How God Makes Us Great Again

[HKHaugan]

How God Makes Us Great Again

God the Father sent His Son Jesus to make us great again. But, because of our inherited Adam-disposition to self-centeredness we have chosen apart from God how we function in the midst of others to be the source of our identity and fulfillment. However, there's a distinct difference between our temporary and spiritual functions. Our temporary functions are based on how others see us and lead us. Our spiritual function is based on how God sees us and leads us. If we play to the first, we die alone. If we yield to the second, we live with God and His people forever. It's important that we distinguish between the two. We can do that when we look at the Cross. Can you see the vertical and horizontal beams of the Cross in this picture? There's the temporary which dies and the spiritual which lives.

Our temporary functions are what we do professionally, socially and economically in this world to give ourselves purpose, identity and survival. It's about where we get our money, our position and acceptance. Basically, it's how we establish our recognition and self worth. It's the image we make for ourselves and whatever that takes to get one that is acceptable to others; how we want others to see us and how we want to see ourselves. This is the horizontal dimension.

Our spiritual function is believing, trusting and acting in faith. It's what's behind our temporary functions. It's the image we believe will give us acceptance. It's who and what we trust to guide our belief. It's who and what we have faith in motivating us to act. The question is, what is the spiritual source, the unseen dynamic, behind how we navigate our belief, trust and faith? This is the vertical dimension.

There are all kinds of voices out there offering us a pot of gold if we follow their advice. Most of them present a quick fix to identity and its function. Without God in the mix, survival and 'fitting in' will win the appeal, at least for a moment or so. As disciples of Jesus this is stating the obvious. But to clarify it simply is to see things in a spiritual perspective. Let me give an example:

Years ago on a forgotten TV show about doctors and their struggles, the chief resident in a hospital was responsible for breaking in new doctors. One of the arrivals was tops in his med school class, enthusiastic and ready to go. As his residency unfolded, there was a climactic scene involving patients' personal and relational issues that went beyond his horizontal medical expertise. The 'newbie' was missing his rounds. After a brief search he was found sitting confused and dejected on a stairwell platform between floors. The chief resident found him and asked him what was wrong. Looking like someone lost and unable to cope, he replied, “I had this idea of being a doctor, but I didn't realize I was going to have to deal with people.” I'm sure we can parallel that with other professions, jobs and occupations that were chosen because of their social perspective only to end up feeling lost, unfulfilled and hopeless.

It is important to put this in a spiritual perspective since worldly wisdom is how most of us have made choices and decisions in the early part of our lives. The idea of being a doctor is not bad. Spiritually it is good. But it's the basis for making the decision that needs to be dealt with.

There are really three questions involved here:

First, professions, jobs, whatever we call our work in this world, can be rated as good by whatever standard is out there. But what is the source that validates them, that makes them good as opposed to bad? What was and is the source of our choices?

Second, are the choices arriving out of an internal belief they can be performed and performed in the context of the relational dynamics that will be confronted? In what is that belief centered?

Third, and most important, if you come to that crossroad of internal conflict between your worldly function and relational demands, can your choices be redeemed or must they be rejected and something else take their place? What happens when you discover there's more to your job than its function? For me it was a mix of the three but the weight fell on the third, that what I chose from a worldly sense was spiritually redeemable. When I functioned according to social expectations there was no payoff. When I asked the Lord into my life something else happened. He lived through me according to His expectations. And that in spite of me. What a glorious realization. It was no longer about me but about Him. The more I knew about Him and trusted Him I found I could respond in faith like Him. It's being born spiritually to believe, trust and act in faith that He is the One functioning through me.

In the Cross of Christ we see Him redeeming the concept of a Messiah from the function His culture and religion thought it should be to what His Father spiritually designed it to be. He redeemed what it meant to be an image of God, by growing “in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men (Lk.2:52).” He lived what an image, a child of God and a witness for His Father really looked like (Heb.1:3). He redeemed the vertical idea of work as being belief in Him and the horizontal idea of work as being what we labor at to make a living in order to be a witness in the world around us (Jn.6:29). He redeemed the ideas of faith, hope and love (Jn.13:34). He redeemed what it means to make a choice and a decision in every area of human experience (Mt.11:28). He redeemed birth from being only physical to spiritual rebirth (Jn.3:16). He redeemed the meaning of life from physical survival to spiritual eternal energy, from physical death as the end to spiritual life as never ending (Jn.14:15-17). He redeemed the whole spiritual dimension from one of fear, uncertainty and distance to one of love, relationship and eternity. This is how the Father's will made Jesus the great Redeemer and how a relationship with Him redeems us making you and I great again. But it's not conceit. It's being humble before God in the presence of others. That's greatness. That's what a witness does.

For me receiving Jesus personally was the turning point (Jn.1:12). I found that something called grace was operating in my life all the time. God's acceptance, regardless of my 'self-in-the-world' centeredness, made the difference. Grace gave me the realization that in spite of me I was taken in by a Lord who cared about me and took me where I was, redeeming my choice to be a clergyman for His use. I like to think of it as the Lord directing the traffic in my life as He redeems me day by day. The thing is, this can happen in everyone's life who turns to Him. That is our message for anyone we come in contact with that needs to hear it. For most of us the old adage fits, “Bloom where you're planted.” Unless, of course, He moves you on to something else.

As far as our world based choices go, there are as many as there are people who need to know that grace awaits them, redemption of their choices awaits them, and the Lord has given us our own experiences of Him to share that possibility. So the issue for each of us who are His disciples, will we pray and humble ourselves to share Him? “In humility consider others better than yourselves (Php.2:3).” If those we share with receive Him that's how He makes them great again.

Paul sums it all up brilliantly in his first written letter to the Thessalonian disciples, “We always thank God for you, mentioning you in our prayers. We continually remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ (1Th.1:2-3).” This is how God redeems the world, reconciles it to Himself and makes it all great again.