Praying The Lord’s Name In Vain

Posted by Jim Thornber on September 15, 2016
Posted in: Christian Spirituality, Religion, Scripture. Tagged: , , , , , . Leave a comment

Ex. 20:7—“You must not misuse the name of the LORD your God. The LORD will not let you go unpunished if you misuse his name” (NLT).

misusedJust for the fun of it, I’ve been reading the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Old Covenant. I’ve been in Exodus the past few days, zooming right along and having a good time, right up until I got to Ex. 20:7, the third of the Ten Commandments. This one stopped me in my tracks. Like many of us, I’ve memorized this verse from the King James Version, which says, “Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain.” This commandment extends the idea of the second commandment, for just as God forbids us to show disrespect to Him by making a god out of something that is not God, it is also a disgrace to use His Name without a legitimate or valid reason.

Until now, I’ve mostly thought of taking the Lord’s name in vain as cursing. When I was barely a teenager, I’d often get frustrated and say, “Jeee-sus Chrii-st,” as if it was His fault I wasn’t getting my way. My dad heard me say that once and he shot me a look that has stayed with me for 35 years, and I’ve (mostly) succeeded in not saying it again.

Other times, I’ve heard people vainly use His name to express surprise or disappointment, or even fill in the gaps in prayer. This last one I find especially irritating. When I’m speaking to someone, I don’t find it necessary to use their name seventeen times in a sentence, so why would I repeatedly use God’s name when I’m praying in public? For instance, how many times have you heard a prayer like this: “Dear God, we come to you Father God and ask you God that you Father God would hear our prayers, Father God, for God you are a God who heals, Father God, and God…” That type of prayer DRIVES ME NUTS! First, God already knows you’re talking to Him, so you don’t have to try to get His attention by droning His name on and on. Second, I see no legitimate or valid reason to repeat God’s name because one has nothing better to say.

However, my reading of Ex. 20:7 in the New Living Testament starting me thinking in a completely new direction, and its implications bothered me.  I wonder how many times I have misused His name by praying for things that feeds my desires—many times at the expense of others—and capping it off with a quick, “In Jesus name, Amen.” To pray “In Jesus Name” is not some sort of spiritual abracadabra wherein God must comply with our prayers because we have said the magic formula. The fact is, many of us simply pray our own desires to enhance our own name and stature and attempt to use God’s power with an “In Jesus name” tag at the end of our prayers in order to accomplish our own will and desires.

To pray in the name of Jesus means so much more than merely uttering the syllables. His Name includes His nature, being and very person. It also means His morals, teaching and doctrine. It means I know His will before I pray it—I’m not guessing at what He would want. I don’t pray for a bigger house if I’m not taking care of the one I have. I don’t look for a different spouse if I’m not treating the one I have now with the respect God requires. I don’t ask for lots of money if my purpose is to spend it on myself. God created the earth because He wanted to share His abundant goodness with His creation. He didn’t create it so we may keep our portion to ourselves.

When Jesus taught His disciples to pray, the first thing He taught them to say was “Hallowed be your name” (Matt. 6:9).  Above all else, our lives are to reflect the holiness of the character of God. This passage in Exodus has me thinking about the way I pray, why I seek God, and what I ask Him for. I learned at a young age not to substitute His name for an expletive. Now I want my whole life, especially my prayer life, to reflect the sacredness of His Name.

 

A Poor Widow’s Rich Offering

Posted by Jim Thornber on August 16, 2016
Posted in: Christian Spirituality, Church, Religion, Scripture. Tagged: , , , , . Leave a comment

“A poor widow came by and dropped in two small coins. ‘I tell you the truth,’ Jesus said, ‘this poor widow has given more than all the rest of them. . . she, as poor as she is, has given everything she has.’” Luke 21:2-4 (NLT)

This passage is an instant challenge and bothers me for one reason: I don’t know if I could drop everything I have in God’s collection box and walk away.

Yet, that is exactly what this widow did. She took her entire net worth, two of the smallest of Jewish coins, walked into the presence of God, and without considering anyone was watching, especially God as Messiah, dropped them in the collection box and walked away. She didn’t get a receipt, couldn’t write it off on her taxes as a charitable donation and didn’t tell the pastor she no longer had food money or bus fare to return home. She simply gave her all to God and walked away because that was what her heart wanted to do.

Not me. My ego always struggles with acknowledgment. I want the leaders of the church and denominational officials (and truth be told, God, to a lesser extent) to know exactly what I’m sacrificing. I not only want my left hand to know what my right hand is doing (Matt. 6:3), I want them to get together and start and avalanche of applause because I’ve done it. Who really wants to give in secret when a bunch of our friends can get together and give us a big party for all our generosity?

Actually, many people give just like this unnamed widow woman: generously, anonymously, and almost fearful somebody will find out. They live to give and look for ways to invest in the Kingdom. I know they’re out there because I’ve met them. I’ve even went to church with a few of them. One millionaire I met said all he wants to do is make God famous with his money. Looking back on it, I wonder if he meant he wanted to make God famous with his own personal money or with the money he knows is already God’s. Either way, the result was the same – a complete investment in the Kingdom of God.

I can’t help but wonder what that would look like – completely investing every thing I have in God’s Kingdom. How would it feel to walk into the Temple of God, take everything I own, drop it at His feet and walk away? I know I was supposed to have done that when I accepted Jesus as my Savior and claimed Him as my Lord. But in reality, I’m grateful Jesus is my Savior but I’ve retained lordship, possession and control of most everything else. It’s my name on Friday’s paycheck, my name on the registration of the truck, my name on the gas bill and my name on the church sign, right after the name of the church – the church name that doesn’t mention God. I claim Him as Savior but live as my own Lord. And now, a poor widow woman is challenging my professed, but not yet possessed, spirituality.

Maybe if I had nothing but a couple of coins in my pocket it would be easier to give it up. But then, maybe not. If I don’t have a generous spirit with everything I have now, what’s to say I’d be more generous if I had less?

I wish I had a good answer to these questions. I do know I need to spend more time talking with God about my attitude toward His stuff, remembering that everything from the paycheck to the cell phone and everything in between is actually His. Maybe when that truly becomes a reality, the story or a poor woman’s rich offering will stop being a challenge because I’ll finally be as generous as she was. But until then, I hope this story never stops bothering me.

God Factors In Our Detours

Posted by Jim Thornber on July 17, 2016
Posted in: Christian Spirituality, Religion, Scripture. Tagged: , , . Leave a comment


“As the sun was setting, Abram fell into a deep sleep, and a thick and dreadful darkness came over him. Then the Lord said to him, “Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own, and they will be enslaved and mistreated four hundred years… In the fourth generation your descendants will come back here, for the sin of the Amorites has not yet reached its full measure”. Genesis 15:12-16

 God confuses me. I’ve been reading the book of Genesis, and His whole treatment of Abraham seems like a bundle of contradictions. 

 First, God told Abraham he would make him into a great nation (Gen. 12:2), only to withhold the birth of Isaac for twenty-five years. Then God told Abraham to “look north and south, east and west. All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever” (Gen. 13:14-15), while in chapter 15 God tells Abraham his descendants would live as slaves in Egypt for four hundred years before they would come back and possess the land. I’ve discovered that reading the Bible is a bit like reading a spy novel; you really don’t know how all the pieces fit together until you’ve finished the last chapter. Of course, the same thing could be about my life. I won’t really know how all the parts fit together until I’ve lived the final chapter.

 This is what challenges me about Genesis 15—sometimes when I think I’ve missed God’s direction for my life, it turns out that God has factored in my detours. Furthermore, about the time I think my detours are a result of sin, I often find they are God’s gift to prepare me for my promise.  

 Until your life is over and there are daisies over your grave, you cannot truly miss God. And even if you try to hide from Him like Adam and Eve did, He still has a way of finding you! He knows the detours you will take and factors them into the equation of your life. Ps. 139:16 says God has counted all our days, and He even makes allowances for the times we think we’ve missed His will and direction. Time away from our Promised Land is a time for growth. The Israelites needed to grow large and strong as a nation and a family before the appointed time when God would release them to possess their inheritance. We may think the days and years we’ve spent doing things other than possessing our promises are wasted years, but this is not true in the economy of God.

 Sometimes the detours in your life are simply God preparing you for your future, as He did with the Israelites. But God not only prepares us, He prepares the place we are going to inhabit. This hit home when I finally saw Gen. 15:16, where God told Abraham his descendants would return after four hundred years, “For the sins of the Amorites do not yet warrant their destruction” (New Living Testament). 

 God will not punish a nation or an individual until the time warrants their destruction, or as the NIV phrases it, reaches “its full measure.” Not only is God preparing you and me for the next phase or our lives, He is also waiting patiently for others to find their place in His will. God would not give the land of Canaan to the Israelites because the Amorites did not yet deserve to be removed. God’s loving patience with others may be the reason I’m in the middle of a detour. But that is good, for ultimately God takes no delight in the death of the wicked (Ezek. 33:11). God’s patience with sinners does not mean He approves of their behavior, but that He is allowing them time to repent. And until the time and place was prepared, the Israelites were not ready to inherit the land of God’s promise. Likewise, until others have had a chance to obey the Lord, it may not be time for us to move in and accomplish His will. 

 Phil. 1:6 says, “And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns” (NLT). So take heart if you do not know your future. Don’t despair if you think you’ve taken one detour after another in your travels with the Lord. God knows where you’ve been, where you are, and where you are going. And if you find yourself on a detour, you might as well enjoy the scenery along the way.

Scriptures That Bother Me — 2 Kings 5:1-19

Posted by Jim Thornber on July 9, 2016
Posted in: Christian Spirituality. Tagged: , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Dipping in the River of Humility

 

If you haven’t done so in a while, go read 2 Kings 5:1-19 and then come back to this article. I’ll wait….Jordan_River_entering_Sea_of_Galilee_aerial

When I read the story about Naaman, two things stand out and cause me pause. First, why does the Old Testament give an entire chapter to this one character and his leprosy? And two, why am I so familiar with just how Naaman must have felt when he was told to wash in the puny Jordan River?

Regarding the first question: I haven’t a clue as to why an entire chapter is given over to this story. I figure God thought it important but hasn’t told me why. Regarding the second question: I am truly bothered by Naaman’s response to Elijah’s directives to go wash in the Jordan. Here is a highly regarded warrior whom the king of Aram knew to be a great man, “because through him the LORD had given victory to Aram” (vs. 1). Aram, by the way, is also known as Syria, whose capital is Damascus. But I digress.

Naaman is a great warrior, esteemed by all, adored by the masses and rich enough to own a slave girl imported from Israel. His only problem seemed to be a small case of leprosy, which is a bit more distressing than acute acne by not as bad terminal cancer. He’s a great warrior and respected by his peers. He’s a bit like me, if you will; a warrior with words and respected by the dozens of people who know I like to write.

Now comes the crisis (leprosy, or cancer or something tragic in my life like another rejection letter from an editor) and the solution (go bathe in a muddy stream, or bow to God or apologize to your family for being selfish or something equally mundane). “Wait!” I want to shout, “I’m a SOMEBODY. Elijah, you can’t be serious.  Don’t just send out your maid and tell me to do something mundane. I’m special and I want special treatment!”

That’s it, right? I know I’m somebody special and I want the world to acknowledge it. But God isn’t interested in my feelings; He’s interested in my obedience (Have you noticed how Scripture is painfully lacking when it comes to God’s concern for our feelings?). And you know, perhaps if I were a tad quicker in my obedience, I’d be less popular during my times of disobedience. Do I really want almost an entire chapter in Scripture given over to one verse of compliments and eighteen verses of me acting selfish and childish?

But I still can’t help but identify with Naaman.  I still want my name to be called out by the prophet and given a spectacular assignment that will seal my name and fame among the amassed throng of admirers. Yeah, I know that sounds silly, but I also know that it strikes a chord with many of us. Don’t you know that the spectacular is a tool of the devil to get our focus off God? Remember, it was Satan who took Jesus to the highest point of the temple and said, “If you are the Son of God throw yourself down.” That would be a crowd-gatherer. But that wasn’t what Jesus was about. Instead, Jesus was so unspectacular that at the end of His life there were only about a half-dozen folk who even made it to His execution.

So here is the lesson: Beware of trading the simple life of obedience for the tug and temptation of the spectacular at the expense of your soul. Jesus told the devil what he could do with his suggestions (see Matthew 4:7) to place pride before purpose, and perhaps you and I should learn to do the same. God may choose to do great things through me, but it will never be at my suggestion. People will see God’s greatness in my life when I am willing to bow my heart in humble submission to His directions. I must learn to decrease so that He may increase.