The Phil Files

Bread. Generally not a very fancy product. While it may be the staff of life, we normally take it for granted. Yet Jesus chose it to be the way we remember Him, share in His Body, and celebrate our life in community together.

What we call bread can vary widely from place to place and table to table, yet it is still called bread. And Jesus teaches us to pray for daily bread. Not very fancy, not very extravagant, and certainly not very special … unless you don’t have it.

Our Father who art in heaven,
Hallowed be they name.

Thy kingdom come,
Thy will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread;
And forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors;

And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.

For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory, forever. Amen.

In praying for daily bread, we are reminding ourselves of the miracle of God in the most common of things and in the most ordinary of shared events — eating bread together. We are to recognize God’s miracle in the most ordinary of circumstances — sharing bread together in a common daily meal.

In my weekly Heartlight.org post, Grace Beyond the Miracle, I suggest that maybe the greater miracle in Jesus’ healing stories is often missed: the restoration of people back to their normal, everyday lives. There is something miraculous about the ordinary … about having daily bread and recognizing that it is a gift from our Father’s hand.

For that article, I suggested some questions that include below:

What is your favorite miracle of healing or exorcism performed by Jesus?

• Why?
• How does the miracle end?
• What is accomplished by the ending of this miracle that is as important as the miracle itself?

How does our sense of individualism impact our seeing the importance of restoring a person back into community found in so many of the miracles of Jesus?

• How would many of Jesus’ miracles have been incomplete without this “grace beyond the miracle” occurring?

How have you felt the miracle of:

• … forgiveness?
• … fellowship?
• … acceptance?
• … service?
• … mission?

Could these have been fully experienced without sharing them with someone else or in community?

Who are what shapes your identity?

This is a starchy question that I ask myself face-to-face in the morning mirror. I don’t know about you, but this question takes some soul-searching. I oftentimes let the borders of my identity-shaping world crumble and the desire to be accepted, respected, and valued come rushing in like water through a breached levy.

I would like to say my Father in heaven shapes my sense of identity — self-worth, value, life-mission, purpose, and meaning. On good days, days tuned by the music of heaven, this is true. But, staring that familiar mug in the mirror, I have to admit that far too often I forget my Father’s words of affirmation: “You are my son, who I love, with you, I am well pleased.”

In my Heartlight.org post this week — entitled “Who are You?” — I explore this whole identity issue and who shapes it for us. This was a crucial question for Jesus and it remains the key question for us. I would love for my heart to be yielded and my faith to be firm so that I could always let God’s view and value of me shape that identity, but I forget. I forget who He is. I forget what He has done for me in Jesus. I forget how long He has known me. I forget He is the one who shaped me in the womb. I forget the cost He paid to redeem me and reclaim me. I forget who I am. So I come back to the Lord’s Prayer today — well really late this evening — and I don’t have to get far before I am reminded who I am!

Our Father who art in heaven,
Hallowed be they name.

Thy kingdom come,
Thy will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread;
And forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors;

And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.

For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory, forever. Amen.

“Our Father!” Simple words. Life-orienting words. Identity shaping words.

“Our!” I am part of a community. I am not alone. I belong. My voice is joined to other voices. My life is part of a larger story of interlocking and overlapping stories. My world is shaped by a shared journey. You are a part of my world. We share life and we anticipate and encourage each other to a shared future. We are, in spiritual reality, family.

“Father!” God has graced me and empowered me and invited me to call Him — the Holy One, the Majesty on High, the High and Exalted Creator, the Holy One of Israel — my Abba Father. I am His child. I am His beloved one. His value of me can shape and give purpose to my life.

And so I choose to believe what I pray, knowing that when I do, my identity is reset to a higher value, an eternal purpose, and a gracious future.

O dear Father, please help me hang on to this sense of who I am in the middle of my mess ups and under the assault of the enemy’s attacks. Give me wisdom to not trade Your view of me for some quick fix from those who are willing to share their false accolades of me for a moment as long as they get what they want from me. In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.

Now for a few questions from the “Who are You?” post:

Why is the question of identity in Christ so important?

How does being unsure of our identity make us vulnerable to temptation?

Why do you think that the devil began Jesus’ temptations with the question about His identity? (“If you are the son of God …”)

• How does God’s affirmation of His son after His baptism prepare Jesus for the time of temptation (Luke 3:21-22; Luke 4:1-13)?
• What’s the difference between doing good things to gain God’s love, approval, and acceptance from doing good things because God has already claimed you as his Masterpiece, Prince/Princess, his Beloved child? (Ephesians 2:1-10; Colossians 1:21-23)

What are other stories about Jesus changing the perception of people’s identity?

Why is it so important that He showed to others that their identity is no longer what they once were, but who they are now (1 Corinthians 6:9-11)?

• Why did Jesus have the leper go show himself to the priest after his healing (Mark 1:40-44)?
• Why did Jesus call out the woman who was healed when she touched the hem of Jesus’ garment (Mark 4:24-34)?
• Why did Jesus emphasize that the formerly sinful woman who anointed His feet with her tears and dried them with her hair had been forgiven much (Luke 7:36-50)?

What do you need to do to realize, claim, and live out your real identity in Jesus (Ephesians 2:1-10; 1 Corinthians 6:9-11; Colossians 1:21-23)?

I can remember as a boy, in the summer between my fifth and sixth grade years in school, I was trying to wrap my head around eternity — what forever meant. I know now that this mental struggle was part of the journey through puberty as the abstract thinking part of my mind began to unfold. Sometimes in those long ago days, forever felt daunting. Sometimes it seemed wonderful. Sometimes it was just flat out scary. All the time, forever seemed like … well … like a long long time.

Those years are on my mind today as I prepare to help with the funeral for the mother of one of my childhood friends. This mother’s name is June Smith. For all of my life, I have known her as Mrs. Smith. Her presence is frozen in my mind as Brad’s mom.

As we prepared for her funeral, the family spoke with quiet assurance of June’s “forever” as she passed from this life to the next:

June Fry Smith entered the presence of the Lord and began a wonderful new life. … Knowing all good things in life come to an end, June looked forward to the next life and being in the presence of The One who blessed her so much in this life.

It is not surprising that when I opened Mrs. Smith’s Bible, it fell open to a well marked verse in the most used portion of her of Bible (Ephesians 1 and 2):

In Him you also, who have heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and have believed in Him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, which is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire the possession of it, to the praise of His glory (Ephesians 1:13-14 RSV).

I like the strong flavor of the words “salvation” and “believed” and “sealed” and “promised” and “guarantee” and “possession” and “inheritance.”  These strong words are ours because of grace and God  and Jesus and the Holy Spirit. These words remind us of the joy of our forever in Christ Jesus our Lord!

Seems like I deal a lot more with “forever” issues these days. Of course the reality is, I have always dealt with them, I hope that I am just much more aware of these forever realities now than in previous years. So when I come to those closing words of great Scripture passages that include the word forever, I pay more attention to the forever now than before. These “forevers” are not just part of the window dressing of a great passage, but are instead the holy exclamation mark that punctuates and highlights the importance of the sure hope we have in Jesus.

So today, when I pray the Lord’s prayer, I will rejoice that all forevers belong to the Lord, who taught us to pray:

Our Father who art in heaven,
Hallowed be they name.

Thy kingdom come,
Thy will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread;
And forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors;

And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.

For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory.

Forever!

Amen.

I hate to wait! Bet you do, too. Yet over the last several decades, study after study suggest that the average American spends 5-7 years of his or her life waiting in line (Europeans wait a little more and those from Asia even more) — by my calculations, it may be closer to 3-4 years, but who is going to quarrel of  2 or 3 years of life?

While I know that is not encouraging news, it is important for us to acknowledge because it makes us hear the call to “wait on the Lord” in a different light. Our knee-jerk response to waiting on anybody or anything is negative. So this spiritual call to come wait on and in the presence of the Lord sounds like a waste of time and a delay in our schedule. Now clearly, getting away to quiet place and resting in the presence of the Lord and waiting on His leading is a beautiful and necessary break in our hectic lives. But that doesn’t sound like waiting in our understanding of the term.

So when the Lord calls on us to wait to on Him (Isaiah 40:31; Luke 24:48; Acts 1:4), let’s hear it for what He means. This is not a waste of time waiting, but a resting in expectation of His meeting us, renewing us, restoring us, and empowering us with His Holy Spirit. It is submitting to Him and seeking His presence. This is asking Him to send His Holy Spirit into our lives to empower us to be His people (Luke 11:13) and asking Him to bless and transform the lives of our brothers and sisters in Christ (Ephesians 3:14-21). This is not waiting, it is eager anticipation:

In the morning, O Lord, you hear my voice; in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait in expectation (Psalm 5:3 NIV).

So don’t — but rest, expect, hope, anticipate, intercede, trust … in the Lord and on Lord. Think of prayer as active submission and intentional rest and eager expectation! Don’t equate waiting on the Lord with waiting in line. Waiting on God is an active choice to be changed, nurtured, empowered, and surrender to the Creator and Sustainer of the universe who who wants us to draw near to Him as Abba Father. (For more on this see my Heartlight.org article this week, “Where’s the Power?”)

And today, as we come to the Lord’s Prayer, we will pray for God’s Kingdom to come and His will to be done in our lives waiting in expectation!

Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us today our daily bread.

And forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.

And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one.

For yours is the kingdom and the power
and the glory forever. Amen.

And for your consideration and mediation, here are some questions about waiting on the Lord:

Why do you think it is so hard for us to “wait” on the Lord in prayer, worship, and seeking His guidance?

What is the difference in praying and praying with expectation that God is going to do something only He can do?

Paul uses the phrase “I eagerly expect and hope” to talk about God’s work in life and death to bring Him glory and bring Paul deliverance (Philippians 1:19-25).

What difference does it make to approach God’s promises with expectation and hope?

Paul expects God to act with power through his prayers for the Ephesians (see the Scriptures mentioned above) can we expect God to do the same for the people in our church?

Of course, Paul challenges the Ephesians to expect God to work and to submit their lives to God. How can we do this in our spiritual family?

Read through the story of Jesus feeding the 5,000 again, and share some principles from this story that fit the theme of prayer and the release of God’s power (Luke 9:10-17).

For God so loved the world, He did not send a committee!

I remember when I first read this bumper sticker 14-15 years ago in church parking lot. I laughed out loud even by myself. Being involved in church ministry for well over 30 years, I know our tendency to make everything into a program and then create a committee to carry out that program. In the years since, I’ve seen and hear this bumper sticker modified in different ways. For God so loved the world, He didn’t send …

• a program.
• a clergyman.
• an initiative.
• a politician.
• a parachurch ministry.
• a radio program.
• a book.
• a philosopher (or philosophy).
• etc.

Now don’t misunderstand: there is nothing inherently wrong with any of the above. But God didn’t send one of those, He sent Jesus, His Son.

And just as God sent Jesus into the world, Jesus has sent us! (Matthew 28:18-20; John 17:18; 20:21) We are the ones called to carry out Jesus’ ministry in the world. No wonder that one of the key images of Jesus’ church is “the Body of Christ.” We are His presence in the world. And since we are sent into the world as Jesus was, that changes everything … especially our sense of strategy, purpose, mission, and evangelism.

In my Heartlight.org article this week, also called Incarnational, I try to distinguish between the difference of looking at the Great Commission of Jesus as an evangelism passage or a call to incarnational ministry. I tried to define incarnational ministry and proclaiming, training, and living the Good News of the Kingdom with people. In our church, we try to define our mission in similar terms. We want to be God’s community front porch — a place where folks can meet  God and His family. But for that to happen, we know we have to invite them into the life of Jesus (proclaim), include them in the family of Jesus (live), and involve them in the mission of Jesus (train).

Incarantaional ministry means that we have to enter the worlds of those who do not know Jesus, walk alongside them, and accompany them through the transformation the Holy Spirit carries out in their lives when they yield to the Lordship of Jesus. If we don’t, we’ve just spoken a message — we’ve only given them a drive by sound-byte of the Kingdom of God. God didn’t do that. His message, His Word, was enfleshed in Jesus (John 1:1-18). How can we do anything less?

Cody is  friend on our Refresh planning team who recently moved out of town. As I was thinking through these ideas of incarnational ministry, like a gift from heaven, Cody’s email arrived where he pointed us to the following video trying to capture the essential difference of God’s offer of salvation in Jesus versus other religious answers. It is a fundamental difference. God didn’t send a message or even just a messenger. God came and entered our mess Himself, vulnerable to our stuff, to include us.

Here are some discussion questions for home gatherings or small groups. I’d love to get your take on some or all of them and the whole concept of incarnational ministry.

What is difference between evangelism and incarnational ministry?

How can such an approach make your life more purposeful?

Do you think a good definition of incarnational ministry is “people who proclaim, train, and live the Good News of Jesus alongside those they want to reach”?

Which of the three is most important — proclaim, train, or live the Good News?

Can we fulfill the Great Commission of Jesus and leave out any of these three elements?

What do you need to do to incorporate an incarnational approach of Good News Kingdom living into your daily life?

How can such an approach make your life more purposeful?

Where can you incorporate this incarnational approach to Good News Kingdom living into your daily life?

How does it work in your family? (Deuteronomy 6:1-9)
How does it work in your workplace or school? (1 Peter 3:15)
How does it work in your public life? (Matthew 5:13-16)

Who is someone with whom you can partner in an accountability commitment to fulfill the Great Commission in your world?

How are we doing to do it? We’re running so far behind our budget, what are we going to do? Could it just be a summer slump, or has the economy really set in and we are going to be dealing with this a long time? With all the increase in federal spending, what are we going to do to compensate with the great reduction in taxes going to the federal government?

These are all real questions I have heard the last three days — I am away studying and out of the busy places my life often takes me! Some of the questions have been asked by family and friends. Others I have overheard in restaurants. Others were found in newspapers. Some have been asked about churches, others about families, others about government agencies, and still others by business folks worried about the hidden time bombs in our economy — increasing deficits, tighter budgets, more rounds of defaulting on loans.

If we want, we can sure get pessimistic and fearful! So let’s pray the Lord’s prayer and then read the echo of one clear principle that Jesus gives us a few verses later:

Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us today our daily bread.

And forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.

And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one.

For yours is the kingdom and the power
and the glory forever. Amen.

Yes, I believe I am to be responsible and have some plans for the future, especially plans that involve living and serving the Lord. But I must not let my fear create anxiety for the provision only the Lord can supply. So let’s pray, “Give us today!” while we remember the Lord’s call to stay in today and not worry about tomorrow:

But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own (Matthew 6:33-34 TNIV).