Devotion.al

  • The Fruit We Yield

    The Fruit We Yield

    Psalm 52; Jeremiah 22:1–9; Luke 6:43–45

    Have you ever been somewhere with a beautiful bowl filled with fruit, then picked up a piece of fruit, and realized that it was fake? It looks pretty and improves the ambiance, but beyond that, it is useless for living.

    Christians have a discrepancy (okay, we have many). We understand the “” of following . We also have a general understanding that we cannot earn our way into Heaven (i.e., “works righteousness).

    Yet, here we are stuck in words of actions. There is the reality that actions can form us. This is why the ancient church focused so much on disciplines of behavior (bible reading, confession, etc), not because they, in and of themselves, reformed us, but so that the pattern of lives became set. Through that setting, we are more and willing to let the Spirit transform us.

    Despite those intentions—we see this in Jewish and Christian traditions—the rules intended to guide the heart became rules to follow. By following the rules, people were able to appear transformed, but their hearts were anything but.

    Jeremiah’s to live a just continues from yesterday’s (Jeremiah 21:11–14). The battle being waged upon the hearts of Judah is about living life versus following rules. When we only follow rules, rather than live, we are only going to die unfulfilled (Romans 7:5, Romans 8:2). We also will be no better than the fake fruit in the bowl.

    When Jesus talks about “good” fruit—kalos—there is actually a play on words that our translations miss and thus we do not connect other phrasings. Kalos (the Anglicization of καλός) has a focus on the outward appearance, which is similar to Jesus’ accusation of the teachers and Pharisees about being whitewashed tombs (Matthew 23:27). At the same time, there is also the implied meaning that there is still some use for the fruit despite the focus on outward appearance. A lot of big supermarkets have buyers who view the outside of the fruit, because they know what will sell at the market, and it is pretty fruit. That doesn’t mean that the fruit is necessarily really tasty, nor does that mean that there are not hidden issues. You, too, may have experienced buying a “nice to look at” piece of fruit, and then found something less than appealing after a bite or two.

    We have to be careful when we draw too much on the good/bad dichotomy as (for example) good fruit goes rotten, too (thus becoming bad). The agricultural aspect of the “bad” fruit is more along the lines of being grown from a seedling (or volunteer) rather than controlled grafting.

    The fruit from such trees is often inedible and so good for nothing but fertilizer. These trees will always produce fruit that is not edible. There is nothing to be done about it. A good tree will not always produce good fruit. The bad tree will always produce bad fruit.

    Another way to think of this is ornamental fruit trees. They are beautiful. Their fruit is often beautiful to look at (weeping cherry comes to mind). The fruit, though, is not good, nor is there much fruit to go with the seed and skin. The tree is good as an ornament. It is not good for life-giving food.

    ※Reflection※

    • What challenges you regarding good fruit and good trees versus bad fruit and bad trees?
    • How is the appearance of good fruit similar to a whitewashed tomb? How is it different?
    • How does living a strictly law-abiding life lead to “death” (as calls it)? On the other hand, how can it lead to life?

    ※Prayer※

    Holy Spirit, only you can transform us from bad trees to good. We you permission and we ask for your aid to become good trees producing good fruit beyond measure. Amen.

  • Defining Justice

    Defining Justice

    Psalm 52; Jeremiah 21:11–14; Revelation 21:22–22:5

    “This then is how you should live, begin your morning by administering justice. All those who know and follow the will of God will people from their oppressor, particularly for those whose God promised has been stolen from them.” [A paraphrase by Ian]

    There is no question that oppression, justice, and theft are phrases that are repeatedly thrown around right now. How they change from place to place and culture to culture also cannot be ignored. There is also a historical aspect to this as the time of Judah and Israel what was meant by this was pretty clear cut.

    Today, it isn’t so clear-cut. There are several possible reasons: (1) we’ve made it too complicated, (2) our understanding has matured, (3) we are applying worldly concepts and understandings to Biblical ones. There are probably a couple of more.

    In almost all societies in history, there is a gap between those who “have” and those who “have not”. How “having” is just or not is part of the question. For many, medical care is a matter of justice (and they have a lot of unjust things to point to). For , medical care is a personal matter of responsibility (and they can point to a lot of unjust things, too).

    Matters of justice include (depending on ) skin color, national origin, first language, career, order, social standing, economics. From the standpoint of the Law, what was oppression and stealing was very clear cut. That doesn’t mean that the Law was followed, hence Jeremiah’s statement about starting the morning with justice. Where it gets really difficult for many of us is beyond the Law version of justice. A great many Christians from the early to today believe that went beyond the Law to Love God and Love Others. Yes, that is the summation of the Law and the Prophets provided by Jesus. Yet, Jesus also commands to not , and he expanded (yes, expanded) the concept of sin from actions to relations.

    Administering justice is easy when it is written down and defined sharply, though some of the gymnastics lawyers and judges go to redefine things gets interesting at times. So, what happens when it is relationships? If you want a simple answer, I’m sure someone sells a book on it.

    Justice is not the same across all situations. It would be nice. Different people, different contexts, different histories, create different justice. Yep, there. A different justice.

    ※Reflection※

    • How do you emotionally to different justice issues?
    • How do you think through the Law and Jesus when you think about justice issues?
    • Why is it , and why is it essential, to wrestle with justice, especially in the of the City of God from Revelation?

    ※Prayer※

    Lord, help us to live, love, learn, heal, and reconcile all things and peoples justly; where you define just. Amen.

  • Wrong Thing Vision

    Wrong Thing Vision

    Psalm 52; Ezekiel 31:1–12; Galatians 6:11–18

    “When a tree falls in the forest, does it make a sound?”

    That philosophical question is designed around the presence of a being. “Sound” being a human , the implication is that the tree wouldn’t make a sound, as there is no one around to hear. From a purely scientific standpoint, of course, the tree makes a sound. We understand that even when we are not present, there still will be sound waves. The animals will certainly hear it and try to move out of the way.

    Yesterday, when we read about the cedar, it was referring to the David line. In today’s passage, is refers to kings and leaders, just not the Davidic ones. The cultural awareness that the cedar represented royalty helps us understand that the cedar might be used in multiple contexts to represent the kingly leaders.

    The difference here is that the tree representing Assyria goes down and has no . Yesterday, the Davidic cedar had a bough taken off and replanted. Here, there is no legacy. In fact, the land animals resting on it show that it is nothing more than dirt.

    The tree, oddly enough, goes down not necessarily for Judah and Israel’s benefit, but to show Egypt who God is. Or perhaps we should say, remind Egypt who God is (reminding Judah and Israel, too).

    Governments, as they are a gathering of people, look to other governments and other people to get an idea of how to succeed, and often how to beat the other guy. Governments too busy looking at the other “guy” aren’t looking to God.

    Often when we are busy looking at the “other” (whether people, governments, and many ), we are not looking at the right things, let alone the things we can control.

    Paul refers to the new . When we look too much to the world we lose sight of the new creation that is inside of us. It’s not that we corrupt it, but we can avoid it. As we look to others to define us or oppose us—instead of God—we miss out on the new creation. As the “others” look to unGodly things, they are often looking at the unGodly things of others, creating a vicious cycle.

    We need to break the cycle. How we break the cycle will be a very individual thing. We, like Paul, may end up bearing marks like Christ on our bodies. We almost definitely will bear them on our souls.

    ※Reflection※

    • How much do you reflect on the new creation inside of you?
    • Do you ever see when the world tries to this new creation?
    • Are you more driven by leaders, governments, or people within your circle? How do you try to influence them for Christ?

    ※Prayer※

    Lord, us the to recognize that we have been freed from the ways of the world. Help us to look to you first, so that we may transform the world through your for us. Amen.

  • Green Majesty

    Green Majesty

    Psalm 92:1–4, 12–15; Ezekiel 17:22–24; 2 Corinthians 5:11–17; Mark 4:26–34

    If you’ve ever walked in a forest, particularly a rain forest (like the one on the Olympic Peninsula), you might see a fallen and dead tree. On that dead tree, or from even its stump, there is a new tree or trees growing. While the “big one” is gone, new comes.

    The cedar tree represented the David line. By taking “a tender sprig”, the main (or empowered/enthroned) line (Jehoiachin) would be ultimately replaced by the line of David that God chose. There seems to be a Messianic tone to this passage, implying that the Messiah may not come from “the main branch” of the Davidic line.

    Depending on how one reads it, “birds of every kind” may represent the nations and peoples of the world. This Messianic tree would shade and nourish the birds, with the implication also being one of the birds raising their young (the next generation) under the protection and in the company of the Messiah.

    You might have noticed the green tree and the dry tree. Neither is set “in stone”. The green tree may wither away and the dry tree may bloom. In the realm of , this means that we must always continue to pursue God (green tree), and that even the dry tree (unbeliever, former believer, etc.) can go from withered and almost dead to fully alive.

    We often find ourselves in places where we are green. We also find ourselves, too often, in places where we are dry and withered. Part of the underlying , , and of ‘s words to the Corinthians was that God was not done with them. We all are made new and being made new daily. Just as the green tree can wither and die when not fed by water, so will we when we do not pursue the Water of Life. Then there is the parable of the mustard seed. It starts very small. It then grows beyond and becomes the plant in the garden that is the resting place of birds.

    Did you catch the parallel to the passage in Ezekiel? We often talk about the mustard seed of faith. If we think of the Messiah as the mustard seed, then the tree grows in the garden of Israel, and the birds (the nations) again in its shade.

    ※Prayer※

    Lord, trees surround us. They us shade. Many give us food. All provide places of refuge for the birds, and the trees even lose themselves to be the wood that forms our daily shelter. While the trees had no say in their , you still chose to walk the road to die on the cross—a dead tree—to bring me new life. Thank you for what you have created for and what you have given to us. Amen.

  • Finer or Better Things

    Finer or Better Things

    Psalm 92:1–4, 12–15; 2 Kings 14:1–14; Mark 4:1–20

    Every generation is in danger of not being as faithful as the one(s) that preceded it. There is, of course, the huge possibility that “this” generation (whichever generation “this” is) will restart a journey of renewed . The church in the US—and so-called Christian Culture—is experiencing a diminishment of significance (whether perceived or real). The US is about 4 decades behind Europe in this.

    While Jesus taught in parables (such as in today’s passage in Mark), the Old Testament is mixed between , history, poetry, and realistic/poetic history. The story of Amaziah is historical, and yet there is something there for us as a parable.

    In many respects, the church has been Amaziah. We haven’t dealt with our shrines (see yesterday’s devotional) and our blind spots. We were proud of our significance and we struck out against the world…and we lost.

    In , the gold, silver, and objects that we held so dear as vital to our well-being were taken away. We have been stripped of much of our . In fact, much of the church is drenched in mud and other filth that will take years to clean off and even more years to remove the aroma.

    Like Amaziah, we confused our title (king, or Judah, or “the church” or “the on earth”) with authority and worldly . We also confused the title with a right to certain outcomes. We have been deeply disappointed.

    This is a good thing.

    Perhaps it is my pastoral and “church” circles, and not yours. I the constant refrain of “back to ” and I don’t want that. I want a church and a people that care more about planting the seeds of the saving Gospel of Jesus Christ than are worried about Washington, D.C., COVID, and so forth.

    It is not to say that we should not be concerned about Washington, D.C., or COVID (or whatever else). It is to say that they have become gods and idols that we turn to while still saying we are God’s.

    ※Reflection※

    • Where in your life do you see yourself following the trappings rather than God?
    • What is missing in the message from/to Amaziah and Joash, and why is that important?
    • How and where are you casting seeds? Are you casting sparingly or generously?

    ※Prayer※

    Lord, help us to release everything of the world so that we are free to only grab onto you. Amen.

  • Faithfully Wise

    Faithfully Wise

    Psalm 92:1–4, 12–15; 1 Kings 10:26–11:8; Hebrews 11:4–13

    We often will use the wisdom in regards to King Solomon. He was granted the of wisdom for the benefit of the people, and they greatly benefited. With the temple being built, on the surface, it would seem that they were benefiting spiritually (or at least religiously) too. Except that all the benefits were short-lived. Eternally, they were of minimal or no value.

    While calling the US a (whether from the beginning or up until now) is really a mischaracterization, it is helpful to think of the US as Solomon.

    Through the inheritance of conquest (Israel took the land, right or wrong, as the US took it from the previous inhabitants) and also hard work, there was financial, societal, and personal security. Everything was going well. Then certain things pulled the US away from its origins. The US, for example, went from a nation needing outside help, to be being one of the dominant (and at times the only dominant) countries that “gave” support (with the general of benefits, even if only figurative).

    The US has chased after TV, space, the moon, computers, the , and you can probably add more to the list. Each of these things, for a time, became more important than the country itself.

    The (and thus us) fell into this same trap. We had the worship “wars”, attractional, missional, Sunday School, , and even digital. Churches chased after these things. Could they serve the kingdom? Yes. Did they server the kingdom? Not always. Where this gets really messy is that some of these may have been beneficial for the kingdom for a time and place (and perhaps still), but at the same time, many churches have stuck to their models rather than their .

    And in case you think that I want the “good old days”, I can easily add “fire and brimstone sermons”, liturgy (which I do love), rural, urban, poor, rich. Anything can inhibit the church—and the people called the church—from fulfilling its mission. Then we are no better than old Solomon.

    Solomon had wisdom, but his had waned. Contrast this with the faithful listed in Hebrews. Some of them may not have had wisdom, but they had faith.

    Often this is where the church and its people can sidetrack. When we lose faith and trust only in wisdom (particularly worldly wisdom), we will often make decisions that we believe are correct (they certainly may be wise), and yet do not align with faith or trust in the will of God.

    ※Reflection※

    • What kind of things/thoughts/“wisdom” have you had/experienced that led you away from God?
    • How do you discern when something good is taking you away from God?
    • What do you think is the mission of the church and the people of the church? How will you use that to filter your actions and the actions of your church?

    ※Prayer※

    Lord, may we grow in wisdom AND faith, that we are your faithful people on your mission. Amen.

  • Choosing the Fruit

    Choosing the Fruit

    Psalm 92:1–4, 12–15; Genesis 3:14–24; Hebrews 2:5–9

    There is something odd about the story in the Garden of Eden, and it isn’t the Fall (though that is central to our ). The story in the Garden of Eden revolves around loving obedience/ of God (that was a failure) and two trees.

    The apple (usually red) is the fruit to represent the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and . Not being a red apple fan, it can be hard for me to see the attraction (as Eve was attracted to it). It really wasn’t an apple, maybe. We don’t know what it was.

    Based upon what was provided in the story of the Fall, neither Adam nor Eve had experienced or evil. Therefore, even their concepts of life and good were not very deep. Describing a beautiful sight to a person born blind, or beautiful sound to a person born deaf is kind of like trying to explain, good, evil, or life to people who have no experience.

    What did the fruit of the Tree of Life have? Some people have created imagery that show that the Tree of Life also produces apples. That similarity is interesting but peculiar.

    It is the fruit of the trees, though, that show something about God. Some say that God put the trees as a test for humanity. It might be better to think of them as aspects of God in material form. As Christians, we talk about eternal life as the ultimate of following Christ. Eternal life was originally just a fruit. As Christians (and definitely as Nazarenes/Wesleyans/Methodists/etc), we talk about and believe in it. To be , one must know what evil is…perhaps.

    This, of course, will immediately cause many to shake or tremble, for by that logic, if God is holy (which God is), God must know evil. The fruit of the trees shows that. Knowing what evil is does not mean one is evil.

    The fruits are a foreshadow of what is to come for those of us who believe in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. We will receive the “fruit” that remains in the Garden and will know what evil is so that we know what truly Holiness is.

    ※Reflection※

    • How does knowing evil help you know what holiness is?
    • Why is knowing holiness important?
    • As you think of yourself on the spectrum of 1 (Holy) to 10 (Evil), where are you?

    ※Prayer※

    God, you have made us lower than you and yet us so much. Help us to know what evil is that we will instead know what it means to seek you. Amen.

  • Changing Diapers

    Changing Diapers

    Psalm 74; Isaiah 26:16–27:1; Luke 11:14–28

    When Joni (my wife) was pregnant with our first (to be born) child, we had an odd conversation with another couple. They told us (almost mockingly) that soon our conversation would to include the color and consistency of our child’s poop. We chuckled. That was ridiculous. Who would talk about poop so much that a couple would bring that up? A few months after our first was born, we had to laugh at ourselves when we realized that was exactly what had happened.

    Before our first was born, we could read lots of books and received lots of advice. Nothing prepared us for being a parent. Conversing about poop was only a minor change. A weird one, definitely, but only a minor one.

    For those of us on the other side of pregnancy, we tend to forget what we were like before it. When Isaiah talks about pregnancy and childbirth, we envision that, but we neglect the before. Just like we could never imagine talking about baby poop as a topic of conversation, we couldn’t understand the life change of having a child…until it happened.

    The same really can be said of Israel. They didn’t understand. There were a few who got it, but they were (it seems) very few indeed: Moses, Joshua (mostly), maybe a couple of judges (though most were a mess), Samuel, David, Isaiah, Ezekiel, and the other prophets (major and minor). To round up, that’s maybe 30 over 1500-ish years. Granted, these are the ones written about. So, if we round up even more to 300 people, every 5 years of Israel’s history (prior to Jesus), a single person gets it.

    Before someone proverbially smacks me, most of the Israelites are followers (and, yes, the numbers are hyperbole). They followed where the leaders led (sometimes). Sounds kind of like us.

    So, when we get to Jesus, we get the and questioning and just flat out not believing. Yes, we think we would respond better to Jesus than “those” people obviously did. Except, we are on the other side of the pregnancy.

    We have the Holy Spirit. For us, looking back we see where God was moving. The Jews to this day also see where God was moving, as do the Muslims. We, however, see Jesus. That is the gift of the Holy Spirit.

    That is the gift that people pre-Pentecost didn’t have (even the disciples). It is the gift of those who know Jesus or who have responded to the nudging of the Holy Spirit through prevenient (that which goes before ) .

    Being aware and recalling what we were like before knowing Jesus through the Holy Spirit will help us reach the world. There is a caveat to this. For those who knew Jesus as a child, this may be very hard, unless there was a significant spiritual crisis of some sort in later years (based on my of this). So, if you don’t know the pre-pregnancy (i.e., pre-Holy Spirit) life, that’s okay. God will still use your life and story to reach others.

    Many people will question our , not because it is unbelievable (though many will use that word), but because the Holy Spirit has not been ignited in them. We are to that almost all of humanity was like that. We were no different. We them grace and in this, for God did the same for us.

    ※Reflection※

    If you were a teen or adult when you came to know Jesus, what life like before then? If you were a child when you came to know Jesus, what spiritual “desert” or “wilderness” did you experience that transformed your faith into something greater?

    ※Prayer※

    Holy Spirit, help us to recall what transformed our relationship with God through you so that we are able to translate that into the lives of those yet unsaved. Amen.

Devotion.al

The Fruit We Yield

Psalm 52; Jeremiah 22:1–9; Luke 6:43–45

Have you ever been somewhere with a beautiful bowl filled with fruit, then picked up a piece of fruit, and realized that it was fake? It looks pretty and improves the ambiance, but beyond that, it is useless for .

Christians have a discrepancy (okay, we have many). We understand the “heart” of following . We also have a general understanding that we cannot earn our way into Heaven (i.e., “works ).

Yet, here we are stuck in words of actions. There is the reality that actions can form us. This is why the ancient church focused so much on disciplines of behavior (bible reading, confession, etc), not because they, in and of themselves, reformed us, but so that the pattern of lives became set. Through that setting, we are more and willing to let the transform us.

Despite those intentions—we see this in Jewish and Christian traditions—the rules intended to guide the heart became rules to follow. By following the rules, people were able to appear transformed, but their hearts were anything but.

Jeremiah’s call to live a just life continues from yesterday’s scriptures (Jeremiah 21:11–14). The battle being waged upon the hearts of Judah is about living life versus following rules. When we only follow rules, rather than live, we are only going to die unfulfilled (Romans 7:5, Romans 8:2). We also will be no better than the fake fruit in the bowl.

When Jesus talks about “good” fruit—kalos—there is actually a play on words that our translations miss and thus we do not connect other phrasings. Kalos (the Anglicization of καλός) has a focus on the outward appearance, which is similar to Jesus’ accusation of the teachers and Pharisees about being whitewashed tombs (Matthew 23:27). At the same time, there is also the implied meaning that there is still some use for the fruit despite the focus on outward appearance. A lot of big supermarkets have buyers who view the outside of the fruit, because they know what will sell at the market, and it is pretty fruit. That doesn’t mean that the fruit is necessarily really tasty, nor does that mean that there are not hidden issues. You, too, may have experienced buying a “nice to look at” piece of fruit, and then found something less than appealing after a bite or two.

We have to be careful when we draw too much on the good/bad dichotomy as (for example) good fruit goes rotten, too (thus becoming bad). The agricultural aspect of the “bad” fruit is more along the lines of being grown from a seedling (or volunteer) rather than controlled grafting.

The fruit from such trees is often inedible and so good for nothing but fertilizer. These trees will always produce fruit that is not edible. There is nothing to be done about it. A good tree will not always produce good fruit. The bad tree will always produce bad fruit.

Another way to think of this is ornamental fruit trees. They are beautiful. Their fruit is often beautiful to look at (weeping cherry comes to mind). The fruit, though, is not good, nor is there much fruit to go with the seed and skin. The tree is good as an ornament. It is not good for life- food.

※Reflection※

  • What challenges you regarding good fruit and good trees versus bad fruit and bad trees?
  • How is the appearance of good fruit similar to a whitewashed tomb? How is it different?
  • How does living a strictly law-abiding life lead to “death” (as calls it)? On the other hand, how can it lead to life?

※Prayer※

, only you can transform us from bad trees to good. We give you permission and we ask for your aid to become good trees producing good fruit beyond measure. Amen.