This is What Religion Does

My husband is now without his laptop charger.

It’s tragic, but we’re making do. In the autopsy of the deceased charger cord, we discovered that he cause of death was that it had been wrapped tightly around itself (for convenient, space-saving storage) one time too many. The wiring within the rugger cord, once flexible and malleable, had conformed to its forced reshaping following repeated strain to the same spot—primarily around the base of where the cord emerged from the power supply.

After some gentle tsking, and with redoubled efforts to keep my eye open for anything similar that my electronics were falling prey to (wrapping my earbuds around my iTouch, winding the vacuum cord tightly around its neat spindle), I got to thinking deep about the entire situation.
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All of a sudden, the thought, “This is what religion does” popped into my head. Seizing the opportunity for potentially hours of internal dialogue, I took the bait and followed this thought down the rabbit hole of relevant allegorical anecdotes. All right, I’ll bite, I thought. How is this anything like what religion does?

I will explain—but first, some context.

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According to Dictionary.com, the simplest definition of the word  religion is “adhering to a particular set of beliefs and practices.”

In the revival culture we see happening in circles like Bethel and the Promise Church, religion is a bad word that leaves a sour taste in the mouth. It’s not a pleasant note to the rest of society, either. Many scoff at the idea of religion in general, though many of those same people would attest to the value of embracing faith.

In this revival culture, religion is less of a synonym for Christianity or Islam or the denomination you prescribe to. It’s rather a label we like to stick on “The Box.”
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“The Box” is our paradigm. It’s our perspective. It’s the lens through which we see our world. We all have a Box—or are in the process of obliterating it through the renewing of our minds.

Romans 12:2 – Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

“The Box” is something that is formed by our experiences, our “normals” of childhood, our personalities, our friends, our churches, our favorite foods—you name it. It’s how we define ourselves. It’s how we protect ourselves from the world around us—and how we justify doing so.

Contrary to popular belief, we all have a “religion,” for religion is simply the prescription of everyday activities. It may have nothing to do with spirituality, and it may have everything to do with it. Most of us are religious about brushing our teeth at least twice a day, sleeping at least four hours a night, wearing clothes and shoes when we go outside, having our thermostats above a certain temperature…you could go on forever. But this is religion.
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Religion is comfortable.
It’s routine.
It’s trustworthy.
It’s safe.

And it’s harmless…or is it?

Because according to Holy Spirit, religion has the potential to destroy us from the inside out.

When my husband wound his laptop cord around the power supply time after time, he was simply following a routine he had established early on. Wrapping the cord in this fashion made it compact and lovely to look at, rather than a tangled mess. It made it easy to store and didn’t take up much space.

But over the two and a half years he’s had his laptop, this practice has slowly worn away at the inner workings of his charger cord—until at last, as of this past weekend, the connection between the power supply and the inner workings of the cord were severed completely.

All from the inside out.

All unseen.

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This is what religion does. It insulates us from thinking outside our box. It keeps us from thinking up creative solutions, encouraging us to instead follow the comfort of our routine.

On the outside, it’s very neat and tidy-looking, and there doesn’t appear to be anything wrong.

But internally, bit by bit, religion turns what once was flexible into hard-edged corners, wearing down the connection to our primary power source until eventually it is choked out completely.

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I’m not intending this for condemnation. I’m not targeting this at anyone. In fact, I would not be spending so much time entertaining this thought if it was not relevant to me personally.
Which should tell you that I struggle with this.
A lot.

And here’s what saves me from becoming discouraged about knowing that I have so much room to grow: knowing that, because of how God has designed us for community, if I am struggling with an issue, I likely am not the only one in my sphere of influence who needs encouragement in this area.

In short, you, precious reader, are my inspiration and my encouragement. To know that I have such a network of support, that I’m not just journaling to nobody but that I have readers who are fed and take away things of value from what I learn—is priceless, and such an honor.

But I digress.

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Jesus described spiritually religious people as tombs washed white.

Matthew 23:27 – For you are like whitewashed tombs–beautiful on the outside but filled on the inside with dead people’s bones and all sorts of impurity.

Note, He wasn’t talking to people who were living immoral lifestyles. He was talking to the people who claimed to know and represent God. The people who appeared to be upright and holy, but who were internally dead.

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The challenge I leave you with today is to think outside your box. Do you wrap your charger cord the same way every time you’re done using your laptop? What do you do when confronted with an uncomfortable situation—do you recluse, or do you embrace the opportunity for growth?

I’m not going to make up any scenario questions to get you thinking, “Is this me?” because I think this applies to all of us. We could all use a self-checkup on how we’re doing, to see if we’re holding ourselves back in any area by our comfort zones and our routines—our religion.

Part III: Diet Plan

Click here for part 1.

Click here for part 2.

I began this series with a warning against spiritual junk food. In part 2, I outlined the importance of staying spiritually hungry.

Now we’re going to make our diet plan.

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First of all, I’m guessing that if you’re reading this, you physically eat more than once a week. You probably would not be able to survive if you only had one meal, one day a week.

Likewise, how can we expect to be spiritually sustained by one or two hours one day a week? If spending time in the Word and His presence, and having worship and fellowship, is so important, why do we allow ourselves to bank on one or two church services a week, call it good, and wonder why we’re miserable by Monday?

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Pastor Steven Furtick demonstrates the importance of “eating before you come.” When it comes to church, he says that he has been approached by members of the congregation who say they have not been spoken to, or “fed,” by the message he gave. His response is, “You should’ve eaten before you came.”

What he means is that church is not supposed to be the Thanksgiving dinner for which we starve ourselves the entire week before because we know it’s coming. Church is a doctor’s checkup. It’s a little supplemental booster. It’s your meeting with your personal trainer to scrutinize and reassess your nutritional plan.

Church can only function the way it’s supposed to if you’re taking care of yourself throughout the week.

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Imagine your spiritual life as compared to your nutritional life. If we went to church, prayed, read our Bibles, worshiped, or just spent time seeking His presence—as much as we spent time putting food in our mouths, I guarantee we would not feel “dry” throughout the week.

Variety is the spice of life.

I think a lot of Christians are either afraid of falling into routine or have already fallen into one that lessens the impact of a life centered around Christ, but look at it this way: If we focused on our spiritual nourishment as much as our physical hunger, we probably wouldn’t enter into that religious routine of doing the same thing over and over again, day by day. Sure, little habits may be the same—I still eat at appointed times and whenever I’m hungry, but there’s variety in my diet.

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We don’t make a habit out of eating the exact same thing for every meal, every day.  The likelihood that we would get the proper nutritional value we need for our daily function by eating a bowl of cereal three times a day, every day, is slim to none.

Even more so, who would enjoy a diet of the same milk and cereal every meal, every day? It would get really old, really fast.

Not so cheerio.

I know if it were me, I would probably start picking at my food by morning of the second day, and by that evening I would seriously consider just not eating. I would start viewing the cereal and milk with disgust and disdain.

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Growing up, we had the exact same rehearsed prayer that we would pray to “bless this food for the nourishment and strengthening of our bodies, and blessed the hands that prepared it, amen.” I think my stepdad learned it from his dad growing up and was never taught that he could divert from the formula and seize the opportunity to actually meet with God.

But after days, months, and years of praying this routine prayer for performance purposes only, the entire act of prayer became something I dreaded and avoided. I hated when it was my night to pray over our food, because I didn’t want to get any of the nuances wrong, or forget or jumble any of the important words in the daily script.

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Ecclesiastes 3:1 – For everything there is a season, a time for every activity under heaven.

There is a time and a place for routine and repetition. But the only time in our lives when we do have the same food every single day is when we are infants, when we ingest breastmilk or formula. Formula is a good thing in its appointed place and time, but it won’t do anything for you if taken out of its timing.

For example, it would be inappropriate for me, at 19, to eat baby formula—in fact, the idea of it is nauseating. But to a 3-month-old, formula may be all that baby can ingest because his digestive organs aren’t mature enough to break down solid foods—and neither is his soft, gummy mouth.

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Ephesians 2:5 – …That even though we were dead because of our sins, He gave us life when He raised Christ from the dead.

When we receive Jesus into our hearts and claim Him as Lord and Savior, we are born again. We have gone from being spiritually dead to being spiritual babies.

As babies who are developing brand new systems of ingestion and digestion, it is appropriate and essential for us to intake as much formula food as possible. It’s okay to rest on fellowship, church services, and being fed by other people.

As a new believer, it’s good to create routines, at first, just to introduce the critical elements of prayer, worship, and discovering the Word. Just like babies have regular feeding times (and frequently), they as well as we need that regularity to grow rapidly.

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Constant doctors’ checkups are recommended for babies to monitor their growth and progress—likewise, many churches make it an aim to not only add more believers to the tally, but to get them plugged into discipleship groups. We surround new believers with as many resources as possible. This is not only to keep them in the church, but to fight off the almost instantaneous discouragement and confusion the enemy brings through the world to attack our newfound salvation. The goal is to empower.

1 Corinthians 3:1-3 – Dear brothers and sisters, when I was with you I couldn’t talk to you as I would to mature Christians.I had to talk as though you belonged to this world or as though you were infants in the Christian life.

I had to feed you with milk and not with solid food, because you couldn’t handle anything stronger. And you still aren’t ready, for you are still controlled by your own sinful desires. You are jealous of one another and quarrel with each other.

Doesn’t that prove you are controlled by your own desires? You are acting like people who don’t belong to the Lord.
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For every infant, and for every new believer, there comes a time where weaning must happen. We must introduce solid foods into our spiritual diets, learn to chew and digest on our own so we in turn may start feeding others.

Psalm 139:2 – Don’t Think it, Just Drink It

Psalm 139:2 – You know when I sit down or stand up. You know my thoughts even when I’m far away.

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“Why would you take me back after all I’ve done to you? Why would you take me back after all I’ve strayed from you?”- Canopy Red, “Why Would You”

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Oh, Papa. Thank you for being near enough to my heart that you know me, and every part about me, even when I feel like I’m far away. Even when I miss the mark in my thinking or theology, you are still there, watching me oh so intently…

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He knows my every move. He knows what I’m going to do it, as I’m doing it, before I do it, and His hindsight is even better than mine in the aftermath!

Past the literal realm, this speaks to me in that He even sense my spiritual posture. He knows when I am about to collapse with weakness, and He knows when I’m all gung-ho, refreshed, and ready to go.  He doesn’t miss any unspoken cues, and He never turns His eye away long enough to have to rely on just hearing for me to fill Him in on how I’m doing. He’s right there. He’s present. He’s paying attention. 

This means so much to me, because my entire life, my relationship with my dad has been the exact opposite. He lived in another state for most of my life. We only filled each other in on our bi-monthly weekend visits and very scarce phone calls in between. Even now, my relationship with my dad is completely dependent on how up-to-date we keep each other. Since neither of us instigate fill-ins very often, we virtually stay strangers.

And now I have a Dad who stays close by, every single moment of every day, sending His goodness and mercy to chase after me, sending His spirit to rest upon me, and never leaving my side as I walk through the mountains and valleys of this life. What a beautiful exchange! 

Just like a really good friend, who can sense a change in your thoughts, your mood, your attitude, or what you’re about to say before you even say it, God is close enough and intimate enough with me that He knows how I’m poised without me even having to tell Him.  

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You know my thoughts, even when I am far away.

I love this. Just declaring and affirming His nearness brings so much reassurance.

How could a God so insurmountably big be so close to me all the time? It’s like looking at Mount Rainier in the distance and simultaneously knowing every square inch and detail of its surface and surroundings.

But that’s exactly how He is, isn’t it? Even when I feel like I’m far away from Him, or far away from being able to worship, pray, or just rest in Him, He still knows me. This is the most beautifully paradoxical relationship I have ever heard of; how could I be far from Him and He be close enough to me to still know my thoughts so intimately, at the same time? It’s mind-boggling.

Even when I feel like I’m far from His presence, He still knows my thoughts. He’s still going the 100% in our relationship. He’s still willing to do whatever it takes to get love across. And while I can never fathom the measures of this wild, reckless love, there’s also nothing I can do to escape from it.

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If you’re anything like me, it’s easy to forget that  God is close and present all the time. But Jesus said in Matthew 28:20, “I will be with you always, even unto the end of this world.”

I encourage you to join me in the challenge of declaring and believing that He knows us. That He knows our hearts, our positions, our place. He knows our posture. He knows if we’re tired and He knows if we’re ready for a challenge. He will never give us more than we can handle, and who better to know what we can handle than the One who knows us better than we know our own hearts?

We can’t afford to go by whether or not we feel His presence nearby. I fall into this routine so often of going off of what I feel and how I feel Him ministering to my heart in a moment or situation–or conversely, how I don’t feel Him.

I feel a freedom coming on. This freedom will release us from our dependence on feeling and loose us from the binds of basing the measure of His presence on our emotional capacity to feel Him. 

So here is my challenge to you:
Don’t think it–Just drink it.  You don’t have to feel it–just know it, chase it, and the feeling will follow.

I promise.

There’s Got to Be More

“I’m not afraid when I hear about things getting hard over the next 10 years…Because it lets me know that the end is near. I’m not afraid of getting persecuted for being a Christian…”

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This came from my uncle at dinner last night, though not to my surprise. I hear stuff like this from Christians all the time.

I grew up with my mom saying things like, “I’m ready for Jesus to come back now.” When I was younger, I didn’t know to think any differently. I was taught to live like Jesus was coming back any second—which Jesus did say was the truth.

Mark 13:32-33 But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. Be on guard! Be alert! You do not know when that time will come.

However, now that I’m a bit older and think for myself, I realize a flaw in my parents’ eschatology.

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Jesus is not just randomly going to come back, and He’s not coming back in response to spiritual death or the lack in the world. He already did His job 2,011—almost 2,012—years ago.

1 Timothy 1:15 – Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.

His second coming will be a response to the unified cry of a perfected, purified bride. He has done His part to save souls, to instigate a love affair with not only His own special possession, but also to the rest of us, the Gentiles.

But He didn’t just say, “Be right back” when He ascended. He left specific instructions for the Bride to carry out in His absence, in anticipation for His return.

Mark 16:15-18 – He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptised will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.

And these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well.”

How heartbreaking, then, that so many of us sit at home, twiddling our thumbs and watching a dying world getting fatally sicker through the safety of a TV screen. How perverted, that the Bride of Jesus Christ can’t stop talking about how bad the world is or will get 10 years from now, while in the meantime we are doing absolutely nothing!

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I would like to fantasize that Jesus won’t come back until every thing is decent and in order, once the entire Church becomes a brightly lit city on a hill instead of a broken and divided sidewalk orphanage. But He is coming, whether the Church is doing her part or not.

In Matthew 25, Jesus gives a parable about 10 virgins with oil lamps, whose job was to escort the approaching bridegroom to the wedding. All 10 of the young ladies fell asleep while they waited, but when the cry arose signaling the bridegroom’s approach, all awoke. That’s when five of the virgins realized they were not prepared…they had not brought extra oil in their lamps, while the other five had.

The foolish five had to go back to town to buy oil, while the wise five escorted the bridegroom to the joyous celebration. When the other five returned with the extra oil, the wedding celebration was in full swing, and they could not come in.

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I’m not into preaching judgment. I’m not into wagging fingers or manipulating, condemning, and criticizing. Rather, I believe in preaching to inspire—definitely not to persuade. The purpose of correction should be to call someone to a higher level of freedom, with greater measures of joy, of peace, of every sweet thing of this eternal Kingdom.

The only reason I exhort is to cry out that there’s something better. And I’m telling you, if you have been fed the lie that we must helplessly, passively wait for Jesus’ return, watching as the world goes to hell—it’s supposed to be so much better than this. We were not designed for misery!

We have access to all of Him. We have access to everything He offers…Right now. While we’re alive on this planet. Think about it—we are allotted 120 years of life on earth, then eternity. What loving Father would give His kids dual citizenship in Heavenly places with Christ, and in a world of chaos—if not for the purpose of drawing from Heavenly places to tame the chaos of a world created for our pleasure?

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How sadistic it would be, if God were to create us for the sole purpose of a one-time encounter at some point in our 120 years, then to live life the same as we always have, and tough out whatever time we have left until we get to die and go to Heaven! There has got to be more.

I know because I’ve seen it.

I have seen the lives of people whom God radically encounters on a daily basis, who in response to this love go and change the world around them.

There has got to be more to life than estimating the dwindling life expectancy of our blue and green rock, like kindergarteners scrutinizing the number of gumballs in a Mason jar.

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I’ll confess proudly, I’m not afraid of the next 10 years either—or the next 20, 50, 100—because I know there’s more. I know there’s always more of God for me, my life, and my world. I know it always gets better, even while it appears to get worse. Because my God is big enough.

Jeremiah 29:11 promises a future and a hope. The dreams and legacy and destiny I have, all seal that promise. As a Christian and forerunner, it’s my job to cry out that Jesus is coming back. But it’s not my job to say when, and it’s not my job to say who He is or isn’t coming back for. It’s my job to take up His passion, the zeal for the Lord’s house, and go proclaim the good news.

To love God and love people; radically, affectionately, and loudly.

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Isaiah 61:1-3
The spirit of the Sovereign Lord is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor.

He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, and provide for those who grieve in Zion—to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.

Psalm 139:1

Psalm 139:1 – O Lord, you have examined my heart and know everything about me.

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What comfort. What peace. What joy! He has examined my heart, so I don’t have to—I can just examine His.
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I see Papa, perfect and tender, with a doctor’s coat thrown on over His robe. He kneels down and places a stethoscope to my heart, looking intently into my eyes. Then He gives me the stethoscope, and my eager toddler hands put the earpieces in, and hold the receiving end to His heart.

What a song! What a privilege! Gone are the days of holding the bulb of that stethoscope against my own heart, a frown of confusion and frustration painting my face downcast because I can’t interpret the rhythms of my own heart—or worse, because I think I can.
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He knows everything about me. There isn’t an angle of me He hasn’t investigated. Not one development has gone unforeseen. Every bump, every bruise, every particle of me has been examined. I can’t surprise Him—and yet I can delight Him!

“Your majesty gently washes over me.” –Kari Jobe

He is so tender and so gracious and so merciful! That He reinforces His sovereignty by gently letting me know that He knows everything about me—and that when He reexamines my heart, the results aren’t death and judgment, but pleasure and affection!

It’s a tender but firm reminder that my mission isn’t to sift through my heart and scrutinize for impurity so I can yank it out—that’s His job. My mission is to romance Him in return. I am questing for His heart, for His face, to know everything about Him.
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My job isn’t to know myself inside and out; that’s a depressing pastime with finite fruit, and after so long of introspection I have discovered that I can’t dig any deeper, that I’ve turned over every stone in my heart there is to turn over.

But if I know His heart, which He has given to me, then I will know my heart. Because you become like that which is your treasure, your object of awe and affection and adoration.

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For He is the infinite adventure! There is no end to the pleasures of knowing His heart! He knows me. He sees me. Every part of me, even down to the cellular level. He knows everything about me, things that even the most knowledgeable surgeon or technician, even the wisest scholar, could never know!

Every  mystery that baffles our minds is simple and, simply, known by Him.

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I am overcome with affection.

“I love you so much,” I say.

Not as much as I love you, is the immediate reply.

The love of the Lord…wow. Astronomic. Titanic. Galactic. Mighty, extravagant love. Overwhelming. Talk about butterflies in the belly. 

Part II: Are you Hungry?

Click here for part 1.

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The enemy will try his hardest to make us believe that obedience will never be worth the sacrifice of favorable public opinion. He will try to cripple us into thinking that disciplining ourselves to God’s ways will make us weak.

This is exactly right. Welcome back to the inside-out, upside-down Kingdom principles.

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I’ll reiterate: The only way God can be made mighty in you is if you are made weak.

2 Corinthians 12:9 – But He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.

I blog about this passage a lot. Every topic I write on, it comes up and becomes more and more relevant to my life personally. It is truly alive for this season of spiritual growth, and is central to the gospel itself.

In our weakness, God is made stronger.

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In the world, when you train for an athletic event, you discipline yourself rigorously. You starve your body of excess things you don’t need–only what’s needed for nutrition and rebuilding is allowed in.

Exercising your body beyond yesterday’s limits creates microscopic tears in the muscle tissue; it is the repairing of these tears that allows for the muscle’s growth.

In the Kingdom, when we rigorously discipline our minds, we emphasize more time spent in our prayer closets. Our daily bread is the Word of God, and our water is prayer. Worship is our oxygen. We fast, depriving our flesh of indulgence, literally starving to death the part of us that is “me.”

Anything to make room for more of Him.

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You make time for what's important.

As we devote more and more time to feeding our spirit, we become aware of how much of our time before was spent on indulging our impulses and making excuses about how we “didn’t have time” to pray and read our Bibles.

In these times, we realize that all our excuses are silenced in the face of a stern but simple truth: You make time for what’s most important to you.

Proverbs 27:17 – One who is full will refuse honey from the comb, but to one who is hungry, every bitter thing is sweet.

This is one of the most crucial verses for revival. Pastor Bill mentions it often to the church as a whole, but I would like to grab hold of this on a deeply personal level. We  can’t have corporate, large-scale revivals unless we have individuals who are hungry.

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Hunger motivates.

When you’re hungry, living from simplicity and not out of gluttony and clutter, every little thing that comes your way is a special gift, something that feeds your spirit. Many times in theological discussions and kung-fu movies, the phrase “You can’t fill a glass that is already full” gets tossed around, and it’s very true.

How can we come to God and ask for Him to fill us up if we don’t take the time to empty ourselves and just get hungry?

Pastor Mark Venti from Generation Church illustrates prayer as the process of emptying ourselves of the world in God’s presence. It’s a spiritual cleanse that purges us of the junk food we eat in our everyday lives, the stuff that’s impossible to escape from, and allows us to be hungry for the good stuff: Him.

A year ago, when I was first really digging deep into the Christian walk, my spiritual father sat me and a few friends down to start watching a series by John Bevere. In the introduction, John contrasts physical hunger to spiritual hunger. He says that when your physical body becomes hungry, your stomach growls. Your blood sugar is low. Survival kicks in, and all you can think about is getting food into that belly to satisfy the hunger pains.

But when your spirit is hungry, it gets quiet. It withdraws.

Only when you begin to feed your spirit will it start marking noise. It’s a peculiar and unexpected aspect that capitalizes on the importance of paying attention to how we’re feeling. In a sense, it’s like we need to constantly monitor our spiritual heart rate, to come and do checkups on our spiritual health.

I believe that’s partly what church is for, though we ideally would be in a place where it’s a daily self-examination as well.

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Reader, I challenge you: Take some time to examine yourself. Are you hungry? What would you do for a word from Papa God, right now? What’s He saying?

One of the biggest symptoms that lets me know if I need to fill up my tank is if I don’t feel like getting close to Him. If I feel like I’m not poor in Spirit.

If I feel like I’m satisfied, I know there’s something wrong.
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God is big enough that it’s possible to never have all of Him. If I think I’ve spent too much time in worship or in the Word, or if I feel like there’s a more important priority, then I’m letting God be second. I realize that I’ve been eating the rich foods of the Babylonian king’s table without coming in hungry simplicity to eat from the Most High King’s table.

Without hunger to drive us, we risk the danger of slowing our pace to a trudge. Without hunger, we risk forgetting that our mission is to those who are starving.

Without hunger to motivate us, we forget why we are even running in the first place.

Philippians 3:14 – I press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling us.