Tag: Christian Living

Articles I have written specifically dealing with areas of Christian living.

Try the Uplook!

by Mike Avery, posted in All Articles, Christian Living, Theology

—October of 1995

Try the Uplook!

A young boy in the neighborhood lost his father last winter.  This spring as father-and-son teams hit the front yards to pitch and hit the baseball, he felt alone.  Not to be outdone, however, he took his bat and ball to the old familiar spot in the front yard and started his own game.  With a chipper spirit he threw the ball into the air and swung with all his might.  The bat cut only air, and a watching neighbor boy yelled, “Strike one!”  The lad hastily retrieved the ball threw it into the air and swung again.  “Strike two!” echoed from across the way.  With a tinge of fear and a ton of resolve, he flipped the ball for the final swing.  “Strike, three, you’re out!” screamed the unwanted umpire, along with the cruel words, “You’re a lousy hitter!”  The undaunted boy sucked up his chest, marched over to the fence and yelled back, “I’m not a lousy hitter; I’m a great pitcher! I just struck myself out!”

This young man displayed a great attitude and enthusiasm toward life.  He obviously had learned well that attitude can make all the difference.

Authentic Christianity has been characterized by an enthusiastic attitude.  Paul, awaiting martyrdom in a Roman cell, wrote, “Rejoice in the Lord always, and again I say rejoice” (Phil. 4:4).  When Peter was placed in Herod’s prison to await his death, the Scripture tells us that the very night before his planned martyrdom, Peter lay down between two soldiers and slept.  No whining or the wringing of hands in misery!  He just slept.  He looked Herod’s sword in the face with perfect peace and went sound asleep.

When we focus on ourselves what we see can be very discouraging.  When we look at the world around us, we can be over-whelmed by its problems.  But when we look to Christ we always come away with hope.

The secret of an enthusiastic spirit is in understanding the sovereignty of God.  Joseph looked up from the long years of separation from family years of prison and slavery, and saw that though others “meant it for evil, God meant it for good.”  Had Joseph just chosen to look at things horizontally he could have walked away a sour, bitter man.  But because he chose to look at things vertically, he went through the dark years of his life and came out a man with the right perspective and a good attitude.

A failure to trace the divine purpose of God in our trials will make room for a negative critical spirit toward what has happened to us.  Jacob fell prey to such bitterness over the tragedy of Joseph.  “All these things be against me,” he wailed when God was simply planning the preservation of his own life and that of his family.

When I was a small boy I would follow the steps of my father as he plowed a long furrow through the field.  I was amazed how he was able to make the rows so straight.  The secret, he told me, was to find a fixed object at the end of the row and keep an upward look toward that object rather than constantly looking down at where you were walking.  This has proven to be good advice for living.  The man who buries his gaze in the temporal troubles of time will lose his perspective on life and ultimately lose his way.  He will become so problem-conscious that he loses his God consciousness.

We certainly are no match for the situations of life, but God is!   For every need we have, there is a corresponding fullness found in Him.  God is sufficient!

Can you feel the spirit of optimism when Paul looks up and taps into the divine resources as he speaks to us in Romans 8:31, “If God be for us, who can be against us?”  He looked up again and said, “I can do all things through Christ which strengthens me” (Phil. 4:13).

The key to tapping into the sovereignty and sufficiency of God is not through the popular self-help teaching, but through real surrender and submission.  We are flooded with articles and books on “four easy steps” to spiritual happiness.  The real formula, however, is not “help yourself,” but “yield yourself.”  As we yield ourselves to Christ, we open our eyes to the sovereign ways of God and avail ourselves of supernatural strength.

Negativism, unbelief and despair are spiritual viruses that have lethal consequences to the soul.  They are contagious and will leave death in their wake.  On the other hand, a positive confident attitude, born out of looking unto Jesus, will help dispel the demons of despair and usher in an optimistic, confident trust – a trust that will straighten our shoulders, lift our heads, and make us far more effective Christians.

So remember! If the outlook is bleak, try the uplook!

The Grace of Gratitude

by Mike Avery, posted in All Articles, Christian Living, Theology

—November of 1995

The Grace of Gratitude

According to a medieval legend, two angels were once sent down to earth, one to gather up petitions and the other to collect thanksgivings.  The first angel found petitions everywhere.  He soon returned to heaven with a huge load of them on his back and a bundle in each hand.  The second angel had no such easy time.  He had to search diligently to find even a mere handful to take back to heaven.

Admittedly, legends can be farfetched and unrealistic or they can be painfully accurate.  This one, however, is much too accurate for comfort.  We would all have to admit that the high stakes scramble for more of this world’s goods has robbed the church of her voice of thanksgiving.  Our long period of materialistic comfort has made us easy in Zion and unaccustomed to the exercise of humble gratitude.

The Apostle Paul knew the importance of gratitude to the Christian as well as the subtle danger of ingratitude.  Listen to the music of gratitude that plays through his epistle to the Colossians:

Chapter one, verse 3: “We give thanks to God the Father of our Lord Jesus.”

Chapter one, verse 12: “…giving thanks unto the Father.”

Chapter two, verse 7: “…abounding…with thanksgiving.”

Chapter three, verse 17: “…giving thanks unto God and the Father by Him.”

Chapter four, verse 17: “Continue in prayer and watch in the same with thanksgiving.”

Paul’s hymnody of thanks seems to center in chapter three, verse 15 when he says, “and be ye thankful.”

Paul’s strong imperative to “wear a garment of gratitude” is anchored to three firm convictions in the Apostle’s life.

Paul saw gratitude as a required grace.  Not a luxury but a necessity, not an option but a conviction.  Paul placed it among the required rather than the elective classes in the school of Christian experience.  I have a debt to be grateful!

I owe it to God to be grateful.  He has given me life, eternal life and the opportunity to do something with it.

I owe it to others to be grateful.  A sour, complaining spirit spreads gloom.  However, a joyful, cheerful spirit brings sunshine and smiles wherever it goes.

I owe it to myself.  Your physician will tell you that a mean, bitter, thankless spirit harms our health and robs us of life.  But of greater concern is what ingratitude does to us spiritually.  Of the thirteen plagues that came upon the children of Israel in their wilderness journey, eleven of those were punishment for murmuring against God.  In Romans chapter one, Paul charts the awful journey from godliness to godlessness.  He says in verse 21 that part of the root cause for such deviation is a spirit of ingratitude, “neither were they thankful.”

Gratitude is also a ripening grace.  A more literal translation of Paul’s words would be, “and become ye thankful.”   We must seek the grace of gratitude and cultivate the grace of gratitude until we are “abounding with thanksgiving.”  This is not an easy task.  None will ever overflow with thanksgiving until they see that gratitude is an inner disposition towards life that must be worked at.  Life has its mix of good and bad—of the difficult and the delightful; but it’s up to us as to how we respond to that mix.  Some people in examining a bush unhappily see only the thorns; others rejoice in the fragrance of its roses.  The lens through which we view life is so important.  Jacob saw his days as “few and evil.”  He described the loss of Joseph and the famine that reunited them with these words, “all these things be against me.”  However, Joseph looked at life through the lens of gratitude and described the same time period with a different set of words completely.  Joseph said, “You meant it for evil, but God meant it for good.”  We see exactly what we discipline ourselves to see in life, and looking through the lens of thanksgiving will ripen us.

It is often said among Christians that our reward is in the world to come.  However, gratitude is a rewarding grace.  It has its own reward for us right now.

Gratitude exalts God.  Very few things honor and glorify God more than the sweet fragrance of a thankful soul.  It expels gloom and ushers in sweet peace and blessed hope.  More than once the child of God has used thanksgiving to drive back the clouds of sorrow and gloom.  Gratitude encourages graciousness.  It gives us the politeness of soul and graciousness of spirit that can’t be purchased for any amount of money.

Let’s declare war on whimpering and complaining!  Let’s put away from us forever the grumbling and fault-finding that is such a blight on the church today!  Reach into the closet of God’s grace and adorn yourself with the garment of gratitude!  It will make a difference!

God Wants His Job Back!

by Mike Avery, posted in All Articles, Christian Living

—February of 2011

God Wants His Job Back!

In our recent Missionary Convention, guest speaker Otto Koning spoke passionately about the importance of relying completely on God’s Spirit to accomplish the work He has called us to do.  He gave numerous personal illustrations (including the famous pineapple story) demonstrating the futility of trying to do spiritual work through mere human ingenuity.  He closed with this lamentation, “God wants His job back.”

No one would ever admit to wanting God’s job much less taking it! But every time we make decisions that marginalize His involvement; every time we allow political considerations to silence the voice of Biblical principle; every time we let self-interest edge out kingdom priorities; every time we turn to secular institutions to change what can only be changed by grace, we are in effect telling God that we can run things more effectively than He.

 This is not to say that human involvement is insignificant to God’s work. To the contrary, God has chosen to save the world through the foolishness of preaching—man’s involvement is not only crucial but central to the spread of the gospel.  Yet the proper balance between human energy and divine grace is sometimes difficult to find.  One of the reasons for having the book of Acts in Holy Scripture is to provide a vivid illustration of what this tension looks like.  It actually gives us a front row seat to witness how this cooperation between the human and the divine plays out.  The opening verses of the book tell the reader that what unfolds in the following pages is the continued work of Jesus through the Holy Spirit.  However, what one witnesses is an amazing group of very human yet remarkable characters whose personality strengths, human gifts and personal intelligence are utilized completely by the Holy Spirit for the advancement of God’s church.  Peter, the one time denier, holds the church together by his unshakable testimony and leadership. An unlearned, unlettered deacon named Stephen mystifies the Doctors of the Law in a spellbinding sermon that precipitates his being stoned to death. The remainder of the book highlights the ministry of the Apostle Paul.  A ministry that entails the most amazing missionary journeys the world has ever witnessed.  On every page it is evident that God is using human hands and feet to accomplish His work.  But it is also equally clear that those same hands and feet are filled and directed by the Holy Spirit.

How is this Balance lost?

 I believe this loss of balance happens when in our zeal to see God’s work advance we become willing to rely solely on human wisdom, secular institutions, religious denominations or political activism as the catalyst for change or advancement.  These are short cuts that will often give the appearance of success but will in the long run fail to bring about lasting change. Christians and churches alike often turn to everything from marketing strategies to politics for the cultural and spiritual changes that actually can only come by grace.  How often have you heard a pastor or a politician make the statement that the only way to effect cultural change is to send the right man to Washington?  This is the false notion that change comes from the top down.  The truth is that there must be a change in the spiritual culture at the grassroots level before anything can happen on the national level.  The Wesleyan Revival plowed the ground and planted the seed for social reform in England at the grassroots level long before William Wilberforce (who was transformed by that same revival) was able to pass legislation changing the slavery laws of the nation. Churches that affect lasting change are churches that are joining hands with God’s Spirit to effect spiritual and cultural change at the grassroots level of life – one man, one woman, one family at a time!

How does God get His job back?

God gets His job back when the Church recognizes that it is God alone who can effect deep and lasting change in both the hearts of men and the moral fabric of a culture.  His divine management is re-established when we surrender to His full control and learn how to faithfully walk under the direction of His Spirit; when we honor His Word through prompt and careful obedience; when we pray, “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” and really mean it.  God has His job back when we finally grasp that spiritual success is finding out what He is doing and then linking our hands with His to make it happen!

“By This Shall All Men Know . . .”

by Mike Avery, posted in All Articles, Christian Living

–November of 2010

“By This Shall All Men Know…”

God has the most remarkable way of placing little object lessons in our path to remind us of the things that are most important.  He has them the tucked away in the most unlikely places just waiting for the right moment to spring them. This happened to me recently while standing at the back door of a church where I had just finished preaching the final service of a revival meeting.  The church is a growing congregation of good folks from a primarily rural area.   They have a number of exciting ministries one of which is a ministry to adults with various challenges.  The church provides this group with their own special Sunday school class and in turn the group participates faithfully in the worship services – usually sitting right up front.

One of the ladies in the group, Robin, has Down Syndrome.  Robin lives with one of the church families where she has received loving care for over 26 years.  Robin is known for her exceptionally mild disposition and loving manner.  She loves the animals on the farm and has spent the entire day in the barn just petting the goats.  Once when a baby deer happened along, Robin’s caregiver saw her standing in the back yard with the little deer – each enjoying the others company.

As I stood at the back door shaking hands and sharing good-byes, Robin and her family joined the line that was winding its way passed me and out the door.  One of the family members whispered to Robin, “Why don’t you give him a hug” and pointed to someone standing right behind me.  Robin thought they meant me and pushed her way through the crowd, laid her head on my arm and began to pat my hand.  This continued for sometime.  It was one of the most pure expressions of love I had ever received from a complete stranger.

A few days later, early one morning as I was praying, I thought of this incident.  As I thought about Robin’s unashamed display of unconditional love, I paused in my prayer and asked the Lord, “ Father, did you make a special group of people just to show us what unconditional love looks like?”  To which He gently replied, “Yes, son I did.  They are called Christians!”

The Quiet Place

by Mike Avery, posted in All Articles, Christian Living

–September of 2010

The Quiet Place

Read Mark 1:21-45

In the very heart of a narrative loaded with action —healing people, casting out devils, responding to impatient disciples, traveling from town to town and preaching from synagogue to synagogue—we find these remarkably quiet words about Jesus, “Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed.”  The more one  reads this nearly silent sentence locked in between the loud words of action, the more one has the sense that the secret of Jesus’ ministry is found in that place of solitude…. where he went to pray….early before dawn.  A further look at the Gospels will reveal that Jesus actually made these retreats into a “desert place” a regular part of His life.

I think it is a fair question to ask ourselves, why did Jesus need this quiet time?  Henri Nouwen suggests that the immediate context shows that it was in this quiet place that Jesus found the courage to follow God’s will and not his own – to speak God’s words and not His own—to do God’s work and not his own – to live in God’s strength and not His own.

If Nouwen is right, and I believe he is, then the quiet place becomes preeminently important for every follower of Jesus. If the Son of God needed these times of solitude it is obvious that we need them as well!  In evaluating what these quiet times did for Jesus, we can learn why they are so valuable to every disciple as well.

It’s was in the quiet place that Jesus found and maintained His perspective on what was really important to His Heavenly Father.

Go back to the passage and envision what the scene in Capernaum must have been like. Word had spread rapidly about Jesus’ power to heal and the streets were lined with the sick, handicapped, demon possessed, mentally retarded as well as the spiritually needy.   The disciples were frantically looking for Jesus to inform Him that, “everyone is looking for you.”  But Jesus had just emerged from the quite place and He already knew that His business for the day was preaching in other villages.  So He walks away from the desperately needy crowds at Capernaum because He knows that the Father’s will for Him lies elsewhere. I can imagine what the disciples said among themselves.  “Look how the people are flocking to Him.  He had a chance to make a real difference, but no, He leaves it all behind and goes off preaching in some other remote place that hasn’t even heard of Him.” But Jesus could easily submit to the Father’s will and plan because he had been in the quiet place!

It is not wrong to have a strong desire to accomplish something for God.  We feel called to do something—to make a difference.  But the problem comes when we make the results of our work the criteria for our value.  And when that happens it skews our perspective on life.     It was out of solitude that Jesus found that doing is not the same as being and that following the will of God and pleasing the heavenly Father is not defined by the world’s concept of success.

It is out of the quiet place that we discover that our obedience is more important to God than the result of all our efforts. It is out of the quiet place that we come to understand that the love we express and the work we do is part of a greater love and greater work that is being done by God Himself. It is out of the quiet place that we become aware that our worth is not the same as our usefulness and that what we see accomplished is only because of what He chooses to do in and through us.

It is only in the quiet place that we can find the power to do work that is marked by divine love.

Ministry without love is cold and sterile. Jesus never interacted with men and women without being “moved with compassion.”  The first person He meets after leaving his quiet place was a leper begging to be made clean.  Of course Jesus was willing to heal him but not until he had first touched his leprous brow!  Why? Jesus need only speak for the healing to happen but divine love could only communicated through His touch.

Unless there is a quiet place in our lives then our work for God will be marked by duty rather than by love. It is only in the quiet place that our lives are saturated with divine love

It’s amazing to me that even though our Heavenly Father knows that the quiet place is the key to successful ministry, He still lets us make the choice as to whether or not we go there.  But  those who go there by choice and by habit will find what  Nouwen said Jesus found, “ the courage to follow God’s will and not our own – to speak God’s words and not our own—to do God’s work and not our own – to live in God’s strength and not our own.”