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-Chris

Psalm 124 - God on my side

"If the Lord had not been on our side..."

I think of these words from the beginning of Psalm 124 almost every week. Already this morning this phrase popped into my head with thankfulness, gratitude, and relief after a line of cars slammed on their brakes, and hearing the squeal of tires on pavement from the vehicle behind me, I thought the trunk of my '98 Lumina was going to end up in my backseat. If not for God's protection, I could've had a very bad morning and maybe even been injured.

But while this phrase holds true for me even on a small scale, in many ways, it's the perfect summary for how God's been at work in my life.

Had God not been on my side and rescued me and changed my life 10 years ago, I might not be in jail or addicted to drugs, but I assure you that I would be miserable, depressed, still looking for purpose and meaning, insecure, greedy, arrogant, and angry. Not that some of those things don't still describe me in some way, but I can't imagine where or who I'd be apart from the grace and mercy of God.

The God of the Universe is on my side and He has dramatically transformed my life.

"If the Lord had not been on my side," God only knows where I'd be.

-CK

Christmas, Terrorist Attacks, Racial Tension - and Hope

Every Christmas season I seem to find myself reading through the book of Isaiah and gravitating toward songs like “O Come, O Come Emmanuel” and “O Holy Night.” Perhaps because it's the story of my spiritual journey, I'm mesmerized by the idea of hope and light overcoming depravity and darkness. This is what Christmas is all about. 

Being from Wisconsin, most of my memories of  Christmas Eve and Christmas Day include bitter cold and dark, dreary weather. But bursting through the cold and darkness are fond memories of family, friends, my mom singing in church on Christmas Eve, and a feeling of warmth and home - hope and light in the midst of an eternal winter.

Picture from nbcnews.com

But every Christmas it seems like there are things taking place in the world that could make it seem like the universe is spinning out of control. In just the last few weeks we've seen stories about racial tension in the United States, hostages in Australia, children being massacred in Pakistan, threats from North Korea - and the list goes on. And yet this is exactly the kind of world that Jesus entered into in order to give hope - one of oppression, violence, and greed.

Read these words from Isaiah 9:

² The people walking in darkness
    have seen a great light;
on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned.
³ You have enlarged the nation
    and increased their joy;
they rejoice before you as people rejoice at the harvest,
as warriors rejoice when dividing the plunder.
⁴ For as in the day of Midian’s defeat,
    you have shattered
the yoke that burdens them, the bar across their shoulders,
    the rod of their oppressor.
⁵ Every warrior’s boot used in battle
    and every garment rolled in blood
will be destined for burning, will be fuel for the fire.
⁶ For to us a child is born,
    to us a son is given,
    and the government will be on his shoulders.
And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
    Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
⁷ Of the greatness of his government and peace
    there will be no end.
He will reign on David’s throne  and over his kingdom,
establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness
    from that time on and forever.
The zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this.

This couldn't be more different than the story of Christmas that many of us grew up with. It seems that when Christmas is more about lambs and manger scenes and wise men bringing gifts and a whole litany of other things that aren't even in the Bible, we take the potency and hope away from the Christmas story.

Instead, what if we talked about Christmas alongside Ebola outbreaks, natural disasters, terrorist attacks, broken relationships, addictions, and injustice? Alongside the stories of the oppressed, hurting, forgotten, and marginalized?

Because this is a story worth telling, a story of God's Kingdom breaking through disorder and entering into our messy lives. A story of hope in the midst of chaos, light shining through the darkness, peace instead of war, and love and goodness overwhelming evil - all because God chose to take on flesh in the form of an infant in order to reconcile all things to Himself.

So after the table is cleared in a few days, scraps of wrapping paper are taken away to the trash, friends and family load up the car to return home, and you're once again faced with the stresses and challenges of every day life, take heart, because there is hope for a better future, regardless of what you're going through!

Merry Christmas!

CK

A Place to Call Home

My generation is the most connected of any generation before it yet is quite possibly also the loneliest. Many of us have been the first in our families to move out of the state and settle elsewhere due to the mobility we’ve been afforded, yet few of us have planted deep roots anywhere for any substantial amount of time. And we have more self-help books and wellness programs than ever before, yet most of us feel lost and are overweight.

Over the last several years I’ve been able to identify with most of these things. I can “Skype” with friends in Africa but most of my closest friends from even five years ago are now scattered across the globe in places like Zambia, the Middle East, East Asia, and the four corners of America. Technology is no replacement for face-to-face relationships.

Places that were once filled with almost all the people we loved have slowly been deserted. It’s funny, almost scary, how places that seem like “home” for a season can quickly lose that status.

And my wife and I were the first in our immediate families to move away for a time, yet post-college, we’ve never spent more than a couple years in a single place.

As relationships, people, and places come and go, it’s easy to feel like a homeless wanderer. 

But tonight, I’m grateful for having found a home in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

In my moments of loneliness and seclusion, it’s the Gospel that provides intimacy. In the moments where I’m most keenly aware of the temporary and fleeting nature of life, it’s the Gospel that supplies permanence. In moments of self-doubt and questioning, it’s the Gospel that offers identity. And when I feel weak, insignificant, and broken, it’s the Gospel that gives strength, loving affirmation, and healing.

God-willing, it will be many, many years before all of the friends and family that have passed through our lives at one time or another will be reunited at a great Banquet, and that too is only possible through the Gospel.

But even now, I do have a home, and His name is Jesus.

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened

And I will give you rest

Take my yoke upon you and learn from me

For I am gentle and humble in heart

And you will find rest for your souls

For my yoke is easy and my burden is light

-CK

What the Noah Movie Reveals about Art and the Church

I haven’t seen the new Noah movie yet, so this isn’t a review or a critique of the movie, but some of the comments I’ve heard about it and the discussions I’ve seen online got me thinking about art and the Church. (For the record, it’s not that I’m intentionally avoiding the movie in some act of protest, my wife and I just don’t go to a lot of movies in the theater in general.)

It sounds like the movie doesn’t do a great job of representing the biblical narrative, and I understand why that concerns some people. But the thought that comes to mind is this:

Why are we relying on non-Christians in Hollywood to creatively and faithfully tell the stories of God?

Shouldn’t these be our stories to tell? Scripture contains some of the most epic, beautiful, tragic, hopeful stories in all of literature, yet in general, we do a poor job of communicating these stories through our art.

Lately, Christian musicians have exceled in writing songs and telling stories that are excellent, creative, original, and true to life – and the Gospel. Some of my most meaningful times of worship have come at “secular” concerts where the artists weren’t getting paid thousands of dollars to crank out cookie-cutter “Christian” music but were believers creating meaningful, beautiful art. It wasn’t worshipful for everyone because many in the room didn’t even know what was happening, but if they were to stop and pay attention to the lyrics and the songs, they would be confronted with some of the most beautiful depictions of brokenness, hope, redemption, and love.

It should be us as Christians telling the stories of Abraham, Noah, and David and finding ways to creatively communicate the themes of creation, brokenness, rescue, redemption, and new life.

But that leads to my second thought:

What are we doing as the Church and as individual congregations to support the artists in our own communities?

As Christians, we spend a ton of money investing in a lot of different things – some are significant, some aren’t. But do we invest in art that will tell parts of the Gospel story in some way? Do we support the artists in our own communities? Are we creating ways for the artists in our churches to tell their stories and use their gifts to serve the Kingdom?

It sounds simplistic to say that if you didn’t like this multi-million dollar Hollywood movie that you should support the artists in your community, but this is where it begins. Why should non-Christians be expected to be the ones that carry the torch in making excellent movies, music, paintings, and novels, especially surrounding the stories of OUR faith? Do Muslims expect Christians or Buddhists to create great art that depicts the life of Muhammad?

We don’t deserve for these movies to be done well if we’re not even going to support our fellow brothers and sisters who are artists. And certainly, nothing is owed to us by Hollywood to faithfully portray these stories, so why not be a part of championing our own stories and artists instead of merely critiquing the art that’s already out there?

So support your artists! Find ways for them to serve! Feed them! Encourage them! Ask for their ideas! Pay for great art! And don’t expect the secular world to create meaningful stories and movies for us, especially around the stories of our own faith.

-CK

Monday Musings - God as Personal Priest or Open-Heart Surgeon?

This has been a season of trying to discern what it is that God would have us do once we're finished with school in a little over a year, and the past few days, I've been processing through a couple questions:

First, what are some of the dreams that God has put on my heart regarding how He might want to use me?

But perhaps the more difficult question is this:

Are my dreams and desires even aligned with God's dreams and desires for my life or am I so much a product of my culture that I have simply equated what I want with what I think God wants and I pray for Him to bless it?

Consider these convicting words from Eugene Peterson:

"Most of the individuals in [America and suburbia] suppose that the goals they have for themselves and the goals God has for them are the same. It is the oldest religious mistake: refusing to countenance any real difference between God and us, imagining God to be a vague extrapolation of our own desires, and then hiring a priest to manage the affairs between self and extrapolation."

As I consider some of the issues that God has put on my heart over the past couple years - things like poverty and racial unity in the Church, I know that my concern for those issues is not from me, but I also have to confess that my desire for safety, comfort, and stability have perhaps gotten in the way of at least being open to how God might want to continue to change my heart and my desires to be more like His and to act on some of those passions.

Allowing God that kind of access to my life and my heart is uncomfortable and dangerous because I might just find that instead of a few tweaks and small fixes, major open-heart surgery is necessary to align my desires with His.

I pray today that we might have the courage to surrender control of lives that are not our own into the capable, loving hands of the Lord of the universe. There's a much greater Story in progress than what our measly goals and ambitions can even attempt to imitate, and the question remains - will we allow God free reign to place us in that Story in whatever way He sees fit?

-CK

Responding to Trials: A Matter of Life and Death

I’d just finished bending over under the hood of my car for about two hours trying to diagnose why it was stalling out at stoplights and getting progressively worse day by day. I know almost nothing about cars, and aside from gaining a new appreciation for mechanics and the physical toll that their bodies must take, those two hours were highly ineffective.

*Start the car…idle for a couple minutes, and then…silence.*

My throttle body and various air intake components were now cleaner than they’d been in years (thanks YouTube!), but my car still didn’t run and certainly couldn’t be trusted to take me places.

Frustrated, I went inside to go back to the drawing board and look up the number for the mechanic I’d been meaning to try the next time we had issues.

And, loading…loading…loading…"PAGE UNABLE TO LOAD."

mirror.co.uk/news/weird-news/black-bears-take-photos-real-2353023

…You’ve gotta be kidding me! I thought the new modem we got was supposed to fix this! NOTHING is working like it should today! If it’s one thing it’s TEN! I just want to throw this thing across the room!...

These were admittedly silly things that are both foolish and incredibly meager compared to what the rest of the world deals with on a daily basis, but it’s amazing how something as small as a bad internet connection or a car that’s not running properly can completely disrupt and pile stress onto our busy lives.

Studying the book of James the past month more closely than I’ve ever studied any particular book of the Bible before has been an amazing experience. I’ve seen Scripture in new and fresh ways that have deeply impacted me and helped me to think about life differently. I’ve also had… we’ll call them “opportunities”… to apply some of the things I’ve been learning.

In the back of my mind I was thinking about the passage from James 1 that says, “Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you encounter trials of various kinds.”

In the days leading up to this one, I could've told you that “consider” is a verb of thought instead of emotion, that it’s better translated “pure” joy than “all” joy, and what kinds of trials James might have been referring to – but I hadn’t been forced to put my fancy Greek skills into practice.

Until now. They were silly trials, but they were trials nonetheless.

So why should I consider my terrible internet connection and barely-running car “pure joy?” Going back to last summer, why was having that same car broken into and multiple windows smashed an opportunity to consider it “pure joy?” Why was my broken ankle in September an opportunity to consider that trial “pure joy?”

Because trials can lead to life that’s more abundant and full than we ever imagined.

...but they can also lead to death.

On the one hand, “Blessed is the person who endures a trial because having stood the test they will receive the crown of life which was promised to those who love Him.”

Trials…endurance…LIFE.

On the other hand, “Then after the desire (to sin in the midst of a trial) has been conceived, it gives birth to sin, and the sin when fully grown gives birth to death.”

Trials…desire…sin…DEATH.

In that moment I thought of these three verses. I could allow myself to get so frustrated that I would be abrasive and short with my wife when she came home, or I could see my trial, however foolish it might have been, as an opportunity for God to work on my character and mold me into the man that He intended for me to be.

I don’t always choose wisely in moments like these but by God’s grace I chose the latter, had a great evening with my wife, and learned some valuable lessons about myself. (And an update on the car: it now runs better than it has in a couple years and was a fairly cheap fix! And at the very least, I learned some things about cars and found an awesome new mechanic!)

Perhaps it’s moments like these that provide opportunities for small “dress rehearsals” for when more significant trials come. If I fail to allow God to use a trial as miniscule as my internet or car not working to mature my faith and I instead choose to sin, how will I ever be able to respond appropriately if I get a bad diagnosis from a doctor at some point in the future or I suffer the loss of a loved one?

So we have a choice – whether it’s the internet not working, our car stalling out at stop lights, or something more serious like being laid off from work or facing financial difficulties or health problems.

We can allow our trials to lead us into sin and eventually death, or we can consider them “pure joy,” knowing that they will produce endurance in us and will lead to full, abundant, eternal life.

-CK

Hope in the Midst of Chaos

I’ve recently been learning about something that counselors call “compassion fatigue.” Compassion fatigue is something that “first responders” often experience – people like firefighters, police officers, and EMTs who are the first people on the scene at a natural disaster, a shooting, or terrorist attack. When you look at someone with compassion fatigue, they often have a glazed-over look in their eyes and they’re kind of staring off into the distance as if they’re in utter disbelief and shock about what they’ve just seen. Often, it leads to feeling like their job is pointless, that things are never going to change, and there’s nothing that they can do to help in such a dire situation.

Though most of us probably wouldn’t diagnose

Sussex Publishers

ourselves with compassion fatigue, I at least, can easily identify with those feelings. You only need to turn on a TV, look at a newspaper or go online and you’re instantly overwhelmed with tragedy after tragedy. Whether it’s natural disasters like the fires in Colorado recently or the tornadoes in Oklahoma – or the evil that humans inflict on other humans, like the tragic murder of school children at Sandy Hook, the Boston bombing, or the shooting at Arapahoe High School – or maybe even the circumstances in our own lives that lead to feelings of hopelessness, depression, or loneliness, like being alone in a new city for the first time or the loss of a relationship, it’s enough to leave us feeling glazed over, numb, and hopeless in the midst of the chaos going on around us.

Though it’s impossible to know for sure why a good God would allow such suffering, the alternative that most people turn to is to deny the existence of God. But doing so means that there is no such thing as good and evil since there is no longer any moral standard in the universe, and there is no possible redemptive reason for what we perceive as suffering – it’s just life, it just is. Everything is utterly meaningless. I for one can’t even fathom trying to deal with times of tragedy and crisis with that kind of belief system – or lack there of.

           

One of the unique things about the Christian worldview is that the Bible describes some instances of suffering as leading to our growth as individuals, and it even says that God is able to bring good out of any situation for those that love Him. But ultimately, Christianity tell us that we have a reason for hope even in the midst of pain and suffering because death and destruction will not have the final word – and it’s that hope that I wish to remind us of.

           

So where are we to find hope when it sometimes feels like the world around us is spinning out of control? One place that many people look for hope is in politics. Especially when Obama was first running for president, it seemed like many people were, whether a good thing or not, inspired by the prospect of change. One of his campaign slogans, which can still be seen on car bumpers everywhere, was the question, “Got Hope?” Others find hope in sports teams and the diversions of entertainment or in their careers or relationships. Still others have placed their hope in human progress – the idea that given enough time, humans will continue to evolve and progress to the point that evil no longer manifests itself. 

But come on, read the comment sections of YouTube videos and online articles or listen to Justin Bieber’s music and tell me you really think the human race is moving toward perfection! Seriously though, the theory of human progress is a myth that few people give much credibility to anymore. So if all of these things offer little real, enduring hope, what’s left?

The book of Isaiah beautifully depicts the prospect of hope and a better future in the midst of some of the greatest pain and suffering imaginable. If you’re unfamiliar with the Old Testament, these books of the Bible take us through the story of Israel, from the calling of Abraham, to exile and slavery in Egypt, to the exodus out of Egypt into the promised land, and the split of Israel into two kingdoms – the North, simply called Israel, and the South, called Judah. It’s here that we pick up the events being described in Isaiah. Most scholars conclude that the first 39 chapters of Isaiah describe the situation during the prophet Isaiah’s own lifetime, around 742-701 BC. After several years of relative peace, Assyria was growing in power. Therefore, the northern kingdom, Israel, made a pact with Syria to protect themselves from the Assyrians, and through their alliance, they sought to pressure Judah into also aligning with them. Isaiah, a prophet, assured the king of Judah of God’s ability to protect the southern kingdom without needing to make an alliance, but instead, the king decided to make a pact with Assyria.

What follows in the first 39 chapters is Isaiah’s warning against trusting in worldly power – horses and chariots and armies – rather than the Lord. But as we’ll see, despite Isaiah’s prophecies about the impending judgment that will come upon Judah and the nations of the earth due to their sin and rejection of God, there are beautiful glimpses of hope and God’s mercy and grace, pointing ahead to the person of Jesus Christ and God’s ultimate cure to the problem of evil and sin. Let’s pick it up in Isaiah 25.

“On this mountain the LORD Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples, a banquet of aged wine – the best of meats and the finest of wines. On this mountain he will destroy the shroud that enfolds all peoples, the sheet that covers all nations; he will swallow up death forever. The Sovereign LORD will wipe away the tears from all faces; he will remove his people’s disgrace from all the earth. The LORD has spoken. In that day, they will say, ‘Surely this is our God; we trusted in him, and he saved us. This is the LORD, we trusted in him; let us rejoice and be glad in his salvation.’” –Isaiah 25:6-9

So let’s break this down a bit.

Verse 6 – a feast is described, prepared by the Lord. In the Ancient Near East, the audience that Isaiah is speaking to, this type of banquet was customary when a new king was being crowned. Indeed, the King of Kings is here being crowned once and for all. Some versions say that “rich food,” or “fat food” is being served – the type of food normally reserved for sacrifice to God, but here, it’s God who plays host and is serving the choicest of foods to his people – and as the text says, “all peoples,” from all over the world. Those who have placed their face in Jesus Christ are gathered together from the ends of the earth to share in this meal and the crowning of the King.

Verse 7 – describes a veil that is cast over all people, and in order to celebrate and enjoy the feast, this covering must be destroyed or swallowed up. As verse 8 describes, that veil is death. Though all people die, death will one day be destroyed and will no longer have the final word.

(Verse 8) – as we continue on in verse 8, Isaiah paints the picture of a merciful God “wiping away tears from all faces” – showing us that God is touched by everything that breaks our hearts, even death, and it is his purpose to do away with all of it. We will no longer mourn the loss of loved ones and all that is unjust and evil will be annihilated. As one scholar, Walter Brugemann describes, “The most characteristic accent of this poetry is the assertion that the present world system – which is arrogant and endlessly exploitative and which creates profound hardship for God’s people – is under assault from God and will be brutally nullified.”

We’ll come back to the end of this chapter as we wrap things up, but let’s briefly look ahead one chapter to Isaiah 26:19 and we’ll see even more explicitly how Isaiah describes God’s ultimate victory over death and evil.

“Your dead shall live; their bodies shall rise. You who dwell in the dust, awake and sing for joy! For your dew is a dew of light, and the earth will give birth to the dead.”  -Isaiah 26:19

Again, what in the world is Isaiah talking about? Bodies rising? The earth giving birth to the dead? Quite simply, Isaiah is describing the ultimate hope of glory, that all of God’s people will one day be raised from the dead to live eternally with Christ when He returns and restores the Earth. And in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, we see the foreshadowing of this event.

But why in the midst of all that the Israelites are going through would Isaiah talk about this? Why now? I would suggest that Isaiah is pointing ahead to the hope of resurrection and the life of Jesus in order to give the Israelites, and to give us, a glimpse of God’s plan for redeeming sinful human beings and dealing with the chaos that we’re constantly surrounded by. Resurrection – not the mere removal of pain or suffering – is God’s answer to their suffering and despair, and our suffering and despair. He doesn’t simply remove it or change circumstances but God himself becomes intimately involved and proves himself capable of and willing to deal with the problem at its root, once and for all.

As we head toward the finish line, let's go back and look at Isaiah 25:9.

The description is of a people who have patiently waited for God’s action and provision in the midst of their suffering and pain, a pain that Isaiah describes as being forcibly removed from their homes, losing loved ones, seeing their city destroyed, and being carried away to a foreign country - yet they’ve come out of it rejoicing and celebrating the installment of the world’s rightful King, and the destruction of death and evil.

But we’re not quite there yet, are we…for now, we’re the ones who must patiently wait for Christ’s return which is in a lot of ways, the most difficult place to be – knowing the end of the story, that God is victorious and that death will be destroyed – and having to somehow patiently wait. But “waiting” doesn’t simply mean to do nothing here. It is in some sense, still very active since we are called to trust God moment by moment in our waiting. So in the meantime, what does that look like for us as we await Christ’s return? And what do the resurrection and this future event seen in Isaiah mean for us?

Five thoughts…

      1)   Live with an eternal perspective – it’s so easy to get caught up in the details of day-to-day living and completely miss the trajectory of how God is working in the world. What are we doing with our time, money, and careers, and in our relationships to further the Kingdom of God? Are we fulfilling our own life missions or are we working to further the mission of God in the world? The reality is that not everything that we do with our lives matters and will have an eternal impact, so are we living for ourselves and our own goals or ambitions, or are we living in a way that reflects who God is to the rest of the world? Using the illustration from Isaiah, as you picture yourself sitting down at this feast and looking around at all of the other believers gathered together from every nation, who did you bring with you?

      2)   Our labor is not in vain - Paul elaborates on the resurrection and what it means for our lives in 1 Corinthians 15, and he concludes the chapter by saying, “Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord, your labor is not in vain.” So as we wait for Christ to return and God to do away with evil and suffering, we are to be steadfast, immovable, and to do the work of the Lord, knowing that our work is not in vain and that what we do with our lives matters. Again, we know that history ends in God’s victory, and in the here and now, we get to be a part of what He’s doing in the world to bring love, justice, and hope to others in the midst of their own pain. So trust God day by day and proclaim the gospel boldly.

      3)   Though life is hard and often painful, a royal feast awaits us –

2 Corinthians 4:16-17 says, “Do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.” Though Paul had been flogged mercilessly, imprisoned, beaten with rods, stoned, and shipwrecked, he considered his pain and suffering “light” and “momentary” compared to what awaited him – an eternity spent with God in a resurrected, glorified body.

      4)   Feelings of depression and hopelessness are temporary, untrue, and do not have to define us. Speaking very honestly, I myself experience bouts of depression every so often where I don’t really want to leave the house, I feel apathetic, and life seems pointless. But as Paul says at the end of 1 Corinthians 15, “Thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” We know the end that history is moving toward and the lengths that God went to in order to call us His sons and daughters – and we can have confidence that life really does matter, I really do matter to God, you really matter, and we can look forward to an eternity in Heaven with Him – it’s this thought that often gets me through those kinds of days.

      5)   A relationship with Jesus is our only hope - Let’s not get lost in all the details of the end times and bodies being raised and miss the fact that a relationship with Jesus is our only source of true, enduring hope. When I gave my life to Christ as a freshman in college, I didn’t know much about the Bible or about the Christian faith, but I believed that the Gospel that I was hearing about for the first time was true –

That God loves me and desires a relationship with me but my sin separated me from him. So God came down to us in the flesh to live as a human in the person of Jesus Christ, to live a sinless life, and to die undeservingly on a cross only to be raised back to life three days later so that my sins might be forgiven if I place my faith in Him and devote my life to him. And through a relationship with Jesus and the power of the resurrection, I am also given the power to change even the most deep-seeded areas of sin in my life. The same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead lives within me and I am no longer in bondage to sin!

Hearing that Gospel, I decided in that moment that Jesus was my only hope at living a meaningful, significant life and the life that I was created to live. If you’re someone who goes back and forth on this whole Christianity thing or has never seriously investigated the claims of Christ and the truths of Christianity, I plead with you to do so, draw a line in the sand, and to figure out where you stand. As it says in 2 Peter 3, part of the reason that Christ has not yet returned to bring to fulfillment all that He has promised is that God desires that none may perish but He is patient with us that we might put our trust in Him. So are you going to put your hope in a mighty God who has the power and desire to raise the dead and to redeem even the worst things that will happen to us in life so that we do not suffer in vain, or are you going to put your hope in something or someone else?

-CK

The Interview Heard Around the World, the Gospel, and My Own Richard Sherman Moment

Let’s go on a trip to a football field in a town somewhere in the middle of Wisconsin. I’m in 9^th grade (pretty much the pinnacle of my playing days) and we just narrowly beat the opposing team after a struggle of a game that should not have been that close. Our team fought valiantly, worked together, and pulled out the victory, but in the heat of the moment as I walked off the field, I had this interaction:

My parents: “Hey, great job.”

Me: “I can’t believe they called a f@#%!& hold on me!”

My mom: [Face turns white in shock]

That was pretty much it. I walked the rest of the way to the bus, shocked that I’d just said my first curse word in front of my mother (and in such dramatic fashion no less!) and I was a nervous wreck the entire three-hour bus ride home, not sure what might be awaiting me in my next interaction with my mom!

(For the record, we’ve since joked many times about this incident, but no one ever spoke a word about it until I was in college and we could laugh about it!)

You probably know where I’m headed with this. While I thought the Richard Sherman interview last night was selfish, embarrassing, and ridiculous, I’ve been there and done that. (If you haven't seen the interview and desire to, scroll to the bottom of this page).

Yes, he’s a professional athlete (not a 9^th grader) and should know when it’s appropriate to speak like that and that he probably shouldn’t be airing personal issues with another player on national television, but I’ll give him a pass for being caught up in the heat of the moment.

It’s probably that same passion and drive to be the best that has brought him to where he is in the first place, and like all of us, our strengths have inherent weaknesses if not kept in check.

But here’s my bigger issue with that interview…

Like my own outburst in 9^th grade, he put the spotlight on himself after a fantastic football game and a great team effort. Instead of talking about what a great game the two teams played and how the Seahawks as a team collectively made up for each other’s mistakes and are now headed to the Super Bowl, we’re talking about Richard Sherman.

But if I’m honest, there’s a whole lot of that taking place in my own heart on a daily basis. Here are two ways I’m more like the Richard Sherman from that interview than I care to admit.

      1)   I compare myself to others to feel more valuable

Perhaps the hardest part of that interview was watching Sherman call out another player on national television. Yet, though I may not verbalize it, I constantly compare myself to other people – other musicians, other writers, other preachers, etc. I hate this about myself because it’s destructive to having a healthy and positive view of who God has created me – Chris Kopp – to be, and because in no way does it line up with the Gospel. For we are all created in the image of God, and all of us have been uniquely designed by our Creator with gifts, skills, and strengths that must be affirmed and celebrated. When I minimize my own value or that of another human being by playing the comparison game, it’s as if I’m telling God that He didn’t know what He was doing when He created the cosmos.

      2)   I’m constantly drawing attention and glory to myself and away from God

I have no glory or good of my own to show off since everything that I have been given is from God, yet how often do I do ministry or interact with others as if it’s me myself that’s awe-inspiring, worthy of worship, and has the ability to change lives? Every time I get on a platform without being dependent on the Lord to move and work, get positive feedback on something I’ve written and take all the credit myself, or get some other form of a compliment and neglect to in some way point to the actual Source of what’s good in me, I fail to worship and praise God as He deserves. I myself cannot change lives and I have nothing of my own that is good to give – all I can do is reflect God’s glory to others that He might be more fully worshipped.

If you’ve read many of my posts, you might be beginning to think that I’m either the most horrible, sinful person in the world or that I tend to exaggerate when I identify and claim the sin that I see in others. If either of those things are true, it’s probably the former.

But what I’m really trying to get at is that I don’t presume that most people are all that different from each other, myself included – whether liars, or cheaters, or adulterers, or gossipers, or boasters, or the arrogant, or the proud, or murderers, or thieves, or those who have been sent to prison - or those who gather in a place of worship every weekend.

The human condition of sinfulness and brokenness is universal and no one is exempt from contributing to the evil that we see in the world. We may know how to hide or harness it, and it might play itself out differently in all of us, but left unchecked, and if we don’t find the Cure, that 30-second interview with Richard Sherman is the least of our problems.

"It’s clear enough, isn’t it, that we’re sinners, every one of us, in the same sinking boat with everybody else? Our involvement with God’s revelation doesn’t put us right with God. What it does is force us to face our complicity in everyone else’s sin. 

But in our time something new has been added. What Moses and the prophets witnessed to all those years has happened. The God-setting-things-right that we read about has become Jesus-setting-things-right for us. And not only for us, but for everyone who believes in him. For there is no difference between us and them in this. Since we’ve compiled this long and sorry record as sinners (both us and them) and proved that we are utterly incapable of living the glorious lives God wills for us, God did it for us. Out of sheer generosity he put us in right standing with himself. A pure gift. He got us out of the mess we’re in and restored us to where he always wanted us to be. And he did it by means of Jesus Christ."    –Romans 3, The Message

-CK