When I was a boy we used to get a flower and pull the petals off, one by one. And as we pulled the petals we would say, alternatively, “She loves me. She loves me not. She loves me. She loves me not.” And the last petal would be the verdict. If it ended with “she loves me”, then the girlfriend of the moment was in love with us. But if the last petal ended with “she loves me not”, then we were out of luck. If it was someone we really, really liked then we would do it over and over until it ended the way we wanted it to end.
Why is love so difficult, so fleeting, so choosy? Why is it said of Christians that they are the only army that shoots their own? A young applicant for a summer camp ministry team was recently asked by the director, “Have you ever worked in ministry before? You need to know that we tend to eat our own.”
The story is told of a man walking across a bridge one evening, who happened upon another man, sitting on the railing, planning to jump off into the river below to end his life. The man on a stroll asked the despondent man some questions, hoping to calm him down and gain his trust, so as to help him out of his despair. He asked if he was a man of faith, and he was. He asked him what church he attended and they discovered that they were both Baptist. He asked which branch of the Baptist he was and again they found they were the same. So they began to rejoice, and drew close, like long lost brothers. They he asked him if he was in agreement with the view of the Southern Synod on the issue of ecclesiology. The man answered firmly, “No, I am not. I hold to the view of the Western Synod.” And with that the first man shoved him off the bridge.
Love is the greatest. The greatest gift, the greatest fruit, the greatest evidence, the greatest empowerment. But we tend to turn it on and turn it off at will. We pour it on when convenient, or when it is to our advantage. Then we turn it off for those whom we choose.
One of my favorite movies is “Princess Bride”. It has some classic quotes in it. “Never go up against a Sicilian when death is on the line.” Or the one I have on a t-shirt that my wife got for me, “Inconceivable!” But the best ones have to do with love. “As you wish.” Or the doctor saying over the almost dead Wesley, “True love, now that’s a noble cause.” The movie appeals to me because it tells a story of true love, love that cannot be deterred or defeated, not by years as a pirate, not by torture or the deceit of a competing paramour, nor even by the duty and mission of war and revenge. Love is the greatest.
“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered. It keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails…. These three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.” ( I Corinthians 13)
My prayer is this. “Lord, you told us to love our enemies. But sometimes I find it easier to love my enemies than to love my brothers. And I am appalled at myself. Not great big moral differences, but simple little irritations cause me to avoid loving. I become negative, pessimistic, biting, or just plain silent. So help me Lord to love. To love like you love, full of grace and encouragement. When I get to the last petal of the flower it is not a 50/50 chance of love, but a choice. I choose to love.”
July 26, 2010
July 10, 2010
Makor
“Always go to the source. That’s my rule. Always go to the source.” He was a lawyer. We were talking, trying to sort out a “character assassination”. What he meant was that unless, and until, you go to the source you will have only opinion, rumor, misinformation, and confusion. “Go to the source.” And I never forgot his advice.
Makor is the Hebrew word for source, usually applied to a fountain, a spring, a well, a source of fresh, living water. This source has nothing to do with getting accurate information, though. Rather, it has everything to do with spiritual life. But the advice is the same, “Go to the source.”
I woke up from a dream with a single word, makor, the focal point. In the dream a group was reading and studying Revelation. Spontaneously, everyone got excited and started pointing at a verse, thumping their Bibles, and exclaiming, “Makor, Makor.” The context of the dream wasn’t important, but the word was, I knew for sure. So I began to study and research the word. It turned out to be a Hebrew word, and I have never studied Hebrew. After several weeks, and many pages of “bunny trail” notes, my wife Carol got up early one morning and interrupted my study and told me that she just had a dream.
She was driving along a highway and crossed over a beautiful, inviting stream. She stopped her car, got out, and went to the stream. Others were there, and they said that the stream was a natural spring-fed stream, and very refreshing. So she knelt down and scooped up several handfuls of water to drink. As she started back to the car, her curiosity drew her to want to go up to see the spring. But there was no road, only a trail. So she had to hike. Alone.
When she got there she found a large cave with a pure lake of water inside of it. The stream flowed from the cave. She walked into the large cave. Inside she noticed an old red and white pickup truck parked beside the lake. Behind the truck was an opening into a smaller cave, from which flowed water into the lake of the large cave. A man walked out from the smaller cave and began to talk with her. He said that it was his job to take care of the spring, to watch over it. He enjoyed having a visitor and had lots to say about the spring water. He enjoyed explaining and sharing his knowledge. He said that he wished others would come up to learn about the water, the source of the stream.
When she finished telling me her dream I was both amazed and relieved. Excited to have a word picture of “makor” In jest, I said to Carol, it’s not fair that I study for weeks to know what God is trying to get into my pea brain and you get a beautiful word-picture dream in ten minutes. The other thing I said was to ask her, how did that man get a truck up there in the cave if there was no road? Before she could respond I answered myself. “Well, I guess if you’re the Holy Spirit you don’t need a road, you can just plop down your pickup wherever you want to.”
Psalm 36:9 – “For with you is the fountain of life.”
Jeremiah 2:13 – “My people have committed two sins: they have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.”
John 4:14 – “Whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
John 7:38 – “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him. By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive.”
Revelation 7:17 – “For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their Shepherd; he will lead them to springs of living water.”
Revelation 22:1,17 – “Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb… Whoever is thirsty, let him come; and whoever wishes let him take the free gift of the water of life.”
Here are some questions to ponder:
The concept of “fountains of living water” is common throughout the Bible. Do we understand it as a word picture, an illustration of spiritual thirsting after the source of abundant life, namely, Jesus and the Holy Spirit? Or do we view it as a label on a bottle of tonic water, something to be ingested through the mouth? Did you notice, in Carol’s dream, that she never even took a drink from the source of water flowing from the small cave, but rather she fellowshipped with the mystical man of the red and white pickup truck? If I, Jesus, came to you personally, how would you drink of the living water I continually offer you? How did the woman at the well of Sychar (John 4) drink of the living water I offered her? Or did you miss that fact (John 4:39-42)?
Which seems more living? A drink from a spring-fed stream several miles from its source, after it has flowed through stagnant little eddies, and through pastures polluted by animal waste and other contaminants? Or a drink from the source of that stream? Is the hike up the little trail worth it, away from the highway and group watering hole? Or worse yet, how often do we seek to satisfy our spiritual thirst with cistern water, pots of water drawn from the stream but stored for quick and easy access? Is it even possible to store up the source of life in a putrid cistern?
How often do you ever get thirsty? With water instantly available at the turn of a faucet can we contemplate and appreciate how valuable the wells were that Isaac and Jacob dug in the land of promise? Can we even relate then to the word picture of spiritual thirsting for the source of living water? For what do you thirst in your inner being? How often do you drink of Jesus, joyfully and worshipfully reliant on Him and upon the Holy Spirit, whom Jesus poured out in us in power and love, a river of life?
Are you one who thinks that fellowshipping with the man in the cave by the red and white pickup is far too mystical? Do you view the Word of God as the only source of living water? Then you must ask yourself, in all honesty, is the Word living and powerful to you (Hebrews 4:12), or has it become lifeless, a mere icon? Have you allowed the incessant verbiage of books and teachers to shape your inner person rather than the living truth of the living Word of God? Is it possible that the Word of God can become an end in itself rather than a conduit to the Source (see John 5:39-40)?
You are not full until you are overflowing. First you must thirst, then you must be filled, then the fountain of living water will flow out of you (John 7:38).
Makor is the Hebrew word for source, usually applied to a fountain, a spring, a well, a source of fresh, living water. This source has nothing to do with getting accurate information, though. Rather, it has everything to do with spiritual life. But the advice is the same, “Go to the source.”
I woke up from a dream with a single word, makor, the focal point. In the dream a group was reading and studying Revelation. Spontaneously, everyone got excited and started pointing at a verse, thumping their Bibles, and exclaiming, “Makor, Makor.” The context of the dream wasn’t important, but the word was, I knew for sure. So I began to study and research the word. It turned out to be a Hebrew word, and I have never studied Hebrew. After several weeks, and many pages of “bunny trail” notes, my wife Carol got up early one morning and interrupted my study and told me that she just had a dream.
She was driving along a highway and crossed over a beautiful, inviting stream. She stopped her car, got out, and went to the stream. Others were there, and they said that the stream was a natural spring-fed stream, and very refreshing. So she knelt down and scooped up several handfuls of water to drink. As she started back to the car, her curiosity drew her to want to go up to see the spring. But there was no road, only a trail. So she had to hike. Alone.
When she got there she found a large cave with a pure lake of water inside of it. The stream flowed from the cave. She walked into the large cave. Inside she noticed an old red and white pickup truck parked beside the lake. Behind the truck was an opening into a smaller cave, from which flowed water into the lake of the large cave. A man walked out from the smaller cave and began to talk with her. He said that it was his job to take care of the spring, to watch over it. He enjoyed having a visitor and had lots to say about the spring water. He enjoyed explaining and sharing his knowledge. He said that he wished others would come up to learn about the water, the source of the stream.
When she finished telling me her dream I was both amazed and relieved. Excited to have a word picture of “makor” In jest, I said to Carol, it’s not fair that I study for weeks to know what God is trying to get into my pea brain and you get a beautiful word-picture dream in ten minutes. The other thing I said was to ask her, how did that man get a truck up there in the cave if there was no road? Before she could respond I answered myself. “Well, I guess if you’re the Holy Spirit you don’t need a road, you can just plop down your pickup wherever you want to.”
Psalm 36:9 – “For with you is the fountain of life.”
Jeremiah 2:13 – “My people have committed two sins: they have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.”
John 4:14 – “Whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
John 7:38 – “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him. By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive.”
Revelation 7:17 – “For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their Shepherd; he will lead them to springs of living water.”
Revelation 22:1,17 – “Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, as clear as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb… Whoever is thirsty, let him come; and whoever wishes let him take the free gift of the water of life.”
Here are some questions to ponder:
The concept of “fountains of living water” is common throughout the Bible. Do we understand it as a word picture, an illustration of spiritual thirsting after the source of abundant life, namely, Jesus and the Holy Spirit? Or do we view it as a label on a bottle of tonic water, something to be ingested through the mouth? Did you notice, in Carol’s dream, that she never even took a drink from the source of water flowing from the small cave, but rather she fellowshipped with the mystical man of the red and white pickup truck? If I, Jesus, came to you personally, how would you drink of the living water I continually offer you? How did the woman at the well of Sychar (John 4) drink of the living water I offered her? Or did you miss that fact (John 4:39-42)?
Which seems more living? A drink from a spring-fed stream several miles from its source, after it has flowed through stagnant little eddies, and through pastures polluted by animal waste and other contaminants? Or a drink from the source of that stream? Is the hike up the little trail worth it, away from the highway and group watering hole? Or worse yet, how often do we seek to satisfy our spiritual thirst with cistern water, pots of water drawn from the stream but stored for quick and easy access? Is it even possible to store up the source of life in a putrid cistern?
How often do you ever get thirsty? With water instantly available at the turn of a faucet can we contemplate and appreciate how valuable the wells were that Isaac and Jacob dug in the land of promise? Can we even relate then to the word picture of spiritual thirsting for the source of living water? For what do you thirst in your inner being? How often do you drink of Jesus, joyfully and worshipfully reliant on Him and upon the Holy Spirit, whom Jesus poured out in us in power and love, a river of life?
Are you one who thinks that fellowshipping with the man in the cave by the red and white pickup is far too mystical? Do you view the Word of God as the only source of living water? Then you must ask yourself, in all honesty, is the Word living and powerful to you (Hebrews 4:12), or has it become lifeless, a mere icon? Have you allowed the incessant verbiage of books and teachers to shape your inner person rather than the living truth of the living Word of God? Is it possible that the Word of God can become an end in itself rather than a conduit to the Source (see John 5:39-40)?
You are not full until you are overflowing. First you must thirst, then you must be filled, then the fountain of living water will flow out of you (John 7:38).
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