UNFORCED RHYTHMS OF GRACE

Don’t you just love the sound of that phrase, “unforced rhythms of grace”?  It has its own cadence and  brings to mind waves lapping on the shore, or catching the wind in a sail boat on a warm summer night.  Somehow we instinctively know that life is about rhythms.  We know all too well what it feels like to be way out of rhythm and it seems we only get fleeting glimpses of what it’s like to be in perfect rhythm.  But Jesus intends for us to catch His Rhythm and live our entire lives there, in the unforced rhythms of grace.

This concept comes from a very familiar passage of scripture in Matthew Chapter 11:28-30. Jesus’ invitation to the weary: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest….learn from me…. my yoke is easy and my burden is light…”  Check out the Message paraphrase:

“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.”

I always thought this scripture was speaking to those who don’t know Him.  Are you tired of trying to do life your way?  Come to Jesus and you will find rest for your souls.  While this is totally true, upon closer inspection, perhaps Jesus is also talking to Christians… we’re tired, worn out, burned out on religion…    

Think about it, how many Christians do you know who would call the Christian life “restful”.  How many would say, “yes, this yoke is easy”.  The truth is, often His yoke feels hard… We have all these responsibilities to fight our flesh and die to ourselves. We are supposed to turn the other cheek, not worry about anything, pray at all times, have faith in the good, even when life looks bad.  On top of which, we have to navigate the “world”, work on our marriages, support our families, raise our kids, run our households AND volunteer for every service team and ministry that comes along.  Exhausting!!! 

So, where is the disconnect?  What are we missing?  Why is life not light and free? Of course, I don’t  have all the answers!  Many times our lives don’t feel light and free…. but Matt and I have been pursuing unforced rhythms of grace and I’d like to share some of our experiences with you.   

One day, a few years ago,  we came across the phrase, Unforced Rhythms of Grace.  It captured our imaginations!!  For one thing, it sounded like a great hook for a song!  (Turns out, it is! Check out Matt’s CD at mAc.hisplace.me)  For another, it is so compelling… "Yes!" We said, "We want to learn the unforced rhythms of grace from Jesus!"  We began to ponder what this might mean and talk to each other and the Lord about it.

The first thing we did was decide to believe God; to believe He means what He says in scripture and to believe that He is interested and active in every aspect of our lives.  We began to look for Him in our everyday lives.  We asked ourselves: What is happening right now, that is just not a coincidence?!  Where is God active around us?  What is absolutely clear in scripture about how to live and what He promises?  (For a complete course on this concept, see Experiencing God by Henry Blackaby.  We only got through the first 2 chapters of that study, but it has been life changing!)  With these kinds of questions, we began to consider the different aspects of our lives, try to discern what God would have us do and then boldly do it.

So, how does this play out in a practical way?  Matt came down one day and described a phenomenon that he experiences when writing computer code.  Sometimes he just feels like he needs to do a particular project, maybe it’s converting everything to a new library, or incorporating a particular tool or functionality with no apparent need for it in the immediate future.  And then, within a few days, something will come up that needs the very thing that he just completed!  This has happened so many times, Matt knows when he gets this feeling to go ahead and do the thing, because the odds are great he is going to need it. “Ah-ha”, we said, “this is an example of unforced rhythms of grace!  Let’s believe God works in our lives this way, and go with it!”

This knowing also happens with people!  Have you ever just met someone, yet you feel like you’ve known them your entire life?  Or maybe you are just inexplicably drawn to a person, they keep coming to your mind?  This is not just an oddity!!  IT’S A DIVINE APPOINTMENT!  God is connecting two lives because He has something in the connection for each of you!  Pay attention, make room, follow-through and you will be blessed!  I’ll never forget the day I was attending a gathering at another church to pray for a unified Easter service.  It was 630am on a Sunday morning and I showed up in my baseball cap and ratty old sweater with big pockets full of Kleenex, some new, some used!  (You get the picture, I was not there to meet people! LOL!)  As a woman I had never met began to pray, I felt something like a wave of electricity go through me!  It was like an arc that connected me to her and I remember leaning forward to get a look at who was speaking so I could meet her after.  We became fast friends and prayer partners and she opened a whole new world of prayer and believing God for more in my life.  We have been on many adventures with the Lord since that day….  I can honestly say, my life was NEVER THE SAME, after I met and invited this dear sister to be a part of it!!  All because I recognized God at work in this connection and moved into it.

On another occasion, we were asked to help lead a bible study in a prison. We had never even considered prison ministry.  I remember we took a long walk one cold winter night and landed on the fact that Jesus said, “when you visit a prisoner, you visit me”.  Well, we want to be where Jesus is, so we said “YES”, and now six years later we can’t even count all the benefits and blessings that have come from this one decision!  Not only do we get to invest in many lives and encounter Jesus in powerful ways, through this ministry, Matt has gained the confidence to perform his original music live and I have started teaching, which is something I have wanted to do since I was a child!  God is giving us the desires of our hearts!  In fact, the day we decided to believe God for our wildest dreams, He downloaded a complete song to Matt, lyrics and music, in one hour.  We didn’t choose prison ministry, it chose us! And it has been LIFE GIVING!!!  Did we feel a prolonged call on our lives to do prison ministry?  No. Did God make it obvious this was where He wanted us in a vision or a dream? No. He simply put it in our path and we said “Yes”. 

This one decision to believe God means what He says, to look for Him in our lives and move in His direction has paid off in huge dividends!!  Since we started this journey, we have become debt free. (That’s right, NO MORTGAGE!)  You would think this would have required both of us working 2 jobs, but instead, during this time, I voluntarily took several cuts in pay…. all the way to $0!  And Matt quit his job and we started our own business!!!  Can you say, “abundantly more than we can ask or imagine”? 

Another way to describe this way of life, is to simply be faithful with what He puts in front of you.  If you feel prompted to start something new, start it! Believe that He orders the steps of the Righteous!  That He’s put His words in your mouth!  Do what He gives you to do to the best of your abilities and leave the rest up to Him.  Don’t try to figure out how it will all work out in the end.  If you feel like you should connect with someone, don’t miss it!  What treasures!  What blessings the Lord has in store for us if we will only believe Him.  Get ready for the ride of your lives in the Unforced Rhythms of Grace. 

Poor, Blind and Naked

For me, there has been something missing in the church experience my entire life. I grew up in a Holiness denomination that had somehow boiled it all down to a list of do’s and don’ts.  At least that’s how it came across to me. Yet, I felt the Spirit of the Living Christ in this church often, especially during altar calls and camp meetings. But it was a striking dichotomy to me that day to day life in this congregation felt nothing like “living”.  Later, as an adult, I attended a more main stream “Evangelical” church, where most of the emphasis was on Grace and the Bible is treated as the final and only Word from the Lord.  Then I met some people who were having incredible experiences with the Holy Spirit; operating in the prophetic, hearing from the Lord and having visions and dreams. The Lord confirmed to me over and over again that He was speaking to and through these people, yet nothing like it was being practiced at my church. I have come to believe that every church and denomination who believe Jesus is the son of God and the way to salvation has some of the truth!  Further, I believe that no church, (or Christian for that matter) has all of the truth.  We are all lacking some aspect of understanding.  Jesus is the truth.  So, on the day the church possesses 100% of the truth, the MANIFEST PRESENCE of JESUS CHRIST, HIMSELF WILL BE STANDING ON EARTH.

This isn’t intended to criticize or blame. In fact, the letters to the angels of the churches in of Revelation prove that God knew all along that we were going to get some things right and some things wrong.  It would even appear, He did it on purpose… He is the one who decided to let the tares grow with the wheat.  I honestly have no idea why… We would not have done it this way…. We also would not have left sharing the good news with the whole world in the hands of mankind!  

So what is the point? Why does this matter?  For one thing, we need to get over ourselves and stop criticizing other Christians.  For another thing, we have a lot to learn and experience by actually opening our hearts and minds to aspects of the Lord we do not yet understand.  Do you think you know all there is to know about God?  Hardly!!  There is always more Jesus to know!

Jesus is coming back for His pure and spotless bride. Look around, do you see any pure and spotless brides?  I don't... So, this must mean something happens before the end of time that calls the church up higher…(not the rapture), but the clarion call of the Lamb of God to see things from His perspective, to set ourselves apart and admit that we don’t have it figured out.  To return to our first love and actually become One with each other, as Jesus is One with the Father and submit to Jesus as the Head. 

No doubt, I have already got the dander up of several faithful servants of God.  In fact I’m sure my dear mother is none too happy with what I’ve said already in blog #2.  Because we are all striving the best we know how to seek truth and follow Jesus, we don’t want to think that we are doing anything wrong.  But, as they say, the proof is in the pudding! 

A few years ago, I was reading the letter to the church of Laodicea in Revelation Chapter 3, and I got to this part:

 ¹⁷ You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. ¹⁸ I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see.  

I thought, yes Lord, I’m sure this is talking to me, to the church in America.  We certainly are rich compared to the rest of the world and what’s more we think we are rich. So, I asked, “how, Lord?  Show me how we are blind and naked.”  The very next day, we had a horrible tragedy in our community.  A young man, in Jr high, was attending a youth group on a Wednesday night and went in the bathroom and cut his own throat.  Yes, you read that correctly, he was physically at a church event when he did this terrible thing.  Not only was this student a long standing member of this youth group, but he also attended a Christian after school program (led by people from other churches), AND he had been meeting with yet another Christian mentor for several years.  This young man lived through his experience. He was a cutter and not necessarily trying to take his life, but he is tormented to the point he cuts himself and this time, he chose his neck.  We were all stunned.  I’m still stunned.  How could we fail so miserably?  We think that all we need to do is get these kids involved in a good youth group and get some Christian influence in their lives.  That all they need to do is accept Christ and go to church and all will be well.  But, NO, all is not well.  The truth is, we (the church) are pretty helpless in situations like this.  We don’t know what is wrong, we don’t know how to pray and we don’t see real and meaningful change and freedom come in many lives of the people we love and try to serve. 

We think we are rich, but we are really wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked.   

Please don’t misunderstand, I love the church!!  I grew up in the church and I can think of no other group of people that I would want to claim. I am proud to be a Christian! There is none like the redeemed, the ones who know we are broken and need a savior. Who else would literally feed and clothe the entire world?  I’ve never seen an apartment so quickly furnished than to send out an email to 500 or so Christians and sit back and watch them LOVE and GIVE!  The church is magnificent, literally the HOPE OF GLORY, the BELOVED BRIDE OF CHRIST!! I love her as a whole, as individual congregations and as individual people! 

But the time has come on the Kingdom calendar for the church to wake up from our slumber, to recognize that we are doing many things right, but there are still things the Lord has against us.  It’s time to lay down our critical attitudes toward each other, our competitive spirits and our need to control our “people” and our lives and instead submit and surrender to Christ as our only Head, joining together the body – one living organism that shares the same heartbeat to share the good news with a lost and dying world.  It's time to humble ourselves and pray and fast and wait before the Lord, showing our dependence on Him! It's time to believe God for more and step out in faith. I say RISE UP Church and come into your glory. You were created for such a time as this!