What Does Life in the Spirit Look Like? How Might I Live Like That?

 

Let's ask Jesus.  In John 6:63 (ESV), he says

It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life.

So it ISN’T the flesh, and it IS Jesus’ words.  Sometimes it helps to focus on what something ISN’T in order to understand what something IS.  What other guidance does the Bible offer?

Rev. Paul Beckingham will be reflecting on Romans 8:1-9 this week.  This letter from Paul to the church in Rome contrasts flesh and spirit.

Romans 8:1-9. ESV

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.

Without the benefit of Rev. Beckingham’s explanation, I found this passage a bit difficult to decipher.  I don’t find that the word “flesh” makes the meaning clear to me, so I turned to other translations for other words.  The Common English Bible (CEB) uses the word selfishness.  Here is the full passage:

So now there isn’t any condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death.  God has done what was impossible for the Law, since it was weak because of selfishness. God condemned sin in the body by sending his own Son to deal with sin in the same body as humans, who are controlled by sin. He did this so that the righteous requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us. Now the way we live is based on the Spirit, not based on selfishness.  People whose lives are based on selfishness think about selfish things, but people whose lives are based on the Spirit think about things that are related to the Spirit. The attitude that comes from selfishness leads to death, but the attitude that comes from the Spirit leads to life and peace.  So the attitude that comes from selfishness is hostile to God. It doesn’t submit to God’s Law, because it can’t. People who are self-centered aren’t able to please God. But you aren’t self-centered. Instead you are in the Spirit, if in fact God’s Spirit lives in you. If anyone doesn’t have the Spirit of Christ, they don’t belong to him. 

The MSG translation says something similar; it contrasts focusing on ourselves rather than focusing on God:

Focusing on the self is the opposite of focusing on God. Anyone completely absorbed in self ignores God, ends up thinking more about self than God. That person ignores who God is and what he is doing.

I know that I can only focus on one thing at a time.  If I focus on myself for too long and then switch my focus to God, I find that my spirit lifts.  Might that be Life in the Spirit?

I hope you can join us in the Dogwood Room (behind the stage in the Lower Hall) for Worship this Sunday.  Rev. Beckingham will be reflecting on life in the spirit and gathering us at the Lord’s Table.

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What Do Our Prayer Postures Tell Us?

 What did you hear during our Joys and Concerns praying last week?  What did you notice?

I noticed our postures…we didn't bow our heads like we usually do in church when we pray.  And didn’t Jesus often look up when he prayed?  I wonder what our postures can tell us?

Our postures last week were similar to our postures during circle conversation - postures of listening.

“Just as love to God begins with listening to his Word, so the beginning of love for the brethren is learning to listen to them.” - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

I’ve been thinking a lot about love this week.  I joined the CVC Advisory to serve the church, but now it has evolved into a committee that is surrounded and immersed in so much love that I can’t imagine my life without it.  It reminds me of Paul’s prayer for the church in Ephesus.  In his letter to them we read:

And I ask him that with both feet planted firmly on love, you’ll be able to take in with all followers of Jesus the extravagant dimensions of Christ’s love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God.

The Advisory Committee prays for each other often.  We hold each other up and we bear each other’s burdens.  We pray for each other because we love each other. 

And that love involves as much listening as it does praying. In order to pray for each other we need to invite confession of problems and weaknesses and then listen. 

That invitation and listening was what I noticed during our Joys and Concerns prayers last week.  It was a joy to see and to hear.  

This week, we will stay with Romans 8:20-28:

All around us we observe a pregnant creation.  The difficult times of pain throughout the world are simply birth pangs. But it’s not only around us; it’s within us. The Spirit of God is arousing us within. We’re also feeling the birth pangs. These sterile and barren bodies of ours are yearning for full deliverance. That is why waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a pregnant mother. We are enlarged in the waiting. We, of course, don’t see what is enlarging us. But the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy.

Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God’s Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don’t know how or what to pray, it doesn’t matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God. That’s why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.

I know that Rev. Donna will be listening as well as speaking.  

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How is Community Prayer Different from Personal Prayer? Is it OK to Pray for Ourselves During Community Prayer?

 

How is the praying we do in worship (“community prayer”) different from personal prayer?  Is it OK to pray for ourselves during community prayer?  These are just two of the questions that the CVC Advisory Committee grappled with this week.  What are your questions about prayer? 

We probably have all prayed for people we love in personal prayer.  But all kinds of things can affect how each of us enter into community prayer.  We recently talked in Circle Conversation about why community prayer is difficult, and the barriers were many.  We have also discovered through Circle Conversation that many of us are introverts.  This affects how we speak.  Did you know that extroverts think out loud and introverts think about their words before they say them?  

God loves us all just the way we are.  Being silent during prayer time is OK - some of us are thinking and some of us are trying to find the words, the emotions can be difficult…many reasons, right? 

Romans 8:26-28:

Meanwhile, the moment we get tired in the waiting, God’s Spirit is right alongside helping us along. If we don’t know how or what to pray, it doesn’t matter. He does our praying in and for us, making prayer out of our wordless sighs, our aching groans. He knows us far better than we know ourselves, knows our pregnant condition, and keeps us present before God. That’s why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.

Community prayer can draw us closer together, though, as I have discovered at the Advisory Committee.  When we pray together we share our concerns with each other.  

What can watching Jesus teach us about prayer?  Did Jesus pray in community or just alone?  We know that Jesus often went away to pray by himself.

But in the passage we read last week, when Jesus taught his disciples the Lord’s Prayer, did you notice that the pronouns are plural?  “Our father…Give us this day our daily bread…Forgive us our  trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.  Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.”  So the Lord’s Prayer is actually a community prayer.

And in John 17,  just before his betrayal and arrest, Jesus shared a final Passover meal with his friends.  Right before leaving the Upper Room, he prayed for himself, for his disciples, and for all believers.  And he did this with his friends.  I invite you to read it - it’s a great example of community prayer.

So yes, Jesus prayed alone and in community.  And He shows us that it is OK to pray for ourselves in church!

I hope you can join us this week for worship and praying.  Rev. Donna will be reflecting on Romans 8:22 - 28; I invite you to read that ahead of time.

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Why Do We Pray?

I confess that often I pray because I want things to be better.  I need God’s help because I can’t do the hard job of living all by myself.

Apparently I am not alone.  In the Psalms, the prayer book of God’s people, there are as many as 67 Psalms of Lament, depending on who is counting.  They are also known as Psalms of Complaint.  Some are individual complaints, some are for the community to pray.

“Prayer begins when God addresses us.  First God speaks; our response, our answer, is our prayer.  This is basic to understanding the practice of prayer: we never initiate prayer, even though we think we do.  Something has happened, Someone has spoken to us, before we open our mouths, whether we remember or are aware of it or not.” - Eugene Peterson, Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places

Hmmm…when I want things to be better than they seem to be, can I back the story up to better understand what I am responding to?  Maybe it would be useful to ask myself, “What New Beginning is God starting here that I am resisting?  How might I respond to what God is doing here?”

What did Jesus say about prayer?  In Matthew 6:9-15 (NRSV), we read

 “Pray, then, in this way:

Our Father in heaven,
    may your name be revered as holy.

    May your kingdom come.
   May 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 do not bring us to the time of trial,
        but rescue us from the evil one.

For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.

I invite you to read the same passage in the MSG version as well.  I noticed an interesting sentence added at the end of the same passage.  What do you notice?

We welcome back Rev. Donna Dinsmore this week, who will be reflecting on this passage and teaching us about prayer.  Once again, we will worship in the Dogwood Room (behind the Lower Hall Stage), where it is cooler than in the chapel.

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Do You Know How to Really Rest?

 

If you have a pet, watch them…they know how.

Most of us come from backgrounds that value hard work.  Some of us may find it difficult to stop and rest.  There is so much to do!  Who will look after it all if WE don’t do it?

But Jesus says in Matthew 11:28-30:

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

Jesus knows that we need rest…for our souls.  So how do we learn how to rest and put aside the massive weight of expectation to work, work, work?

When I watch Jesus, I see him withdraw from the fray periodically to pray.  Crowds were gathering to listen to him and to be cured.  Right after Luke observes this, we read:

Luke 5:16 But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.

I wonder how Jesus learned this?  How was he able to rest his soul when there was so much to do?  How could he let his guard down for one minute…didn’t he have to do it ALL?

We know that Jesus knew his scripture.  In Psalm 91, we read God’s words, words that Jesus would have known well:

14 “Because he holds fast to me in love, I will deliver him;
    I will protect him, because he knows my name.
15 When he calls to me, I will answer him;
    I will be with him in trouble;
    I will rescue him and honor him.
16 With long life I will satisfy him
    and show him my salvation.” 

On Sunday, Rev. Paul Beckingham will gather us at the Lord’s table and teach us about resting in God.  We'll be doing this in the Dogwood Room (behind the Lower Hall stage) where it will be a bit cooler than the Chapel.  I invite you to read the rest of Psalm 91 before Sunday.  

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