John Fischer The Catch

An Iranian woman was asked what was the most difficult part in her adjustment to living in the United States. She didn’t say anything about the different environment for women as might have been expected. Instead, she said the most difficult adjustment was the fact that she found it hard to cook for only her family of four. She was used to feeding, at any time of the day, meals for various extended family members and friends. Serving in that way is a natural part of her culture.

Her solution to this problem is simple. Besides providing an elderly woman across the street with dinner delivered each night to her door, she goes out and invites people to join her family — sitting at the table and eating what would have been leftovers. Now there’s an easy solution to leftovers — invite the neighborhood.

Hearing this story reminded me of a parable Jesus told of a man who prepared a great feast and invited many guests, but when those guests made excuses about other things they had to do, he sent his servant into the streets and alleys of the town to invite the poor, the crippled, the blind and the lame. “After the servant had done this, he reported, ‘There is still room for more.’ So his master said, ‘Go out into the country lanes and behind the hedges and urge anyone you find to come, so that the house will be full'” (Luke 14:22-23). There won’t be any leftovers at this feast!

It’s quite an indictment on western society that this woman’s most difficult adjustment was to the selfishness of our culture compared to her mid-eastern culture of hospitality. Americans don’t share very well. We have been raised in a culture that worships individuality and ownership. The goal is to have all our own stuff so we don’t need to depend on anyone else. We work very hard to have our own house, our own car, our own swimming pool, our own entertainment system, and our own dinner with our own family. Sharing is not an American trait.

I’ve noticed in myself a resistance to sharing the family dinner with outsiders. When my older children were around more, they often sprang their friends on us at the last minute. I always resented this at first, but then it would often turn into an evening enlivened with conversation, music and laughter. I would go to bed a little later and a little more tired but always richer for it.

Maybe it’s time to go out and invite in the neighborhood. I have a good enough sense of God’s economy to know that if we work at sharing, God will give us more to share.

Everybody worships something or someone. Worship may be a new emphasis these days, but it is not new for human beings. We have been doing it since we were created. God did more than create us and tell us to worship him. He created us with a need for worship.

Blaise Pascal, the brilliant French physicist, is the one who is credited with the idea of a God-shaped vacuum in every human heart. That’s because he studied the vacuum and noticed that whenever a vacuum exists something by nature has to rush in and fill it. It seemed to him the perfect picture of how God created us, as constantly pulling in something. Think of yourself as a human spiritual vacuum cleaner – a kind of holy Hoover.

Now the thing about a vacuum is that it will pull in anything that is within its reach. Like me, you may have heard this concept before, and assumed its work was already accomplished in someone’s life by becoming a Christian. God created us with a need for Him — a hole inside us that is in the shape of God so nothing else satisfies that need but Him, and once I respond to Christ, that hole is filled and I am spiritually satisfied. But this description doesn’t go far enough. It doesn’t show that we are continuing to need Him. God doesn’t plug up the hole so we can go on and indulge in whatever we like since this foremost thing is taken care of. He has made us with an enduring need to keep filling ourselves up.  In other words, we not only have a vacuum, we are vacuums — always on, always sucking up whatever is near the heart.

Whatever you put near the door of your heart is going to be sucked in. Think of the number of things cluttering our spiritual core simply because we have not kept God and his truths close to our hearts at all times. This is why Jesus said we couldn’t serve God and anything else. In order to live the way we were meant to live, we need to keep God as the focus of our worship and nothing else — not pride, or money, or material things, or even people.

Think about what you have near your heart today, and make sure that God is there, because only He can satisfy.

How many times have we seen it? How many movies end with lovers racing, crawling, swimming, or taking trains, planes, busses, or automobiles to get to each other’s arms? It’s because it’s part of the script for a successful romantic story. There has to be something that drives the love interests apart and then something, or more than likely someone overcoming those obstacles to reclaim what was lost. You cannot have a successful love story without it. And guess what? We fall for it every time. Anyone ever wonder why?

Because it is the story of the universe. All of creation resonates with this story. God and man together. God and man separated by sin and rebellion. God and man together again, the result of God overcoming the barrier to his love (justice having been paid for on the cross), and man overcoming his pride and repenting and turning back to God. So simple, a child can understand it; so huge a universe can’t contain it.

“Come together… right now… over me.” The only words that actually make sense in an otherwise nonsensical Beatles song could very well be the words of God to us. “Come together… right now… over me.”

“Come together…” Husband to wife, father to son, brother to brother, friend to friend, and most importantly: man or woman to God… Whatever it takes, whatever you have to overcome… get there.

“Right now…” Not the sweet by and by. Not the second coming. Not when the time has come. Not when conflict is over. Right now, in the middle of whatever you’re in the middle of.

“Over me.” Over me… through me… because of me… God is the one who is all over this. It is His will and His purpose for all things to be reconciled to Him. So be reconciled one to another. He is the reason.

Are you in on this? How long have you been with us and not accepted His invitation? The prodigal came home; the father saw him coming and ran to meet him and embraced him. It’s the all-encompassing embrace of the universe.

Look at the marriage of Jesus… the one with the Bride who sleeps around, never listens, disowns, scorns, dishonors, runs away, intentionally proves to be more interested in anything but her husband, is selfish and bears the children of every affair and the scent of every escapade. It was a marriage that killed Jesus. And it was the Gospel that brought Him back to life to love once more. – Dan Haseltine

Did you ever stop to think about what a bad deal Jesus got when He chose us to be His bride? No one would blame Him if He gave up on us. Good thing He doesn’t think like we do or He would have left this marriage a long time ago.

Listening to our culture, one might get the impression that a good relationship is something for which we all have an inalienable right. This conclusion comes from observing how quickly we look for the back door on any difficult relationship, and how that exit is usually justified on the basis that the current relationship is just too hard – the assumption being, there’s someone out there with whom a good relationship is a much easier proposition. That’s a far cry from realizing all relationships are going to have their challenges, and even the best will be severely tried.

Does God have a right to a better relationship? I suppose so, since He’s God. But does He take it? No. And thank goodness He doesn’t, or we would all be out on the street for sure.

We could stand to think a little more like Jesus when it comes to our relationships. He never allows Himself an out. He is in this for the long haul including whatever suffering is involved. He is able to do this because He isn’t thinking about Himself or His own rights. He is thinking about us. He even sees us as holy and blameless, yes, as even beautiful. He makes it so.

We become beautiful in that He sees us that way, even now, when we know darn well we are not. He sees the finished product that He paid for and washed clean through the blood of His forgiveness on the cross. And if He can see us that way, we should be able to see each other that way as well, at least enough to be more patient with the process. This is love over the long haul, and there’s just no way any of us can be in fallible human relationships without this.

But when all was going well, your people turned to sin again… (Nehemiah 9:28 NLT)

Any study of the Old Testament history of the nation of Israel reveals an on again, off again pattern of the people’s relationship with God. When they are obeying Him, things go well, when they are disobeying Him, things go poorly. You would think that they would get the point and just keep obeying God, but history repeats itself, and these slips are so gradual that no one gets it. We can see it when we read a number of years represented in a paragraph, but lived out, that’s a different thing. Nehemiah makes the right observation when he gives the people a quick history lesson after returning to Jerusalem to rebuild the walls that were torn down while the people were in exile.

In fact, this is a time of spiritual clarity for the people where they are eager to confess their sins, hear the word of God and do what it says. The best times seem to be right at and briefly following a time of repentance in turning back to the Lord. The worst times are when things settle in and are going relatively well.

Does anybody notice anything familiar here? Isn’t there some truth to this in your life? I know there is in mine.

What if we could live in a perpetual sense of returning to the source of our forgiveness? What if that moment of repentance was a permanent reality? Would that be because we are continually sinning or perhaps, like peeling away the layers of an onion, continually discovering how deep sin goes? Either way, I believe a believer’s sense of the need for grace is always present. Astonishment is a permanent possession.

This is the glory of what we have in Christ. The children of Israel had to regularly bring sacrifices for their sins – something that might begin in sincerity but would soon become empty ritual. You and I have a relationship with the Lamb of God who once and for all took away the sin of the world. We can continually confess, continually receive, continually walk in a state of amazing grace. We live in this reality every moment of every day because we are continually being humbled by our human nature and amazed by God’s love.

Nehemiah was just a guy who loved the Lord and cared about His people. He wasn’t a king or a prophet. He was a Jewish cupbearer, in charge of the wine for the Persian King Artaxerxes while the Jews were in captivity there. Then he heard how bad things were back in Jerusalem. “They are in great trouble and disgrace. The wall of Jerusalem has been torn down, and the gates have been burned” (Nehemiah 1:3), his visiting relatives told him.

Nehemiah immediately went into mourning. He wept and fasted. He confessed his sin and the sins of his people, then he, like Abraham before him, remembered the promise of God to Moses: “If you sin, I will scatter you among the nations. But if you return to me and obey my commands, even if you are exiled to the ends of the earth, I will bring you back to the place I have chosen for my name to be honored” (Nehemiah 1:8-9). So he asked God to remember His promise and He did. Nehemiah got the blessing and protection of a pagan king to return to Jerusalem and rebuild the walls of the city.

And he did all that and more, with the help of a remnant that remained in Jerusalem, the protection of the Lord, and the readiness of the people for battle while they worked, for there was much opposition from surrounding nations.

And regular guy Nehemiah became great because he believed and acted on the promise. And they rebuilt the walls in 52 days! And all the people stood up for days after to hear the word of God read again in the city that was founded on it. And there was obedience, and much joy and rejoicing.

What a difference a wall makes.

My walls are down.
My wife is disgraced.
Much lies in ruins.
I weep over what is —
“You will never rebuild the walls of your life
Until you first weep over the ruins.”
 
I confess my sin.
I remember the promise
To bring the kingdom of God to earth.
I call on the Lord.
I remind Him of the promise.
He brings courage and renews strength.
I cautiously hope for what can be
Because there is opposition.
 
We will build.
We will rebuild these walls from the ruins of our home
Around our place in the world
Around our portion of the kingdom of God.
The Lord is confirming our call.
The walls of strength will be built.
Will you help us build?
Then they said, “Let us arise and build.”
So they put their hands to the good work. (Nehemiah 2:18)

On the day that you were born the angels got together
And decided to create a dream come true
So they sprinkled moon dust in your hair
And golden starlight in your eyes of blue

Remember this one by the Carpenters? It should be a theme song for Christians as a reminder of what we want to do with people in the world…. get close to them.

Someone asked what to do with a New Age friend with lots of objections to Christianity. Well first and last, you love him. Then you realize he is seeking the same God you know. He may be a Christian on a path to truth, and though that path may look like it is aimlessly winding nowhere, as far as God is concerned, it’s a straight line to Him.

When you realize this, then you realize you don’t have to talk anyone out of believing anything. If given the opportunity, you want to talk them into Jesus. You are not trying to win an argument. You are not trying to prove Christianity by disproving everything else. You are seeking truth and rejoicing when you find it. Remember, we are not confronting people; we are walking alongside, pointing.

Mostly, you want to get close to people. You want them to talk while you learn to listen. You want to learn as much as you can about what someone believes — not to shoot it down, but to find what truths are present there. If someone is into New Age, they are realizing a spiritual dimension to life. This is good, and something you want to encourage, not do away with.

Remember our job is to walk alongside people and point to the truth. The priority is getting close to people. You can’t point someone somewhere unless you are next to them; otherwise, they might think you are pointing at them and get defensive. We are all pilgrims on a journey. You can only see what someone else sees by getting close to them, and you can only show them what you see in the same manner.

…perplexed, but not in despair… (2 Corinthians 4:8)

We are human. We are dysfunctional. We are prone to disease, temptation, addictions, anxiety and every form of depression. We get tired.

We lose our keys. We forget where we parked our car. We are tied to the technology that both simplifies and complicates our lives. We eat too much. We eat too little. We are caught in the culture that holds us. We are slaves to a job. We wish we had a job.

We know a lot. We have incredible resources at our fingertips. We don’t know everything. We know just enough to get ourselves into trouble. We are continually distracted. We are gullible. When we think we have the answer, we are convinced of it until a better one comes along.

We have bad habits to overcome. We are full of rationalizations. We are confused. We are constantly trying to get our arms around what seems to be flying apart.

We have issues. Things we should have overcome long ago stay like thorns in our sides. Life seems to be getting away from us.

And though all these things ring true for all of us in some way, we don’t want to admit it because we all live behind a carefully manicured facade of coping, especially in religious, Christian or evangelical circles.

We would all be better off admitting that we are perplexed… but not in despair.

Following Christ does little to erase the perplexities and futilities of human existence (see the book of Ecclesiastes in the Bible), but it does keep us from throwing in the towel, because we know that God is always working out His will in our lives even when we can’t see it. And it confirms the unexplainable truth that God is willing and desiring to have a relationship with us in the midst of our perplexing human existence. He must really want this.

This is one of those days that feels like it’s being squeezed from both ends and it’s going to burst somewhere in the middle. Marti sat up in bed like a bolt early this morning and started listing things that needed to be done. I realized it was really bad when a little later in the kitchen she asked me, very kindly, if I could possibly run out front and get the morning paper while she was standing right next to it on the counter. A woman of lists, she’s already got one from the night before, but she’s adding to it every minute and feeling overwhelmed. Life feels like it is crushing down on us.

We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed… (2 Corinthians 4:8)

And I can’t help but think of this verse because of the obvious pressure and crushing feeling. Oh yeah? And how are we not crushed? Tell me again, Jesus, because I think I forgot.

It’s in the verse before it about being an earthy vessel with a treasure inside, and the treasure, from the verse before that, is “the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.” Well great, how does that help me?

It helps me focus on the big things – the eternal things – the things that will still be there at the end of the day regardless of what was or was not accomplished. God’s in His heaven; Christ is in my heart. Who knows what He has on His agenda today that we don’t even have on our list because He hasn’t told us. It helps me to remember that maybe if we are crushed hard enough some of Him will come out of us for the good of someone else.

And here’s one really great thing about the way this day will end. Whatever happens, we will be at some point sitting somewhere in a restaurant to be determined in southern California, raising a glass to our now 31-year-old daughter who is the most incredibly gifted, impossibly insane, completely unmanageable woman who has already medically (as an emergency room P.A.) and physically (as a lifeguard) saved countless lives with her compassion for the poor and her persistence in making sure everyone gets treated like they truly matter in the world because when she listens to them and looks them in the eye, they know they do. Hands down, it’s Anne Fischer’s birthday, and that really counts. We did something good here and we can’t even take any credit for it. I’m hard pressed to think there is anything more worth all this than that.

Wait patiently for the Lord. Be brave and courageous. Yes, wait patiently for the Lord. (Psalm 27:14)

This part of the scriptures caught my eye this morning. Sometimes you see something in a passage you have read several times, but weren’t ready to see. That is what is unique about the word of God. It is alive in that it touches you in different ways depending on where you are on your journey with God.

Today, this passage says, “Hurry up and wait.” Like so much truth, it is paradoxical. The words “brave’ and “courageous” are not often associated with waiting. “Brave” and “courageous” are action words; they are adverbs telling us not what to think but how to act. That’s why I don’t believe “waiting” here means sitting around doing nothing. It’s a spiritual kind of waiting that implies that the Lord will show up at the right time. It could even mean He’s there all along; we just don’t see Him all the time, so in the meantime, when we don’t see Him or know what He is doing, we continue forward, bravely and courageously waiting on God to show up in our faithfulness.

Marti will like this because she is an action-oriented person. She doesn’t know how to wait. She’s moving, churning, all the time. She gets an idea or hears a directive from the Lord and she is off down the road a few blocks before the rest of us know what happened. I honestly can’t keep up with her. She complains about having to drag me along most of the time. That’s because, for me, waiting means hanging back having a cold one.

For instance, I returned home yesterday to find my office knee deep in papers that were once in binders and folders all over the room. Marti announced that everything on the floor was to be thrown away. Now I know that in the amount of time it took her to amass that pile up, I would have handled maybe three pieces – staring at them for a while before putting them back down somewhere because I didn’t know what else to do with them.

In my book, waiting means just that – wait. Don’t do anything. Hang around for instructions. Don’t run ahead. Sit back. Relax. Wait. Well, mix that with a naturally lazy person and you have a spiritual justification for doing nothing. Which can’t be it either, because doing nothing doesn’t sound very brave or courageous.

That’s why I believe the truth involves both of us. It means to make plans and move forward bravely and courageously, listening for the Lord while you go, because if the Lord isn’t in it, you are spinning your wheels and might as well be doing nothing.

In other words, waiting on the Lord is an attitude of the heart that knows that all my efforts will amount to nothing if the Lord isn’t with me. So I move forward bravely with my ear cocked in His direction. It’s what Paul says we do with fear and trembling knowing it is the Lord who is working in us to achieve His will and purpose.

Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed — not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence — continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose. (Philippians 2:12-13)

Simple, right? But wait…