More on God and Time

Here is a bit of what I've been reading on time and eternity, so you all can know where I'm coming from. This is an excerpt by C. S. Lewis in Mere Christianity. I'm actually pulling from a lot of sources, but Lewis is an old one that's been in the back of my mind throughout. I'm giving it in full, and I'll comment on it tomorrow - I don't want to throw too much at you at once, and its long enough by itself. (Also, feel free to take the advice offered in the first two sentences below - this may not be for everybody.)

From C. S. Lewis:

In this chapter I am going to talk about something which may be helpful to some readers, but which may seem to others merely an unnecessary complication. If you are one of the second sort of readers, then I advise you not to bother about this chapter at all but to turn on to the next.

In the last chapter I had to touch on the subject of prayer, and while that is still fresh in your mind and my own, I should like to deal with a difficulty that some people find about the whole idea of prayer. A man put it to me by saying "I can believe in God all right, but what I cannot swallow is the idea of Him attending to several hundred million human beings who are all addressing Him at the same moment." And I have found that quite a lot of people feel this.

Now, the first thing to notice is that the whole sting of it comes in the words at the same moment. Most of us can imagine God attending to any number of applicants if only they came one by one and He had an endless time to do it in. So what is really at the back of this difficulty is the idea of God having to fit too many things into one moment of time.

Well that is of course what happens to us. Our life comes to us moment by moment. One moment disappears before the next comes along: and there is room for very little in each. That is what Time is like. And of course you and I tend to take it for granted that this Time series--this arrangement of past, present and future--is not simply the way life comes to us but the way all things really exist. We tend to assume that the whole universe and God Himself are always moving on from past to future just as we do. But many learned men do not agree with that. It was the Theologians who first started the idea that some things are not in Time at all: later the Philosophers took it over: and now some of the scientists are doing the same.

Almost certainly God is not in Time. His life does not consist of moments following one another. If a million people are praying to Him at ten-thirty tonight, He need not listen to them all in that one little snippet which we call ten-thirty. Ten-thirty--and every other moment from the beginning of the world--is always the Present for Him. If you like to put it that way, He has all eternity in which to listen to the split second of prayer put up by a pilot as his plane crashes in flames.

That is difficult, I know. Let me try to give something, not the same, but a bit like it. Suppose I am writing a novel. I write "Mary laid down her work; next moment came a knock at the door! " For Mary who has to live in the imaginary time of my story there is no interval between putting down the work and hearing the knock. But I, who am Mary's maker, do not live in that imaginary time at all. Between writing the first half of that sentence and the second, I might sit down for three hours and think steadily about Mary. I could think about Mary as if she were the only character in the book and for as long as I pleased, and the hours I spent in doing so would not appear in Mary's time (the time inside the story) at all.

This is not a perfect illustration, of course. But it may give just a glimpse of what I believe to be the truth. God is not hurried along in the Time-stream of this universe any more than an author is hurried along in the imaginary time of his own novel. He has infinite attention to spare for each one of us. He does not have to deal with us in the mass. You are as much alone with Him as if you were the only being He had ever created. When Christ died, He died for you individually just as much as if you had been the only man in the world.

The way in which my illustration breaks down is this. In it the author gets out of one Time-series (that of the novel) only by going into another Time-series (the real one). But God, I believe, does not live in a Time-series at all. His life is not dribbled out moment by moment like ours: with Him it is, so to speak, still 1920 and already 1960. For His life is Himself.

If you picture Time as a straight line along which we have to travel, then you must picture God as the whole page on which the line is drawn. We come to the parts of the line one by one: we have to leave A behind before we get to B, and cannot reach C until we leave B behind. God, from above or outside or all round, contains the whole line, and sees it all.

The idea is worth trying to grasp because it removes some apparent difficulties in Christianity. Before I became a Christian one of my objections was as follows. The Christians said that the eternal God who is everywhere and keeps the whole universe going, once became a human being. Well then, said 1, how did the whole universe keep going while He was a baby, or while He was asleep? How could He at the same time be God who knows everything and also a man asking his disciples "who touched me?" You will notice that the sting lay in the time words: "While He was a baby" --"How could He at the same time?" In other words I was assuming that Christ's life as God was in time, and that His life as the man Jesus in Palestine was a shorter period taken out of that time--just as my service in the army was a shorter period taken out of my total life. And that is how most of us perhaps tend to think about it. We picture God living through a period when His human life was still in the future: then coming to a period when it was present: then going on to a period when He could look back on it as something in the past. But probably these ideas correspond to nothing in the actual facts. You cannot fit Christ's earthly life in Palestine into any time-relations with His life as God beyond all space and time. It is really, I suggest, a timeless truth about God that human nature, and the human experience of weakness and sleep and ignorance, are somehow included in His whole divine life. This human life in God is from our point of view a particular period in the history of our world (from the year A.D. one till the Crucifixion). We therefore imagine it is also a period in the history of God's own existence. But God has no history. He is too completely and utterly real to have one. For, of course, to have a history means losing part of your reality (because it had already slipped away into the past) and not yet having another part (because it is still in the future): in fact having nothing but the tiny little present, which has gone before you can speak about it. God forbid we should think God was like that. Even we may hope not to be always rationed in that way.

Another difficulty we get if we believe God to be in time is this. Everyone who believes in God at all believes that He knows what you and I are going to do tomorrow. But if He knows I am going to do so-and-so, how can I be free to do otherwise? Well, here once again, the difficulty comes from thinking that God is progressing along the Time-line like us: the only difference being that He can see ahead and we cannot. Well, if that were true, if God foresaw our acts, it would be very hard to understand how we could be free not to do them. But suppose God is outside and above the Time-line. In that case, what we call "tomorrow" is visible to Him in just the same way as what we call today." All the days are "Now" for Him. He does not remember you doing things yesterday, He simply sees you doing them: because, though you have lost yesterday, He has not. He does not "foresee" you doing things tomorrow, He simply sees you doing them: because, though tomorrow is not yet there for you, it is for Him. You never supposed that your actions at this moment were any less free because God knows what you are doing. Well, He knows your tomorrow's actions in just the same way--because He is already in tomorrow and can simply watch you. In a sense, He does not know your action tin you have done it: but then the moment at which you have done it is already "Now" for Him.

This idea has helped me a good deal. If it does not help you, leave it alone. It is a "Christian idea" in the sense that great and wise Christians have held it and there is nothing in it contrary to Christianity. But it is not in the Bible or any of the creeds. You can be a perfectly good Christian without accepting it, or indeed without thinking of the matter at all.

(C.S. Lewis, Time And Beyond Time, from Mere Christianity)

The Sacrament of the Present Moment

We have a lot of pain in this life. There is physical pain, like when you throw a bowling ball wrong and have it twist off a piece of your fingernail; and emotional pain, like when you feel alone or fearful; and mental pain, like when you fear the physical or emotional pain that is to come; and sometimes all of them at once, like when you have to go to the dentist.

We have a lot of reasons to worry and to think about our future, where our lives will lead us. This comes naturally to us. Scientists are now telling us that our brains are primarily designed to predict the future.

Ps. 118:24 reads - "This is the day the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it." Increasingly, I find this scripture to be important. It's a motif found throughout the Bible. Like...

* Today is the day of salvation...
* Now is the time to worship...
* This is the day the Lord has made...

Arguably, this moment... right now... is the moment of all moments. It is not to be avoided (as if we could) or gotten-past because we are on to better things. I like how Greg Boyd puts this:

"God is the God of the living, not the God of the already-past or the not-yet-present. He's the great "I AM," not the great "I was" or the great "I will be." He's been present for every moment in the past, for which we can be thankful, and he'll be present at every moment in the future, which gives us great hope. But he's only alive and active now, in the present - which is the only thing that's real." (Present Perfect: Finding God in the Now, 15)

Now, for example, God loves you. This core Jesus-truth is meant to be not a mere theoretical truth but an experiential reality. This is cool because it is experience, not theory, that breeds conviction. So right now, "remind yourself that you are submerged in God's love." (Ib., 19) Dwell with God who makes his dwelling place in you 24/7. God is in the house of "you" right now. Why not say "Hi?"

Those who practice attending to God in every now-moment are the ones who will do great things for God in the future. Non-attendance now means failure tomorrow. And, God could grant one of those watershed-life-changing now-moments... now. Read history to verify the truth of this last statement. Therefore attend. Raise your hand and say "Present, Lord."

Boyd says that "now is where God lives." (Ib., 21) Missionary Frank Laubach encourages us to "Make a new beginning." Boyd writes: "Wake up to God's presence in this moment now." 17th-century monk Jean-Pierre de Caussade called this "the sacrament of the present moment." We attend to God now so we can know God now, and so we can be different in the next moment.

Speaking for myself personally, I am a wuss when it comes to physical pain, and I'm a sucker for emotional pain, and I put a lot of mental pain on myself. The devil likes to try to steal my joy whenever I let him. Yesterday, I was driving home with a sore thumb after a terrific weekend. I was joyful, and listening to worship music. Yet my praises were not enough to keep the devil away, to prevent him from reminding me of what I do not have, of placing a pang of emotional hurt into my heart. He knows that that will trigger my mind into overdrive, and I'll start that slow spiral into self-induced pity and panic by overthinking a situation. It was a perfectly designed trap for me on all three levels of pain. And all three were lies.

That's right, devil, it didn't work that time, did it? I hope my spoken Word of God and subsequent loud praises sent you running in pain yourself. "Rejoice in the Lord always, and again I say, Rejoice!" (Phil. 4:4). God is with me now. He doesn't leave me alone to go prepare my future - He stays beside me to work on my present.

So the next time you are sitting in the dentist's chair (literally or metaphorically) and the oral surgeon is about to drill and tells you, "You'll now feel some vibration," do not decide to just to hang on and long for this particular now-experience to be over. I don't believe that God says, in that moment, "Excuse me, I'll be back when the tooth is out." Instead, my ever-present God suggests that it would be good to take this time to pray for some other people that He has on His mind, and that now would be a good time since you have nothing else to do. So, fight the enemy by praying for some specific friends that you care for very much.

If you are like me, you need God now and not in some distant future. And while it is very good to recount our past experiences with God, it is better to experience God now. God is not like some person we used to live with but is no longer with us. Nor is God living in some far-off land but making plans to visit us in a few years. God calls himself "Emmanuel." God with us. God with you. In the now.

Thy Will

Teach me to feel that Thou art always nigh;
Teach me the struggles of the soul to bear -
To check the rising doubt, the rebel sigh;
Teach me the patience of unanswered prayer.

Does the fact that I cannot forget indicate that God does not want me to, or is it my own unwillingness to forget that has kept God from answering my prayer to that end?

Or does He want me to remember - to "suffer me to hunger" so that I might the more fully learn to find all my satisfaction in Him?

Can it be that by a show of what Paul called "will worship" I should crush the bud of a flower of God's creation?

I know no prayer for this other than: Thy will be done.

Catch Up

I have a lot of writing to do. There are two Pillars of Faith to talk about from IMPACT, and we just had a Saturday Night. That's in addition to my usual rambling theological thoughts. If I actually have any readers out there - I thank the both of you, ha ha - expect a fair number of posts to appear soon.

EDIT - Yeah... until finals week goes away, this blog is officially on hiatus. I'll see you on the other side of half-dead!

The Pillar of Prayer - IMPACT April '10

There was an IMPACT meeting last weekend. For those of you who are unaware what that is, roughly once a month we hold a Christian overnight retreat outside of Stroud, OK. A message is brought by Tonderai, lessons are taught by various college-aged Christians, worship and prayer abounds, and we all have a good time playing games and eating deliciously-prepared foods, too.

This time, Tonderai gave us five pillars of Christianity that hold up our faith and lives in Jesus. I want to summarize each pillar here, in my own words. I will be doing one at a time, in no particular order. None of these pillars are more important than any other; all need to be equally strong to fully support your Christian walk.

The first pillar is prayer. Prayer is communication with God. In the same sense that you can carry on a conversation with your friends, your teachers, your parents, or a total stranger, so can you carry on a conversation with God. When you talk to and with God, you are praying. Sometimes you have light conversation with your friends, over the phone or while driving in the car or in passing at school. Thus, simply saying a few words with God periodically throughout your day is prayer. Sometimes, though, you have deep and serious conversations with friends, where the two of you sit down over coffee or the like, face to face, and work through some issue. In the same way, there are occasions to get alone with God and have a serious conversation with Him. This, too, is prayer.

That being said, the most common use of prayer is requesting help from God. There is nothing wrong with doing this. Hebrews 11:6 states, "And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him." A central part of Christianity is that we should come to Him with our needs and desires, with the knowledge and faith that God will answer our prayers.

But why aren't all of our prayers answered? I can provide two reasons from the Bible.

The first is that God's answers come as long as we remain in Him. In other words, we must be seeking Him with all of our heart ("He rewards those who earnestly seek Him"). As we do so, we will learn to hear and know God's will, and our prayers will grow to be aligned with His will. I won't say that God will NOT answer a prayer that is contrary to His will for us, but we would still be stepping out of faith to ask for that prayer. Also, a part of remaining in God is continuing to repent of any sins that may hinder our hearing of His answer. Isaiah 59:1-2 states, "Surely the arm of the LORD is not too short to save, nor His ear too dull to hear. But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden His face from you, so that He will not hear." God will not refuse to answer us - His promises state His answer will come - but by sinning and turning from God's will, we stop listening. Many of God's answers require faith on our part to come about; if we are willfully disobeying God and not listening to Him, we will not do whatever it is God asks of us to receive the answer!

The second reason is that we tend to give up. We lose our faith. We do not receive an answer immediately, or within the time frame we desire, and so we assume it has gone unanswered. This cannot be. God has promised He will answer, and "God is not a man, that He should lie, nor a son of man, that He should change His mind" (Numbers 23:19). We must accept the answer to our prayer in faith, believing that it WILL come. In the meantime, we get on with serving God, with seeking Him (as per the first reason above). 1 Thessalonians 5:17 urges us to "pray without ceasing." In other words, don't give up!

Tonderai gave us something to remember this with: the acronym PUSH. When you or someone you know is faltering in their faith for a prayer, tell them to PUSH through, to Pray Until Something Happens! Do not give up until God makes something happen!

There was one other thing touched on during Tonderai's message. Sometimes, we feel the tugging in our hearts that someone or something is in need of our prayer, but we do not know what it is. Or perhaps we have a need or desire and in our minds we think we know what would be the answer... but this may not be what God has in store for the answer. If we do not know exactly what to pray for, Paul gives us advice in Romans 8:25-27.

But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently. In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. And He who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God's will.

This, to me, is a way of using the Spirit to pray. There are a few ways this "groaning" might be expressed, though. In the Old Testament, both Hannah and David experienced times where all they could do was cry out to God. They were in need and didn't know what to pray for, but their spirit connected with God's Spirit and moved Him to act. Paul speaks of using the Holy Spirit to speak in tongues as a way of "edifying the self." How would that edify and strengthen our spirits if not as a prayer directly to God that we simply cannot understand because we do not know what to pray for? The "groaning" may be the Holy Spirit directing us to some action that we need to take to receive the answer to the prayer we are unaware of. If you feel a desire to pray for someone, but you aren't sure who or what to say, do NOT doubt the urging! Act on it. You may receive further direction at that point, or you may walk away feeling as though you did nothing. Either way, you were faithful in a "small thing," and you will learn to trust God more and more when the Spirit moves you so that you will be ready to be faithful when trusted "with much."

In summary, prayer is talking with God. You can do this walking down the sidewalk or closeted in your room. Many prayers involve asking God for something, and God expects this because He wants you to rely on Him for your every need. All of your answers should ideally come from or be confirmed by God. To see answers to your prayers, seek God's will and do what you know is right to do, and do not give up. Find the Biblical promises and stand on them despite current circumstances. And always remember to act on whatever urgings the Holy Spirit places inside of you; God will meet your faith and make things happen!

The Definition of Sin

I'm reading a number of books right now (you can see them on the sidebar to the right). A running theme that has been popping up in my prayer and reading for the last few weeks has been the definition of sin. By that I mean that my understanding of what constitutes sin has... well, not really "changed" so much as "improved." I have a deeper understanding of it now, I think. Sin is simply any act outside of God's will; to put it another way, the absence of God's will in your life is sin.

We are all taught in church that everyone is born into sin, thanks to that original sin by Adam.

"For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God." (Romans 3:23)

"For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive." (1 Corinthians 15:21-22).

This is a true statement. However, it gives the impression of some innate disease that rots us from the inside out regardless of what we do, that we are hapless victims. This, too, is true, but it goes deeper than this. It is true that we are victims to sin, that death is the inevitable consequence of sin, and that our only hope is Jesus Christ dying for our sins. We can't do it alone.

"For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." (Romans 6:23)

The wages of sin are death. A wage is something you earn. Thus, it isn't that you are "cursed" with sin immediately because you were born. And this isn't anything novel. We all come to Christ knowing that we're sinners, that we've done "wrong," and that we need forgiveness for this. But what is it that you consider the wrongness in your life in need of repentance?

I would wager that many of us look to the laws and rules in the Bible to measure our actions. The Ten Commandments are a prime example. The two commandments given by Jesus, love God with all of your heart and love your neighbor as yourself. Whenever we fail to live up to these standards, we say we have sinned and we ask for forgiveness. As we should. The Law given by God is the perfect standard, because it represents walking entirely in God's will. And none of us can do that, at least not on our own. Jesus was the only One able to walk perfectly in God's will, and He is the only One who can help us do the same.

I'm in danger of becoming side-tracked in talking about how the Law, its purpose, and how it is fulfilled in Christ. That is not the point of this entry. The point I'm trying to make with the above paragraph is that Jesus said He came to fulfill the Law, and that if we love Him we will follow the Law despite no longer being under it. The Law represents walking entirely in God's will, and the Law makes us aware of how far we fall short of God's will. Simply breaking the Law doesn't equate to sin, in the same sense that simply following the Law doesn't equate to righteousness.

The sin is walking outside of God's will; righteousness is walking within God's will. If you are walking in God's will, you will be obeying the commandments by default. That is why Jesus said the first priority is to love the Lord your God with all of your heart -- if you do this, the rest will follow.

Here is where my eyes were opened up a little more. Living a moral life - judging between right and wrong and choosing right - isn't enough to be free of sin. In other words, you can still do all of that and be walking outside of God's will. God has an unique calling for each of us, a predetermined path specially designed for you and I. Any time we step off of that path, we're sinning. That's a hard truth. That's why Jesus calls us to commit ourselves to Him fully. If we aren't running the race 100%, all-in for Jesus, we risk stepping off of the path. Paul warned us of this. Rob Bell, in Velvet Elvis, puts it a different way.

"... let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith..." (Hebrews 12:1-2)

"Your job is the relentless pursuit of who God made you to be. And anything else you do is sin and you need to repent of it." Rob Bell, Velvet Elvis)

When we step off of the path, we open ourselves first to sin, and then to the curse of God for sin (as opposed to His shelter of blessings when we walk in righteousness), and finally to the snares and attacks of the devil. Believe it or not, our lives are easiest managed when we do the very hard thing of committing everything we have and all of our actions to Jesus. See my entry on Perfection - His burden really is light! When we start seeking Him with all of our hearts, we find Him, and He takes care of us. At that point, the only thing we have to worry about is pleasing God. Wouldn't that be nice? To only have ONE thing to worry about, ever? To never give another care to bills, or relationships, or sickness, or hunger? To know that all of our needs - and through us the needs of our loved ones and everyone around us - are met by God because we're walking in true faith and obedience to Him?

I write this not only because I find it important for myself to be reminded that simply living a good life is still sinful, to remind myself that I must seek God's Word and direction in my life and then follow wherever they lead me, but also because my heart breaks for many of my friends who are living in sin. And I'm not just talking about those who are unsaved. I know to pray for them by default. I'm talking about the friends I have who believe in Jesus, have asked Him to be ruler of their lives and try to live following the Law, but aren't letting Jesus really work at them from the inside. I have friends who live with their unmarried partners, friends who only think about God on Sundays, friends who half-heartedly seek God and half-heartedly cling to their own will in life. I don't lay any judgment on any particular friend -- I'm the world's worst at not acting when God calls me to act, and even if I weren't, I don't know the private dialogue between Jesus and them. But before, I always thought it sad but not life-threatening; they were Christians, doing their best to not sin, but simply not enjoying all of the benefits of a deeper relationship with Christ. Now, though, I recognize it for what it is: not seeking God with everything in you, not running the race to whatever extreme God wants you in, is sin. They may be willfully rejecting God's call for their lives, and not realizing it is sin to do so! And this makes me want to cry. I understand now why David asked the Lord to forgive Him his hidden faults as well as his willful sins, and why Jesus cried out for forgiveness of those who had not repented because they didn't know they were sinning (but still were!):

"Who can discern his errors? Forgive my hidden faults. Keep your servant also from willful sins; may they not rule over me." (Psalms 19:12-13)

"Jesus said, 'Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.'" (Luke 23:34)

Their unknown sin may also be playing a part in unanswered prayers, which is tragic. I'm not going to jump into this now, having gone on more than long enough already, but sin in your life can contribute to unanswered prayer. I don't think that God ignores those who pray with sin, nor do I think that He won't answer when it is in His will to do so, but the promise of receiving "anything we ask" of Jesus is likely blocked by sin. Obviously we all struggle with sinning - I do daily - but unrepented sin, sinful areas not given over to Jesus for improvement, block the prerequisite to getting what we ask for.

"Surely the arm of the LORD is not too short to save, nor His ear too dull to hear. But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden His face from you, so that He will not hear." (Isaiah 59:1-2)

"If you remain in Me and My Words remain in You, ask for whatever you want and it will be done for you." (John 15:7)

So, to summarize, sin entered the world through Adam and Eve when they stepped out of God's will. Since then, none of us have been able to walk that perfect path within God's will. Until Jesus came along. Through His perfect life and subsequent death and resurrection, He provided the way for His Spirit to enter our spirits and change us from the inside-out, to model His behavior and finally be able to walk in God's perfect will.

In the same way that darkness is the absence of light, and cold the absence of heat, sin is the absence of God's will. Giving anything less than 100% is sin. We all sin and fall short of God's will, but each time we do, as long as we are faithful to come to Jesus in repentance and give over that part of our lives to Him, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from the unrighteousness, to help maneuver us back onto God's path and will. Search out God with all of your heart, seeking the areas where you might be holding back, and God will be faithful in shaping them anew, better.

Jars of Oil - February's Saturday Night Message

This last weekend was Saturday Night. For anyone who is unaware of what that is, once a month we have a get-together in Edmond for local Christians. The night includes some social time, a short sermon or Biblical discussion, and a period of praise, worship, and prayer for each other. Saturday Nights are always amazing, filled with the power of God, and this weekend was no exception. Tonderai brought a very wise message from the Bible, and I'd like to share the gist of it to anyone who reads this and couldn't make it. Obviously, this isn't my message and I won't be covering all of it, but I will go over the points that spoke to me.

The message came from 2 Kings 4:1-7.

The wife of a man from the company of the prophets cried out to Elisha, "Your servant my husband is dead, and you know that he revered the LORD. But now his creditor is coming to take my two boys as his slaves."

Elisha replied to her, "How can I help you? Tell me, what do you have in your house?"

"Your servant has nothing there at all," she said, "except a little oil."

Elisha said, "Go around and ask all your neighbors for empty jars. Don't ask for just a few. Then go inside and shut the door behind you and your sons. Pour oil into all the jars, and as each is filled, put it to one side."

She left him and afterward shut the door behind her and her sons. They brought the jars to her and she kept pouring. When all the jars were full, she said to her son, "Bring me another one." But he replied, "There is not a jar left." Then the oil stopped flowing.

She went and told the man of God, and he said, "Go, sell the oil and pay your debts. You and your sons can live on what is left."

The first thing to be noted here is that the woman was honest with the issues in her life. Tonderai spoke of our culture's tendency to put a positive spin on everything. Daily we encounter people who ask a variation of this general greeting, "Hey man, how are you today?" We typically respond positively, "I'm doing great, thanks!" regardless of how we may actually be feeling. Even amongst our fellow Christians, we tend to put up a positive façade. And even if we do share some of what is troubling us, we try to make it look like we're handling it. "Well, things have been rough, but God is faithful."

We don't dare be completely honest, for a multitude of reasons. It could be considered rude, or we don't want to burden our friends with our troubles, or we might be seen as weak or incapable or needy, or they will think less of us, or whatever. Tonderai's point was we tend to have an image we want people to see us as, and so we only answer in ways that support that image.

However, in doing this, we separate ourselves from the help they could provide. We put ourselves in precisely the situation that Satan wants us in: alone. When we are alone, He can come at us in full strength. Together, we can use each other's strengths and wisdom to overcome his attacks. Jesus clearly intended for His followers, His church, to work together, to support each other.

For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith. For as we have many members in one body, but all the members do not have the same function, so we, being many, are one body in Christ, and individually members of one another. (Romans 12:3-5)

The woman in 2 Kings went to Elisha, a man of God, and didn't sugarcoat her problems. Note that her husband was a man of God as well. He served the prophets faithfully. But she didn't talk about his virtues; she said he left debt, and I now have a problem! She laid it all out to Elisha, explaining that she had nothing, and her boys were about to be made slaves. She needed help!

Another thing to note is that she went to the person she knew could provide help, a man of God. If there is anyone we should be honest with, it is those we know are in touch with God and can help us discern His will. We tend to be ashamed to say how worse off we are then them, but that is foolish. They are precisely the people who will NOT judge us, who will be ready to jump to our aid through the love of Christ in them. We as Christian brethren go through different trials and lessons in life. One point that was made during Saturday Night was that, in going to others for help, we acquire their experience and wisdom. I may have spent ten years overcoming some weakness, some challenge and lesson from God. Through that experience, I know God's will in that specific area. If you're starting to go through that same problem, you can benefit from my experience and save yourself ten years of tribulation. But you've got to be honest first so I know what you're going through. That is how we are set up to work; none of us are strong everywhere, all the time, but each of us are strong in some area at some time, and together we can grow much quicker than apart.

A wise man will hear and increase in learning, and a man of understanding will acquire wise counsel (Proverbs 1:5).

Where there is no counsel, the people fall; but in the multitude of counselors there is safety (Proverbs 11:14).

The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, but he who heeds counsel is wise (Proverbs 12:15).

So, we know that the woman in 2 Kings had to face her problems in order to even hope to overcome them, and so must we. We must be honest with ourselves, honest with our Christian friends and elders who can help, and honest in our prayers to God. Let's move on.

Once the woman gave her story to Elisha, he asked her a question: "What do you have?" She replied, "I have nothing, except this small bit of oil." In her eyes, that bit of oil was essentially useless. It wouldn't solve her problem. But it was a starting point for God. If you want to find an answer from God, if you want to move out of your situation, you should take inventory of what you have. Once again, be honest with yourself. You have gifts and strengths from the Lord, even if you cannot see how they would help.

(Sidenote - Tonderai spoke of a SWOT analysis, something he undergoes periodically when he is in tribulation. A SWOT analysis consists of discovering your: Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats. Such a self-inventory could be useful in figuring out what you have to offer to God, what is hindering you, and what direction you could go in.)

So, now the woman and Elisha are on the same page. They both know the problem, and what the woman has to offer to God. Elisha's suggestion, though, seems counter-intuitive. He tells her to go borrow all the jars she can find. Did you catch that? Her problem is she is in debt, and his solution is to go borrow. Borrowing is not typically how you get out of debt; in fact, it tends to make the problem worse.

The point is that God's solutions will always require faith. Once you pray and discern God's will, it will require that you step out on faith. It will not make sense to you; the ways of God look like foolishness to man. But that is what faith is: hearing God's will, and choosing to follow it regardless. The woman heard God's will, and chose to follow regardless of how wise it sounded because she trusted it was from God.

The requirement of faith by God to act serves a purpose: it increases your capacity to believe. This was the heart of Tonderai's message.

Once you have faced a problem, heard God's will and acted on faith to receive the solution to the problem, your belief in God's ability to provide has now increased. Before you had the solution, you were worried about the problem. The woman was afraid her children were going to be made slaves, and she didn't see a way out. After the events with Elisha, her faith is increased. She now knows without a doubt that God provides, and she can share that faith with others facing problems. And now we get back to our role in helping other Christians with our experiences.

Your capacity for God's blessings is up to you. Once the woman had collected the jars - acted on faith - she began to pour her oil into them. She kept pouring until there were no more jars, and at that point, the oil stopped. The man of God told the woman to gather as many jars as she could. Had she only gathered one or two, she only would have filled up one or two jars. Had she gathered a hundred, she would have filled a hundred. Her level of faith was the only thing that decided how blessed she was. When God calls you to do something, give everything to Him. Go all out. He'll pay you back to the measure of your faith.

One final point. Once the jars were filled, she went back to Elisha and he told her to do two things: sell the oil and pay back the debt, and THEN use the rest for herself.

The woman started out in debt. God first provided for her to come up to stability. Then He moved her on to prosperity.

You cannot be in prosperity, able to bless others with your experience and blessings, until you are out of your problem and stable. In other words, God will first provide for your problem, meet your needs. Then He will give you overabundance so that you provide for others' needs. Elisha was prosperous. His needs had been met, and so he was in a position to meet the needs of others, like this woman. He had the faith required, not a deficit.

Do you want a solution to the problems and stresses in your life? Do you want to be prosperous? Go to a Christian who has already overcome the problem you're facing, who has the abundance of faith in that specific area to provide for you. Share your problems with your Christian family, and you'll find the answer so much quicker. And then you'll have the faith to answer for others. Look for people with stability and prosperity in order to leave debt.