FreeTruth

What is TFC's More of God?

Someone asked me this today; here's my answer:
During our More of God seasons (3-4 times per year) we encourage folks to alter their lives a bit by giving up a little food for all or just parts of a couple of days, so that they can give a bit more time and focus to prayer.

The fasting part of M.O.G. is optional. We don't mandate that people fast. But just becasue it's not mandated doesn't mean that it's unimportant. Congregational fasting shows unity in prayer and in a display that we all, together, desire God even more than food.

The prayer part of MOG shouldn't be viewed as optional (unless folks have other unavoidable stuff going on). TFC members really should join us in the two day season of prayer since in the Bible church leaders have the responsibility to call congregations together for seasons of prayer, and every believer needs to be a part of this at least on some occasions.

During the days of each More of God event, we encourage people to pray alone, with each other, and with their families more than they might normally. We suggest that they spend time praying for their families, their care groups, their church, their pastors, the various ministries of the church, the mission of the church, and unbelievers that they are trying to reach for Christ.

It all comes to a climax on the Friday PM at 7:00PM, when we gather to pray specifically for "more of God": more of His love, more of His power, more of His grace to live transformed lives, more of His Holy Spirit to give us spiritual gifts and power to edify each other and reach our world, more of His presence to change us and to change others through us.

This Friday time is normally a free flowing time, with no set agenda by the pastors. We simply start by singing (normally) and then pray and speak and share prophetic words of encouragement as God brings these all to mind. We don't want to manage God on these occasions; we want God to control and lead us.

There you have it!!

Labels: Church, Fasting, Prayer

I've been a hold-out on Lent, and, as commonly practiced, I still am. All human traditions have a built in high-risk factor which is one reason why I try to undermine them every chance I get!

This gets me into a lot of hot water, but I believe that traditions about music, Sunday attire, men's and women's roles (other than those spelled out in God's Word), holy days, liturgies, and more, must be deliberately altered periodically, or else in time they will replace God's Law. I must intentionally change the way I've always done things or the way I've always done things will supplant God's Law in my conscience.

Spiritual growth should never depend on a tradition, but on God and all His ordained means of grace alone. All else is sand. Traditions are just tools to be used or not, as the moment may suggest, and the heart may choose.

But with all that necessarily said, I think there are helpful ways we can observe traditional holy seasons if we so choose. Regarding Lent you might choose from the following options (from various sources):

1. Take a deep repentant inventory of soul. This should happen regularly (do not wait for Lent!), but it can be helpful to use the Lenten emergence from winter as a kind of spiritual emergence from any soul-winter we may be in. You can ask questions like:

- What are my characteristic sins, and how can I work and pray for change?
- What idols have captured my imagination and cooled my love for the living God?
- In what ways is my devotion to Christ and his church less than wholehearted?

2. Memorize a gospel, cross-focused text like Isaiah 52:11-53:12.

3. Write one gospel-presenting letter each Lenten week to an unbelieving person expressing the love of Christ.

4. See Lent and the Good Friday/Resurrection Day event as a reminder of your solidarity with all true believers everywhere. It's undeniably stirring, if you have a love for the universal Church, to realize that in such "holy seasons" true Christians everywhere are united in repentance, faith, and love for Christ.

5. Read good books about the finished redeeming work of Jesus Christ--through Whom alone we have our salvation apart from works and traditions. Fill your mind with grace alone, faith alone, Christ alone themes.

6. Plan to make three visits to people who are lonely or especially needy. Read them Scripture on the death and resurrection of Christ and encourage their faith and hope in Christ.

7. Choose to fast, going without food for a meal or a day or longer, using the time and energy saved to pray and meditate.

Whatever you choose never think of your way as God's Law. Never think that your observance of Lent is penance or atonement for sin. Jesus' blood alone atones. By His blood and righteousness alone are we justified in God's sight. Trusting in Jesus alone, make your choice regarding Lent. This is an evangelical way to do Lent.

As we proceed now to offer 40+ readings on the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus--His Path to Glory--the way is clear for us to reflect and worship with no legalistic strings attached.

Labels: Fasting, Holy Days, Lent, Prayer, Repentance, Spiritual disciplines

Today FreeTruth begins a Lenten series entitled Path to Glory. Nearly twenty of my friends will contribute to this 45+ day journey through the life, passion, resurrection, and triumph of our Lord Jesus Christ--His path to glory.

I think there's wisdom in first getting this "Lent thing" straight in our minds, before we present about forty meditations heading into the Good Friday and Easter season. If you're an evangelical Christian like me--someone who has a legitimate concern to keep the gospel free from man-made traditions and legalistic additions--you've probably asked questions about Lent. If you haven't, you probably should have, for traditions and additions can kill unguarded evangelical faith.

Let's see if I can help out with a few posts answering some FAQs about Lent.

FAQ #1--"Isn't Lent a Catholic holy season?" Answer: Yes and No.

Yes, Roman Catholics observe Lent every year. No, Lent is not only a Catholic holy season. The fact is that through the centuries to this day, many evangelical, Bible-believing Protestants have observed the Lenten season to one degree or another. That doesn't mean it's right or wrong. It just means that it isn't strictly accurate to say that Lent is only a Catholic holy season any more than to say that Christmas is only a Catholic holy day because Catholics observe that too.

Church history shows that Lent-like practice was observed widely before the Roman Catholic Church ever became very dominant and as seriously in error as it is today. Widely diverse observance of some form of fasting, repentance, and prayer, all leading into the Good Friday/Resurrection Sunday (Easter) season, traces back at least into the 100's A.D. That doesn't mean necessarily that this is a good thing to do; it simply means that a lot of real Christians have been observing Lenten-type practices for a long time.

Truth be told: there are troubling Roman Catholic, Orthodox, Coptic, High Church Anglican or Lutheran, and even superficial evangelical ways to observe Lent, and there can be a truly evangelical, gospel- and grace-saturated way to observe it.

It is by no means critical that we choose to observe Lent. I never have. And many other Christians have chosen not to and are strong devoted believers. What matters is that if we choose to observe Lent (which I believe a Christian may do), we do so in a way that in no way compromises the gospel of God's free justifying grace through the atonement of Christ alone.

We'll see if we can outline an approach to such holy seasons that does not undermine the gospel in the process.

Labels: Fasting, Holy Days, Lent, Spiritual disciplines

One of the woeful effects of the evolutionary theory that Peter wrote about yesterday (isn't it good to hear that the peddlers of folly are at least squirming a bit under the weight of having no proof?!) is that it has given a pseudo-intellectual credibility to the age-old philosophy of materialism. It has made the idea that all there is and all that matters is matter. The realm of the spirit and the supernatural has been denied even more openly and brazenly than ever.

One effect of this has been an emergence of crass hedonistic materialism. We're told to love money and what money can buy, because after all there is nothing but the body and the present to live for. Even though our world's woeful condition of unhappiness (I saw a report just this morning that 27 million stuff-stuffed Americans are on anti-depressants!) would surely imply that stuff doesn't bring happiness, and life disconnected from the Living God and connected only to matter, is bankrupt, the blind still don't know they're blind.

A few weeks back I told you I wanted to do a 30 day experiment in joyful austerity; a commitment for one month to live as close to a need only existence as I can get. It has begun. For one month I'm going to eat, drink, shower, spend, relax, and simply live with need rather than mere pleasure or habit in mind. I started on Saturday. Three days in I'm learning some things about what we really need and what we don't. I'll try to keep you posted.

BTW this really isn't inteneded to be something like a fast; it's not really a profound spiritual plan so much as an intentional learning experience. I want to learn a bit more what God sees as my needs, what others have and don't have, and just how happy and contented I can be without all the stuff that money buys.

As one stuff-stuffed American to others, I'm hoping to learn some things that'll change my life.

Labels: christian life, Fasting, Materialism, Spiritual disciplines

I have only a moment or two to post a thought for the day, so here it is: I'm going to pull away from the normal routine for the next two days in order to pray, read, plan, and care for my flock through a personal, pastoral retreat.

I'm retreating in order to advance. I'll be avoiding the phone, staying away from the internet (so there will be no blog posts over the next couple days), breaking loose from pressing details and plans and administrative work, avoiding food, and more, in order to go before God in your behalf. In other words I'll be in retreat in order to help us advance.

Please pray for me as I pray and plan for you all. As I enter this retreat I do so with a heart aching for the spiritual strength and joy of all those I know and love and pastor. Very much aware of the ways the enemy is attacking souls and families and our world, I long for the joy and holy growth of all of us and our families. I am pulling away that I might serve you in a quiet place.

And I pray that I will see many of you Friday evening at 7:00, as we gather together to pray that God would dazzle our hearts, our church, our families, and our world with His glory.

Please prepare. Please pray. Please come.
God bless.

Labels: Fasting, Prayer, Spiritual disciplines

In past times fasting involved great sorrow and despair. And there may be occasions still--especially when a person is facing a battle with sin over which he/she has had little victory--in which a fast may be one of repentance with cries for mercy and grace. But there is a distinct difference in the starting point of fasting for the Christian today.

Whereas in the past fasting emerged from a posture of desperate need and perhaps even overwhelming grief, today we can fast from a place of great joy and overwhelming confidence. The believer need never be in despair. He need never be in a place of wailing hopeless sorrow. He need never be in a place of emptiness.

For the believer does not fast as a have-not, but as a have. She fasts, not from a position of longing for love or grace or favor that she does not have, but from a position of knowing that He who did not spare His Son but delivered Him up for us all, will also graciously give us all things (Romans 8:32).

Here's what the fasting believer carries with him/her into each season of abstinence:
1. Confidence that the fast will not make God love him/her more, though it will help us to love God more. God cannot love us any more than He already does. Fasting (or not) does not affect the love of God for us; it affects only the love we have for God.

2. Confidence that our standing before God is not dependent on the frequency or quality of one's fasts. Our standing before God rests on the finished work of Christ in our behalf, and the perfect life and obedience (which includes flawless fastings) which Jesus performed while on earth and credits to our account upon our faith in Him.

3. Confidence that our fasting is inspired, sustained and made fruitful by the Spirit of Grace within us. We need not fast in our own strength, but as with all works we do, we may fast in the strength of Christ through His Spirit.

4. Confidence that as we draw near to God through Christ in fasting and prayer, God is going to prepare a feast of grace for us as we linger in less distracted fellowship in His presence.

Have you ever been so hurried and harried that when some good news or circumstaces arrived you had to stop what you were doing, pause in mid-activity, put things down, take a deep breath, and then pay attention to take it all in?

That's something of what Christian fasting is. It's stopping the mad rush and frantic pace to pause, stop what you're doing, put things down, take a deep breath, get focused, and enjoy the news of all that God is and has for us in Christ! Try that out this coming week and see if maybe it transforms your abstinence from fast to feast!

I close with another Piperian moment:

"What’s new about the fasting is that it rests on...[the] finished work of the Bridegroom. The yearning that we feel for revival or awakening or deliverance from corruption or the mere presence of the Bridegroom is not merely longing and aching... We have tasted the manifestation of Christ’s glory, and our fasting is not because we are hungry for something we have not tasted, but because the new wine of Christ’s presence is so real and so satisfying.

"We have tasted the powers of the age to come...and because the new wine of Christ's presence is so real and so satisfying...because we have tasted it so wonderfully by his Spirit...[we] cannot now be satisfied until the consummation of joy arrives...[w]e must have all he promised" (John Piper, Hunger for God).

Labels: Fasting, Prayer, Spiritual disciplines

In his comment on my May 19th post, Gregory asked about whether fasting should ever include abstinence from things other than food. His point is well taken and is worthy of a post all its own.

Remember that Dr. Piper says that it is not the poison of evil so much as the simple pleasures of earth that most often distract us from devotion to God. These we have to renounce. That doesn't mean that we can never enjoy these things (unless they are sinful in themselves) but it does mean that if any of these are impeding our walk with God in any way, they need to go.

You might remember the words of John Wesley's mom, Susannah, who answered her son's question, "What is sin?" with these words:

Whatever impairs the tenderness of your conscience, weakens your reason, obscures your sense of God, or dulls your deep desire for spiritual things; whatever increases the authority of your body over your mind and will, that thing to you is sin.

This wise woman knew that Christians need to guard their souls from anything and everything that distracts them from God.

I've noted elsewhere that in a recent conversation someone asked me what my greatest pastoral concern is at this moment. It's an easy question to answer: My greatest concern is the fact that so few believers practice the spiritual disciplines which are meant to increase their devotion to God. And if someone were to ask me why this is so, I'd have to suggest that it is largely because so many people are distracted by so many lesser things.

If people are having a hard time finding time for daily, focused, and beneficial prayer, Bible reading, private worship, and communion with God, then they need to proclaim a fast from whatever it is that is keeping them from these delightful duties of the soul. It may well be that a prolonged period of abstinence from TV, sports, internet, movies and other forms of amusement needs to be considered.

This cannot be done as an end in itself; it must be done for the purpose of prayer and devotion. It must be done so that time and mind and heart can be dedicated to Christ, His Word and His love without the normal dulling distractions of other things.

Does this seem radical to you? If it does, then you need to ask God to give you a greater passion for Him.

If it doesn't and you find your heart connecting, how's this for a suggestion: (If you're a part of TFC) Why don't you do a fast starting right now through next Friday PM (when we gather for our time of prayer and singing at the close of our More of God season)? Why don't you reduce or even better, curtail all TV-watching, internet for entertainment purposes use, movie viewing, novel reading, non-Christian music listening, sports following, and/or any other amusements?

Then fill the time by reading the Word and good books on Christian faith and life, and by spending time in prayer.

If you don't think you could handle that, you've got a pretty good indicator that the world's got too strong of a hold on you. Are you up for it? If so, seize the moment and go hard after God!

Labels: Fasting, Sin, Spiritual disciplines

I'm back with a few more thoughts on prayer and fasting. My plan is to employ some material from John Piper's simply marvelous book entitled: A Hunger for God: Desiring God through Prayer and Fasting. This book is packed with simple but deep thoughts about God and our needed hunger for Him. It's been a joy-giver in my life, so I'm not hesitant to share some of its choicer fruits with you.

As the sub-title indicates, the chief purpose of fasting--and really all spiritual disciplines and (now that I think of it, the purpose of all of life)--is to desire and delight in God.There are many things that can interfere with such delight in God. For some it is legalistic religion and religiosity. You know what I mean: formalistic prayers, ascetic attitudes that we ought to abstain from certain foods or drinks or enjoyments because they are bad.

Such fasting and self-flagellation have certainly been practiced as a way of trying to atone for sins and win the favor of God. But I'm not guessing that that is a clear and present danger for many, if any, of us. I'm guessing that it is not abstinence that is dulling our affections for God, but indulgence. Dr. Piper says:

The discipline of self-denial is fraught with dangers--perhaps only surpassed by the dangers of indulgence (p. 9).

Let's face it: indulgence has killed a lot more grace in our lives than abstinence has. If our affections for God are going to go cold on us, it's not likely going to be because we've been too hard on our bodies but because we've been too soft. It's going to be because we've enjoyed the gifts of God more than we've enjoyed the Giver. We're full and forgetful.

Piper adds:

For all the ill that Satan can do, when God describes what keeps us from the banquet table of his love, it is a piece of land, a yoke of oxen, and a wife. (Luke 14:18-20) The greatest adversary of love to God is not his enemies but his gifts. And the most deadly appetites are not for the poison of evil, but for the simple pleasures of earth. For when these replace an appetite for God himself, the idolatry is scarcely recognizable, and almost incurable (p. 14).

Food is among those wonderful gifts which God gives which can steal our hearts away from God. One value of fasting from time to time is that it reminds us of that for which we should really hunger: God. It subdues for a time the appetite of the body (whether for one meal or one month of meals) in order to give freer reign to the appetite of the soul.

By fasting from time to time we are able to say to our souls: "I love God more than food." This is what Dr. Piper has in mind (at least in part) when he writes:

Therefore when I say that the root of Christian fasting is the hunger of homesickness for God, I mean that we will do anything and go without anything if, by any means, we might protect ourselves from the deadening effects of innocent delights and preserve the sweet longings of our homesickness for God (p. 15).

Are you hungry for God? If you fast occasionally you might find that you get even hungrier. If you are not hungry for God it could be that the very thing you need is a time in which you pull back from your normal appetites and give space and time and thought to the One Who alone can fill your heart.

Things to think about.

Labels: Fasting, Prayer, Spiritual disciplines

We've been announcing recently our upcoming quarterly More of God fast and prayer season (May 28, 29). If past history is an indicator it's likely that many have hardly given this event a second thought. So far the commitment we've made to corporate fasting and prayer has not caught on much, and it sets me to wondering why.

The reasons may be many:

1. People somehow have had (by an almost unbelievable series of providential circumstances) other unavoidable commitments every time we've scheduled one of these (I'm not suggesting that there not valid occasional scheduling conflicts; there are).
2. People forget to put it on the calendar (just to remind: with few exceptions, we plan these every time there is a fifth Friday in a month; go ahead and mark the calendar now for July 30, 31; Oct. 29, 30).
3. People really aren't that interested.
4. People have decided that they don't need these times despite the leadership of their pastors who have determined from Scripture that such events are important.
5. People prefer a more traditional approach to prayer meetings (by the way, one reason we have not gone the traditional route is precisely because we do not want more of the same; we want more).
6. People are full and forgetful.

Here's what I mean by suggestion #6. Hosea 13:4-6 is one of many Bible texts which warn us of the danger of becoming full and forgetful. Among other passages are Deuteronomy 8:11-19 and Proverbs 30:8,9. When people are experiencing material, physical, and I'd suggest even doctrinal fullness, they tend to forget their need for God and their desperate dependance on Him for more.

This was the Israel experience time and again. And it is ours too. One reason we do not pray more, and fast more, and then more often combine our prayers and fastings in corporate events is because we've lost our sense that we need more.

Ours is the complacency that comes from living in a culture that feeds us well physically and in a church that feeds us well spiritually. One reason why fasting is a good spiritual discipline is because it reminds us of what hunger feels like, and in so doing it reminds us to hunger more for God and for more of God.

Are you hungry? If so, please tune in in coming days as I review some thoughts on fasting. If not, may I ask you why you think that is? Do you really have all you want of God, or is it possible that you have been nibbling on so much of the stuff of this world that you've lost your appetite for God Himself? I leave you with a few thoughts from John Piper:

If we don't feel strong desires for the manifestation of the glory of God, it is not because we have drunk deeply and are satisfied. It is because we have nibbled so long at the table of the world. Our soul is stuffed with small things, and there is no room for the great (John Piper, Hunger for God).

Labels: Fasting, Prayer, Spiritual disciplines