a drop of water

One of my favorite passages is Micah 6:8, “He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.”  I recently discovered the context of the passage, where God presents his case against Israel, and Israel responds.

God reminds Israel of what he has done for them. He mentions a few characters and events:

• Slavery in Egypt – God sent Moses to lead Israel out of their lives as slaves in Egypt.
• Balak king of Moab – Was preparing to stand in Israel’s way and drive them out of the country.
• Balaam son of Beor – Was called by Balak to put a curse on Israel, but God told Balaam no.  (Same Balaam who had his donkey speak to him)
• Journey from Shittim to Gilgal – This was the parting of the Jordan River by Joshua, which parallels the parting of the Red Sea by Moses, earlier.

Next Israel responds with a few ideas to pay for their sins: burnt offerings, one year old calves, thousands of rams, ten thousand rivers of oil, and even their firstborn children. All of these were very costly sacrifices, some instituted by ceremonial law, but were impractical and some wicked (as Matthew Henry states).  God then tells Israel, that he has already said what he requires of them.

God asked them to act justly.  The verb act (or to do in other translations) implies to make.  God asked them to love mercy.  The love here is the same love that God has for his people. Go asked them to walk humbly with Him.  One of the implications of this verb to walk, implies departing from something.  God asked them to be just in their actions, to love mercy as He loves his people, and to walk away from their sin nature, as they follow Him.

All of these instructions ultimately ask us to offer ourselves to God and directly address the last bastions of our old self.  It is easier to give God things, actions, etc. than to give God ourselves.  Acting justly, loving mercy, and walking humbly with Him is impossible without us letting God permeate our thoughts, actions, and wills. Instead of offering God myself, I think that I often try and substitute something that I’ve assigned great worth to, similar to the Israel’s initial offering of rams and rivers of oil.  I offer up my success or hopes for success, my “big” ideas for the Kingdom; offerings that I think are close to or worthy of what God has already done for me, when in reality they are often just clanging symbols.

Dallas Willard, in his exposition of the parable of the Widow’s offering (Luke 21:1-4, Mark 12:41-44) said “It was of greater value, more of value was done with the widows pennies, than with the large gift of the others.  The context of the kingdom among us transforms the respective actions.   Little is much, we say, when God is in it.  And so it is, really.”  The worth is not in the pennies, but what the pennies symbolize; a transformation of the woman’s heart. This is to say, that often we can make offerings as a response to what God has done in our lives that have “big” outward worth and end up missing the inward surrender to God that allows Him to renovate our heart, mind and soul so that we can become the people who act justly, love mercy and walk humbly with Him.

In a letter to his mother to console her on the death of his father, he wrote,

“Three years have gone and every trifle relating to father is still alive as ever inside me.  I am so certain my love, that we will see him again in an unexpected but completely natural heaven, in a realm that all is radiance and delight.  He will come towards us in our shared bright eternity, slightly raising his shoulders as he used to do, and we will kiss the birth mark on his hand without surprise. You must live in expectation of that tender hour my love, and never give in to the temptation of despair. Everything will return.”

-Vladimir Nabokov

My family and I visited the grave sites of both my mother’s and father’s parents this Christmas.  It has been almost six years since my last grandmother passed away.  I have a few memories stored away of my grandparents, their body language, the feeling of their wrinkly old hands holding mine, maybe a faint echo of a their voices. Deitrich Bonhoffer noted as he was led to his sentencing, “For you it is the end, but for me, it is the beginning of life.”

Nabokov bolsters his mothers countenance against despair by painting a beautiful vision of what Heaven holds.   It is a place where we will be reunited with those whom we have loved so much, restored to their former selves.  Nabakov lives his life not in despair of what he has lost in his father’s death, but in the life and glory of being reunited with his father someday.

Life here on earth is a great gift, and its end opens a door to something much greater in Heaven. I am excited to hold my grandparents hands again someday, to hear their voices in strength and clarity, to see their body language unhindered by age and ailment.  I want to live under the vision so eloquently painted by Nabokov, where death is just the next step in life in Christ.

In his book, Divine Conspiracy, Dallas Willard outlines three aspects of discipleship making: “we must be disciples, we must intend to make disciples, and we must know how to bring people to believe that Jesus really is the one.”  Here are some further hard hitting ideas that are inspiring.  I would like to share with you in hope of a similiar experience, though admittedly the context is partially lost.

…non-discipleship is the elephant in the church; it is not the many moral failures, financial abuses or amazing general similarity between christian and non-christians. These are only the effects of the underlying problem. The fundamental negative reality among christians believers today, is the failure to be constantly learning how to live their lives in the kingdom among us. And it is an accepted reality. The divisions of professing christans and to those for whom it is a matter of whole life devotion to God and those who maintain a consumer or client relationship to the church has now been an accepted reality for the last 1500 years…

…it must be our conscious objective, consciously implemented to bring others to the point where they are daily learning from Jesus how to live their actual lives as he would live them if he were they. That implemented intention would soon transform everything among professing Christians as we know them.  For example, much time is spent among Christians trying to smooth over hurt feelings and even deep wounds, given and received, and to get people to stop being angry, retaliatory, and forgiving.  But suppose instead we devoted our time to inspiring and enabling christians and others to be people who are not offendable and not angry, and who are forgiving as a matter of course.  Great peace, the Psalmist says, have they who love thy law, nothing trips them up.  Psalm 119:165.  To intentionally make disciples is to open the doorway for people to become like that…

…we [should] intend to make disciples and let converts happen instead of intending to make converts and let disciples happen…we are not talking about the duties of full time ministers, but the duty of a friend, a neighbor…

…you lead people to become disciples of Jesus by ravishing them with a vision of life in the kingdom of the heavens in the fellowship of Jesus. and you do this by proclaiming, manifesting and teaching the kingdom to them in the manner learned by Jesus himself.  You must change the belief system that manages their lives…