We're in Week 3 (7 overall) of the Tough Sayings of Jesus II by Mike Kelley, a LifeWay Threads study. We took a look at "The Weeping General," the story of Lazarus from John 11. Most of you have heard or read this story as a demonstration of faith (or the lack thereof), compassion, resurrection, and miracles. But ultimately, as with much of what Jesus talked about in His 3 years of public ministry, the real point of it all was worship. Verse 4 sums up not just Lazarus' situation, but the situation of each of our lives:
When he heard this, Jesus said, "This sickness will not end in death. No, it is for God's glory so that God's Son may be glorified through it."(TNIV emphasis added.)So the question Jesus asks all of us is, what do you consider of supreme value? Even something as noble as "another human life" becomes idol worship when it becomes more important than the glory of God.
When I first became a Christian, I had very little instruction. I was fortunate to attend a campus church at Virginia Tech called nlcf, with a pastor, Joe Pace, who loved God and preached the Word to college students without fear or sugar-coating. But in the summer after my salvation, I did not connect to other Christians in any meaningful way. If you think of salvation as being rescued from captivity or as a prisoner of war, then over 4 months passed between being freed from the prison before I was returned to a friendly camp. I joined Higher Ground, the previous young adult ministry at Mount Ararat in late September/early October of 2001. I reconnected with a friend from high school named Nikki, who I knew from high school as one of the nicest people in school (I think she was named Friendliest in the Senior Superlatives). She bought me a fabulous book by John Ortberg called The Life You Always Wanted, which was the first time I was ever presented with the hub/spokes metaphor. Rather than place God at the top of a list of priorities, place God at the center of everything and allow all other things to flow out from your relationship with God. Because of that, I've never made a list where I put God first, then had to choose from all the other important things in my life to second, third, in priority. Is being a husband more important than being a father? Is my job more important than my parents or siblings? I recognize that each of these areas are important, but only operate as they should when they flow out from the relationship I have with God and if I put His glory at supreme value.
So I have loved signing Steve Fee's "Glory to God Forever" followed by his "No One Higher/The Stand" medley the past two Sundays. What a definitive statement of priority and value! I love closing my eyes and just forgetting where I am and who is around and just expressing the words from these songs back to God.
I was going to relate these things to the NCAA tournament and the Coldplay concert I watched on HDNet this past weekend, but I think I'm going to work on fleshing that topic out a little more for another post.
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