10.23.09
Posted in Fear of the Lord, Humility, Joyful Work at 7:51 pm by trisha
Feeling distraught and invisible recently, I dramatically threw myself down on the couch at the end of the day and said to my husband, “You didn’t even see all the work I did today.” My husband said to me, “Well, sweetheart, God sees you.”
Duh.. Sometimes, our sinful need for praise from people invades our hearts and can make us easily forget that God does see us and is always present. It is his presence that is ultimately satisfying. Even the most sincere acknowledgment from those near us-is empty and gives no life.
Who we work for:
As I labor through all that God has called me to, I wrestle with various questions: Why do I work? Who do I work for? What is the pay off or reward for my work?
Colossians 3:23 Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.
I look out at the audience from the stage of my life and I see many people who’s approval motivates my work to be well done. Fear of man is a sin that I am very familiar with, and by God’s grace am being changed into a woman who fears the Lord more.
Proverbs 29:25 Fear of man will prove to be a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord is kept safe.
We are working for God. He has called us to work not for ourselves or others, but for him. God is not the image of the “boss” you have pictured or have experienced. He doesn’t give job-descriptions, interviews, reviews and bonuses, or lay people off. In fact, our work will never be perfect enough, our intelligence insufficient, our productivity never deserving of reward. We can’t reduce a Holy and magnificent God to our “box” of a supervisor. We have to stop serving God with a “work hard enough to please Him” mentality. He is not pleased with our work. All of our work is inadequate. God only receives perfect holy work, which ours can never be.
Why we work:
The good news is that for the believer, Jesus gives us his perfect job review, his flawless work, takes the test for us, and in his divine majesty clothes us with his righteousness, which is the precious inheritance. We don’t get the inheritance because we worked hard. It could never be enough. We will always fall short. God’s free and perfect saving grace is given to anyone who believes, no matter what the resume says. On the cross, Jesus took our work ethic, our fear of man, our shame, our pride, and paid with his life.
He gives us his holy spirit, who enables our lives to give glory to God. It is the Holy Spirit is who fills my heart with wonder and reverence through the mundane to the significant parts of my day. The Holy Spirit convicts me of sin and turns me the other direction. Work can only by worship enabled by the Holy Spirit.
No audience, no approval, no relationship, or productive day can compare to the gift, the inheritance of God’s grace in Christ Jesus. HE is my reward. Every dish, diaper, errand, relationship, act of service, sacrificial commitment, every job undone or well done, can be offered as an act of worship. Depending on God to accomplish His glory in us and through us is a glorious opportunity that we get! Work is worship not because it is done well. It is worship when my heart is tuned to the presence of a holy and loving God who is glorified by my dependence on Him in all that my hands are called to do. As I worship, my work is transformed from tasks to glory.
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10.12.09
Posted in Fear of the Lord, Joyful Work at 12:14 pm by trisha
Heartily:
1. In a cordial manner; with warmth and sincerity:
2. With zest or enthusiasm.
Colossians 3:23-25 Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.
Do I work- Heartily? What is my heart like when I work? What am I thinking when I am working? Sometimes, I am thinking how good it feels to have modern appliances to load dishes and clothing, other times I am thinking complainer thoughts like: “is it really possible to dirty this much…URG!”
Thankful thoughts cultivate a heart towards “working heartily.”
When Mike and I are around the house and getting on each others nerves a bit, we have over the years played a very decisive game we made up, called, the ” Thankfulness Game.” We take turns saying things that we are thankful for. God enables us to see Him in our surroundings as blessings and changes our hearts to acknowledge him, which is WORSHIP.
I try to play the thankfulness game or prayers of gratitude when overwhelmed with duties, tasks, jobs at home. As God sees my struggle and my desire to depend on Him, He enables my heart to worship Him in it. As I observe God in my work, my praying heart starts to rest and is more peaceful.
Working hard doesn’t always produce a heart that works Heartily.
Imagine Martha in Luke 10, working hard, fast, and bitter. God is the one we work Heartily for, not for approval of others. You can have a hard core work ethic, busting in for someone or yourself and not recognize God at all. Sincere worship is the dependence on an enjoyment of Jesus in all aspects of our lives, even in work!
My prayer is that as God continues to show me my sin with work, that my heart be FULL of thankfulness for hands to work, eyes to see, and the grace from God that enables any fruit that comes from my hands…
Are you Heartily working? Are you prone to grumble and complain when you work? How could gratitude in the mundane tasks of life increase your worship to Jesus?
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10.06.09
Posted in Fear of the Lord, Humility at 9:07 am by trisha
Work I understand. Rest- not really. The other side of work is REST and BOTH are amazing opportunities for worship. God has had me on a journey full of difficult twists and turns- learning how to depend on Him in my work, letting go of agendas, navigating through glory and repentance, and giving my roles to God as worship.
Genesis: 2:2
And on the 7th Day God finished his work that he had done, and he rested on the 7th day from all his work that he had done.
God rested.
We are finite creatures, unlike our Infinite God. He didn’t “need” rest, yet He rested. A whole day devoted to rest. He wasn’t weak or tired. He didn’t need to rest just to make it through to the next crazy busy week.
What if God rested out of pure love for his people- as an example to show us how to worship Him also by resting? He gave us a gift of His grace, by resting.
I don’t rest well. Work is my default and rest is more difficult for me to do. I work until I “need” to rest. Rest is more of a necessity rather than discipline most of the time. Rest feels like pleasure and is far too infrequent. Yet, God calls me to rest – not as an optional survival method.
How many of you when you rest, take the moments to enjoy God? Is your busyness stilled for a moment? Does your soul finds satisfaction in refreshment of God? And when you experience this soul rest, do you regret not resting more often? Exactly. That is why God established the Sabbath, to give us opportunity to worship Him, with disciplined rest.
Now, if I can just plan on resting.. 
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10.03.09
Posted in Fear of the Lord, relationship with Jesus, worship at 12:59 pm by trisha
I had a burst of excitement this morning, one of those moments where many truths hit you in to one momentous jolt of heart! As Mike talks with me about Worship and Change, and reading his latest paper on counseling that confronts religious dualism, I am jumping with joy that I get more of the gospel!
Change happens in some ways layers at a time over time. In our community, there is a lot of teaching and biblical plea to address heart and not just behavior. But, they are connected not separated parts of who we are.
For me to see what I worship- my idols, my straying heart, is to address the spiritual part of who I am. As I repent of sin, acknowledge who I am in Christ, I can rejoice of his grace! Out of that joy of right worship, my heart is shaped, and the other parts may be affected. The heart is connected to the body.
Proverbs 14: 30 A heart at peace gives life to the body, but envy rots the bones.
The heart is connected to the mind and strength.
Mark 12: 30 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.
To worship Christ, I don’t just worship with my spirit, but as my heart is joined with Christ, through progressive sanctification, my whole self is made holy!
Holistic:(from ὅλοςholos, a Greek word meaning all, entire, total) is the idea that all the properties of a given system (biological, chemical, social, economic, mental, linguistic, etc.) cannot be determined or explained by its component parts alone. Instead, the system as a whole determines in an important way how the parts behave.
My whole self, holistically worships, thru repentance and progressive change.. I am already holy in Christ, free, forgiven, His blood covers every part of my pain and sin. Yet, I still work out my salvation with fear and trembling, not because I am unsure of His grace, but because I know Christ’s grace covers me. I am humbled by the battle over my flesh so that I never take his grace for granted. My wretchedness shows me what to rejoice over. I rejoice in Christ and the grace and love he offers.
“There are other parts to being human. In Eric Johnson’s book, “Foundations for Soul Care”, he proposes four “orders of meaning” They are all interrelated and touch on one another, but they are hierarchically ordered. That means that some of them are more significant than others. His orders of meaning in order of the greatest to least significance: spiritual, ethical, psychosocial, and biological. Just because, these are distinct orders doesn’t mean they are disconnected from each other. For example, if I repent of sin at the spiritual order, that will have cascading changes throughout the lower orders, possibly even to the point of rewiring neural networks in the brain at the biological level. Going the other way, if my brain suffers injury, that would undoubtedly impact the higher orders that are built upon it; I may become more emotionally volatile which becomes a temptation to sin in my anger.” -Mike Wilkerson
Holistic Worship is the seeing myself in Christ, whole and new. Until we are glorified with Christ, we have to contend with our fallen bodies, depraved hearts, and minds affected by sin. In Christ, we have freedom, joy, calling, adoption, and GRACE in the midst of suffering. Jesus Christ took the punishment for our sin and only by grace did he do this! And I am in awe and fully boast in Christ!
Galations 6:14 May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.
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10.01.09
Posted in Proverbs 31 at 3:18 pm by trisha
(this post is 1 year old and is being re-posted)
What makes you tremble?
What brings tears of awe to your eyes? What brings you satisfaction? The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.(Proverbs 9:10) It is the satisfied emotion that rests in the awe and presence of God. Knowing his wrath, his judgement, his power, his holiness, his grace, his sacrifice, his faithfulness, his tender mercies, his riches, his holiness, we bow in reverence, in fear.
I fear wind. The wind that is so powerful that the giant evergreen trees towering, surrounding, over our house swaying 50 miles per hour with branches falling terrifies me. Oh, some people have said, “wind storms are cool.” or “the loud sound of the wind is peaceful.” what??? Some winters, I have allowed the fear of the wind and the trees to be so controlling in my heart, that I don’t trust God to protect me, my family, or our home. Fear can be irrational. Fear can be all-consuming. Fear can seemingly take over our thoughts. Every winter a tree falls near our home. On days that it isn’t windy, my heart can experience more peace. I know that fearing God would mean even on the wind storm days, my heart would be in the same place as the “still” days. Fearing God is to trust him and his power over my fear of the wind. To experience calm and rest because God is keeping me safe. The last couple seasons, my wind fear has decreased as fear of the Lord has increased! I have bathed in psalms that talk about God being our fortress, refuge, safety, rock, stronghold, etc. As God has supplied my heart with His fatherly care, concern, lordship, and strength, I am starting to get it. There is no formula for replacing one fear for the right fear. Yet, in God’s grace, he has calmed my fears as I have placed more trust in God’s power, protection, specific love for me, his wrath, his kindness, and his mercy. I have to fight for this trust and fear. I have to tune my heart to the music of Psalm 27,31,61, 71 and believe the words!
In the same way that paying attention to the wind stirs my fear, which motivates me to hide from the wind, fear of the Lord motivates me to hide in him.
Psalm 46:1 God is my refuge and strength an ever-present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea
Deuteronomy 6:13 Fear the LORD your God, serve him only and take your oaths in his name.
God wants us to Fear Him. He wants my heart to trust him, because he wants me to be satisfied in him, so He is glorified.
Proverbs 19:23The fear of the LORD leads to life, and whoever has it rests satisfied; he will not be visited by harm.
Deuteronomy 10: 17 For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who is not partial and takes no bribe.
Fear of the Lord leads to life, and satisfaction.
“Fear of the Lord means reverent submission that leads to obedience, and it is interchangeable with “worship,’”rely on,””trust,”and “hope in.” Like terror, it includes a knowledge of our sinfulness and God’s moral purity, and it includes a clear-eyed knowledge of God’s justice and anger against sin. But this worship-fear also knows God’s great forgiveness, mercy, and love. It knows that because of God’s eternal plan, Jesus humbled himself by dying on a cross to redeem his enemies from slavery and death. It knows that, in our relationship with God, he always says, ”I love you” first. This knowledge draws us closer to God rather than causing us to flee. It causes us to submit gladly to his lordship and delight in obedience. This kind of robust fear is the pinnacle of our response to God.” -Edward Welch When People Are Big and God is Small
Fear of the Lord is Worship.
“Fearing the Lord means that this worshipful awe is the single and unchallenged motivator of everything I think, desire, say, and do.” – Paul Tripp, The Quest for More
Fear of the Lord is REAL beauty.
Proverbs 31:30 Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.
Are you amazed at Jesus? Are you bored in your Christianity? Do you tremble when you see glimpses of God’s glorious grace and presence?
We need to fight for fear of the Lord. It is a temptation for me, for all of us, to not fight for the fear of the Lord. It is a fight of faith. (1 Timothy 6:12) It is a battle to take the blinders of the world off, to fight against indwelling sin, and to fight against evil (Ephesians 6:12).
Just yesterday, a surprise early fall wind storm hit us. With power outages all around and a giant tree that split in half, resting on trees near our vehicles, and wind so loud you could hear the branches spitting. I saw the wind picking up early afternoon. Jesus worked on me. I felt peace. Instead, of right away having anxiety, I went to Psalm 121 and read it out loud to my kids and prayed silently that I would trust God and have peace in my heart. I took a nap! Now, that my friends, is redemption. It snuck up on me. I was sharing with my husband how I didn’t worry, then I realized I am growing in the fear of the Lord. God’s grace is evident! Thank you, Jesus!
How can we practically cultivate and at a heart level have the Fear of the Lord? Borrowed from When People Are Big and God is Small:
1. Review the creation psalms: Psalms 8;19;29;65;104
2. Meditate on the enthronement psalms: e.g., Psalm 95-97;99
3. Memorize Psalm 139. It states that God’s providence is so extensive it goes into all the details of our lives.
4. Go through worship songs/hymn book and highlight songs that express God’s majesty and holiness.
5. Read the book of Habakkuk. It is similar to Job in that God directly addresses a man who had questions about what God was doing. All the questions were resolved when Habakkuk was schooled in the fear of the Lord.
6. Read The Holiness of God,by R.C. Sproul.
7. Review the New Testament passages on hell. 2 Thessalonians 1:5-10;2 Peter 2:6, and Revelation 14:9-11.
8. Talk with others in community about your reflections and meditations.
AND- pray for the Lord to show you where you are hard hearted to fear him. Our God is slow to anger and abounding in love, holy and faithful to hear your desire for him.
Cultivating fear of the Lord is also surrounding yourself with other people who demonstrate this beauty.
Let us work out our salvation with FEAR and TREMBLING. Lord, thank you for your faithfullness to care for me. You are my rock, my safe place, my hiding place, my comfort, my refuge. I thank you for the work of redemption you have done in my heart. Jesus, your blood was shed so that I could experience new life in you, thank you that I receive that gift daily. You are a good dad, who knows me. Amen.
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