.

But I still have a problem, that of the insidious and clinging nature of my relationship to the world system. I seek to throw it off, but the accusation that I give in to sin far too often cannot be dismissed as false. I may say it doesn't matter and recall that, after all, I "live by faith", but that misses the point.

When my wife picked out the carpet for our house, for the main part of it — not my office, thank God — she chose a white berber. It's not pure white, but it's pretty close. I might be the "man of the house" and have every right to walk right in the front door with my boots on, but having the right, and it being right are two different things. She might let me slide if I just need to enter the kitchen with its tile floor, but if I want to watch my big television in the living room, or if I plan on sleeping in the bedroom, I'd better get my boots off and make sure I'm not "tracking in dirt".

On a daily basis, having right-standing with God is a wonderful thing, but if we are going to relate to Him in a more personal way as Father, we don't want to "track in dirt" when entering the sanctuary. The priests of the earthly temple had a big bronze basin filled with water that they used for ritual cleansing before entering even into the first chamber of the sanctuary. They could physically wash off the common dust of the profane world. But how do I do it?

Jesus didn't tell Peter and the rest to take a bucket and wash their own feet. He took it upon Himself to make them clean enough to commune with Him. He will do the same for us. We just need to give Him the time and the opportunity to cleanse us of that everyday stuff that gets on us and clings to us as we walk through this world. A few minutes of opening our hearts to Him in confessing prayer, a moment of meditation, reading a scripture verse or two, singing a few words of praise — that's all it takes for Him to freshen us up and usher us into His presence.

Love You Long Time

As a deer longs for streams of water, so I long for You, God. I thirst for God, the living God. When can I come and appear before God? – Psalm 42:1-2

For the vast majority of man’s time on earth, the main concern must have been lunch. At least that’s what Maslow’s hierarchy of needs postulates. The physiological needs, such as air, water, and food, form the base of a typical pyramid. The base includes all the “animal” aspects of life like sleep and sex. As best I can figure, sex is the only thing in the base that we can live without for very long. Of course, if you assume that the reason for animal life – including humans – is reproduction of selfish genes, then those that do not have sex to pass along their DNA do not live as long as those who do.

Some critics of Maslow’s pyramid argue that the hierarchical structure is a false. While all the listed needs may be more or less legitimate, the idea that sleep is more basic, somehow, than friendship or security is misleading. In real life, most of us have given up a lower level need for a higher level need. Morality is on the capstone of Maslow’s pyramid, implying that morality only becomes important when all the lower level needs are met. In a coherent, sensible society, the satisfaction of lower level needs is controlled by morality. A desperately hungry man may violate his morals to eat, but he knows he is doing something extreme.

God is trying to make us whole, to put us back together, to defragment us. If we are only a body, then we are mainly concerned with satisfying animal needs. If we recognize that we have a soul, then our needs change to emotional and relational objects. At the innermost is the spirit man who recognizes that the most intense hunger and thirst we can experience physically are but a mirage compared to that which gives us true satisfaction in life -- that gives us life.

For the person who seeks after God, hierarchies become meaningless. Needs are more like ripples in a pool, concentric circles leading us back to the point of origin, created by our entrance into material existence. The only thing that matters is His presence in our lives, His voice speaking to our spirit, His life flowing through us and out of us.

“… out of his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water …”