We've Moved!

Sorry to be annoying, but please update any links...I have moved my blog here,

http://fatdaddye.wordpress.com/.

I am still constructing the site, getting it looking better, but I have posted my most recent blog there...Thanks!

Trust Jesus...(or, Elementary Questions, Part 3)

(This is a long post. Please read it, and pay attention. Not so much for you, but for me. I would like to hear feedback. It has taken many years for this to become clear to me, though it may already be quite clear for you. I am going to let this post sit up here for a few days and I hope that you will offer your thoughts. It may seem boring, or even elementary to you, but this topic has literally been keeping me awake for about 4 years now...I think that peace is coming.)

I have been wondering for quite some time now, how you can know who is among the elect. I had mentioned in a previous post that William Cowper drove himself mad trying to battle through the doctrine of election. He knew that he loved Christ, but couldn’t shake the belief that he wasn’t among the elect. I have been in the same boat recently, and likewise, have almost driven myself mad. It’s a sucky thing to think about. I came to this thought like this:

How do you know who is among the elect?
You will know a tree by it’s fruit.
Well, it doesn’t seem that I bear much fruit (though many of my friends have tried, to no avail, to tell me otherwise).
So, if I am not bearing fruit, even though I think that I love Christ, is there a chance that I am not elect?
If I am not elect, and everything has been predetermined, then there is no turning back time so that I may have the chance to be elected from the start...

That sucks.

That is a brief picture of what is going through my mind, though I know how elementary and “sterile” it sounds. There is a bit more to it, but for the sake of brevity, I will leave it at that.

I met with my pastor, Craig Brown, last week, and presented him with these concerns. His response was that no one can tell who is among the elect. Although you can know a tree by its fruit, we always show our best sides, so of course many people will think that I am bearing fruit. However, these people do not know what goes through my mind behind the scenes. They do not know what motivates me to do good things. They do not know how many deeds that I do just so that others will think I am a nice, intelligent, and selfless guy. Those that know me best often times get more than a brief glimpse of the real me, and they tend to agree more with the argument that, no, I am not bearing much fruit. They are justified in this observation.

As for me trying to bear fruit (which seems to be, in a nutshell, the problem that the Jews had with Christ. They continued to try to live up to the old law, to basically earn salvation). Though I haven’t been trying to live up to the old law, I have been trying to live up to the new law, which is supposed to be written on my heart. I see myself failing, day in and day out, and never being able to live up to the new law. So does this mean that its not written on my heart? (And if that's the case, then I am damned, as everything has been predetermined). According to Craig, it means the exact opposite. The fact that I feel the need to live up to the new law shows that it most certainly is written on my heart. Otherwise, I would feel no need to live up to it. That’s a good thing. At least now I know that the law is written on my heart.

So, what about the fact that I fail to live up to the law? Basically, Craig said I need to get out of the damn driver’s seat. No wonder my car keeps coming off the road. As the old Christian t-shirt reads, “Trust Jesus.” Christ does, in fact, expect more failure from me than I expect from myself. He is not shocked when I fall. He made me. He knows what I am capable of (both good and bad). According to Craig, the big puzzle piece that I am missing is that I am not trusting in Christ in many things. The two big things are (1) I am not trusting Jesus to save me. I am trusting in myself to save myself. As a control freak, this news came as no surprise to me. I hate being in situations I can’t control. I need to get over that. (2) I am not trusting in Jesus to help me do good, and to sin less. I am trusting in my own strength to carry me through, though that never works. When I sin, I need to stop and thank Christ for His forgiveness, and ask and expect that He will work in me, to continue to transform my heart. The fruit will eventually flow out that; Him working through me. Christ doing good, in me by me submitting to Him and trusting only in Him, not me. The fruit will come. My tree will bear fruit, though it will not be me bearing fruit. It’s a relief to know that I not expected to live up to the new law. I am just expected to be submissive and trust that Christ will accomplish the good works that He started in me. I think this is my best attempt at putting into words what I walked away from our conversation with. It seems as I am typing this, that several scriptures are going through my head; scriptures that I have heard and read my entire life that now are coming alive and making more sense than ever before. Maybe I am on the right track now.

I have often heard John Piper describe the doctrine of election as beautiful, and I am beginning to see it that way. The amazing is starting to come back into grace for me. It's a relief. It's out of my hands. I can't control it...That's a good thing.

Update...

Man, you guys have got me excited...I want so much to tell you about the talk that I had with my pastor today, but it will have to wait a bit more. I would really like to have time to sit and articulate what all I learned, and I do not have that time tonight. I am also looking forward to the insights that you guys have on this topic. I have talked with a couple of you at great lengths on this topic, so maybe it's time for a roundtable of comments. I head back on the road tomorrow night, for one show, so that will give me chance to sort through what he told me. Don't get too excited, though, because although I am jazzed about what I learned, it may seem rather elementary to the rest of you. Either way, the discussion should be good, and maybe we will learn from each other. I am very thankful to have a pastor that takes the time to walk me through the deeper, yet basic elements of our faith. Moving will give us the opportunity to spend time with other folks in the church that can teach us even more.

As for the house, we got a contract on a new one tonight! Here are the pictures of it. It is really small, which is what we wanted, but really cool, and still dramatically cheaper than our current house. It even has a guest house (that's about 1/2 the size of the main house)! That will be the studio/hang out place when we have company over. Its a great location, not far from the main road that runs through East Nashville, yet it still has a big backyard (big enough for a garden)! We are very excited, and as long as everything goes according to schedule, then God willing, we will close on both our current house, and the new house on August 31...God willing.