Ten years ago, I arrived home late Sunday night, from a retreat. I was physically and emotionally drained. But the next morning I woke up to an adrenalin-induced frenzy. In four and a half days I was speaking at another retreat, to 150 people, and I hadn’t prepared one talk.
The upcoming conference was my very first Hearing God retreat. I had been waiting (impatiently) for years to offer a retreat on how to recognize God’s voice, but commitments (and bad surprises) had frustrated my attempts to plan it. My preparation was woefully behind, and I was anxious about how little time was left to outline my talks.
When I woke up that feverish morning, I sensed God say to me:
If your teachings are the greatest you’ve ever given, but no one hears Me speak to them, the retreat will be a dismal failure.
If your talks are the worst you’ve ever given, but people hear My voice personally, the retreat will be a roaring success.
I sensed God invite me to take two days off from any retreat work—half of my limited, remaining prep time—and simply to give “my” retreat to Him. (Actually, not mine at all.)
That word from God seemed irresponsible, unwise, and a little crazy.
Because Everything About Christianity Seems Crazy
Our single biggest spiritual problem is distorted thinking. Christianity requires a profoundly different grasp of reality than the world preaches. It means that circumstances, events, disappointments—and even our deepest woundings—all reflect a deeper undercurrent of spiritual forces; a revolutionary reality that requires spiritual-eye-transplants to recognize.
Spiritual rebirth is a radical retooling of our minds, not another pair of Walmart reading glasses.
Worldly wisdom dictates that ministries adopt the latest growth strategy; it orders bloggers to leverage social media for greater impact, and it compels spouses to learn their love languages.
All that worldly advice contains seeds of wisdom, but it simultaneously and insidiously waters the weeds of our inner destruction.
Our default human inclination is to operate as though success in life (from ministries to marriages) depends on what we do. But the lesson of Gideon’s three hundred soldiers is that success depends solely on God, and it is precisely in our weakness that He is strong.
For the Hearing God retreat, I needed a transformation of mind, not more hours of preparation.
Jesus Always Attacks Our Natural Thinking
And I mean He attacks it. Head on. He shocks us, astounds us, pleads with us, and convicts us. Why do you think He was crucified? Didn’t He just preach a message of love? No! He preached a message of complete rejection of the way the world thinks. He said:
- If we long for greatness, we must kneel before stinking feet.
- If we want richness in life, must deliberately abandon our own.
- If we wish to feel worthwhile, we must admit to God our complete unworthiness.
Everything Jesus said was revolutionary. He was an anarchist about every “normal” operating principle of life. What is obvious to the world makes no sense inside the gospel; and the message of the gospel is sheer craziness to the world.
In Christianity, the way up is down. It’s always down.
It’s Not an Incremental Evolution
Jesus refuses to offer a nuanced perspective. He does not sell vitamin supplements. He doesn’t spice up tasteless dishes. Instead of adding a dash of reality to our lives, He crucifies and buries our old perceptions to let His spiritual reality be born into something fully new, completely different, no hint of the old man left. Romans 12:2 says,
Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind.
“Transformed” means metamorphosis, like when a caterpillar dies to become a butterfly. We need to hold a funeral service to our this-worldly-caterpillar of “natural” wisdom so that a metamorphosed spiritual mind can be born, sprout wings, and fly. Something must die so that He can live. In us.
My limited retreat preparation lacked everything I’d ever studied on public speaking. Instead of hearing eloquence in my teaching, people heard God in their times of personal prayer.
I think I did too.
Sam
We Are All Addicts
Sam-
Thanks for hearing the Lord for me (and Marcia) with your most recent posting. Just so happens we are in the midst of planning to give a marriage recollection with one of our SOS communities out on the west coast next week. We are woefully behind in preparation (no one to blame but ourselves).
What the Lord said to you (which I read out loud to Marcia), really spoke to us, and gave us peace and comfort-and a call to pray more and not worry so much about content or presentation.
Thanks, again! God bless, John
I absolutely LOVE God’s timing.
Even when He seems to be delaying. (Though I don’t love it in the middle of the seeming-delay.)
Sam
This one’s a keeper! I will have to read this over and over again to remember these words of wisdom which are so very true. And I think I’ll finish your book which I started several years ago and somehow did not finish. It’s time for me to pick it up again.
Let me know what you think when you finish it.
Sam, it is always a delight when I receive a message from you. I assure you, that I always share them. But I have to say that I love the pict. at the top of this message. It so graphically displays the enemy we face in our time.
It is my greatest desire to spend time with our Father. His Spirit continually comforts and encourages us. I do miss the times of standing “in the pulpit,” but I do NOT miss the struggles and time wrestling with the message.
Thank you for the “Spiritual rebirth” and “retooling of our minds”!
Thanks for the thanks!! You are encouraging.
This is good stuff! And I say this while I continue to struggle with perceiving what God wants me to do in my retirement. I am so tired of guessing what it is I should be doing while most of the volunteer work I’m doing doesn’t resonate with me. Is it because it doesn’t match my expectations? Or is it that way because my SELF doesn’t want to do it? Arrggh!
Dear GOD…..grant us spiritual ears to hear your voice!
We all share that prayer with you.