To know Him is to love Him ...

I've blogged before about Christian discipleship, or "transformation" or "spiritual formation", or whatever term you like to use to talk about our growth in the Christian faith. It's an important subject and one that has had many books written about it; in the past and in the present.

I mentioned some while ago about what I call the three dimensions of spiritual growth - the inward, the upward and the outward. The inward dimension is learning more about God, the upward dimension is expressing our worship to God and the outward dimension is serving others for God.

There's an old hymn I like, one that has all but disappeared in recent times, We have not known Thee as we ought. This morning I was musing on the words and realised the author was talking about my three dimensions of growth. He writes about knowing, serving and loving God, which tie up with the inward, upward and outward.

And the point of this spiritual growth? As he says in the last verse, to prepare us to meet Jesus face to face one day!

This is the hymn:

We have not known Thee as we ought,
Nor learned Thy wisdom, grace, and power:
The things of earth have filled our thought,
And trifles of the passing hour:
Lord, give us light Thy truth to see,
And make us wise in knowing Thee.

We have not loved Thee as we ought,
Nor cared that we are loved by Thee:
Thy presence we have coldly sought,
And feebly longed Thy face to see:
Lord, give a pure and loving heart
To feel and know the love Thou art.

We have not served Thee as we ought;
Alas! the duties left undone,
The work with little fervour wrought,
The battles lost, or scarcely won!
Lord, give the zeal, and give the might,
For Thee to toil, for Thee to fight.

When shall we know Thee as we ought,
When shall we love and serve aright ?
When shall we, out of trial brought,
Be perfect in the land of light?
Lord, may we day by day prepare
To see Thy face, and serve Thee there.

T. B. Pollock, 1836-96.

A New Era ...

Well, today is my first day 'unemployed' (for more information about this, see my July blog "The Reason Why" - http://ericgreymatters.blogspot.com/2008/07/reason-why.html ).

Yesterday in church I spoke of the fact that the church has been going through difficult times and that it was a spiritual battle that God had allowed. I quoted Luke 22:31 where Jesus at the last supper said to Simon Peter, "Satan has asked to sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers."

So the church must remain faithful through this current time and be encouraged that Jesus is praying for us! And, when we are through all this, God wants to use the experience to strengthen others! I then challenged people to be part of the "Fellowship of the Unashamed". *

So it's a new 'era' for me. I've never been unemployed as such before. But, as I've said earlier, I'm going to use this time to do some study that I've not as yet had time for and, of course, setting the wheels in motion to find a new pastorate.

I read Psalm 71:17-18 recently:

Since my youth, O God, you have taught me, and to this day I declare your marvelous deeds.
Even when I am old and grey, do not forsake me, O God, till I declare your power to the next generation, your might to all who are to come.

I believe there's still work to do, declaring God's love and power!


* See http://www.godswork.net/inspiration6.htm (although I removed & altered one or two bits).

Where do we go?

My apologies for not having blogged for such a long time. At least one person has complained - so that's good!

A week or so ago at our Sunday evening worship service, a phrase that came up on the screen caught my eye:

"Help me to go to the cross & not to go with the crowd."

It ties up with other recent blogs of mine. When something goes wrong, or life becomes difficult, it's easier to go with the crowd and have feelings of bitterness, resentment, jealousy or even revenge. The challenge is to take those feelings to the cross, give them over to Jesus and leave them there. Otherwise those negative feelings master us and change us for the worse (look up Genesis 4:6-7 in the Bible). It's always ourselves who are the losers!

At the Start of the Day ...

Yesterday God reminded me of a verse from a Psalm, which reads:
I have set the LORD always before me.
Because he is at my right hand,
I will not be shaken.

The Lord is always before us, yet it is good, for me at any rate, to "set" him before me in prayer each day. In other words, to acknowledge his presence with me for the day. And to remember that as he is with me each and every day, I need not be 'shaken' by whatever comes along.

The Psalm continues (Psalm 16:9-11):

9 Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices;
my body also will rest secure,
10 because you will not abandon me to the grave,
nor will you let your faithful one see decay.
11 You have made known to me the path of life;
you will fill me with joy in your presence,
with eternal pleasures at your right hand.

Rhythms of Life

In John Ortberg's book The Life You've Always Wanted he talks about rhythms in life. There are natural ones like day and night. It's interesting, by the way, that the first thing God created was that rhythm. The first thing God did was to create light and so day and night began. The rest of creation was then based on that rhythm (see Genesis chapter one).

But back to Ortberg. He's talking about the spiritual life. He says:

There will be times of consolation and times of desolation. In times of consolation we like to pray because God seems close, the Bible seems alive, sin looks bad and stoplights all seem green. Times of desolation are just the opposite: The Bible seems dry, prayer grows hard and God is far away. ... When we forget the law of rhythm, we assume that whatever phase is current will last forever. In times of consolation I mistakenly think that I now have spiritual life mastered. In times of desolation I assume I must have done something wrong, or perhaps God is punishing me. In truth, both seasons are inevitable, and both seasons can bring unique growth.

I hope you find Ortberg's words helpful.