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June 30, 2011
Agreeing with the Heart of Christ
Many of us can fall into a trap by taking the position here where we resent the American culture. What happens is really a defense mechanism. When you grow up in the American culture, or really any first world setting, and you are introduced to a third world setting you experience culture shock and your heart can easily be broken for the culture that is less fortunate than your own. This is actually a beautiful thing because it is a stage in missions where our own heart is coming into agreement with the heart of God for this people. We are coming alongside the same pain that is in God’s heart because of injustice.
The difficulty then turns to our choice of what we should do with our own broken heart. Many times, we can turn and hate what we perceive to be the problem. We can so easily turn to hate our own first world culture because we think that it is a hideously evil thing that withholds the capacity to “be the change” in the third world culture.
And that is where we are wrong.
For instance, we were just there, where our home culture is now, right before we encountered the the third world experience. So if we turn and hate our home culture it gives way to despising ourselves and holding ourselves responsible for injustices that we had nothing to do with. In any account it is wrong for any of us to come into agreement with the broken heart of God and turn to hate anyone because of it. If we do, we have been deceived.
Another issue with this is the mentality: “Be the change.” Initially this seems to be a good thing and when you have a jarring encounter with poverty it is a very natural response, to help. However when it becomes the forefront of everything, it can quickly become not only help response, but “the Western Savior” response. This is where we want to come in and bring the people salvation from their trials. Where material items such as money, clothes, food, proper shelter will fix the issues of poverty.
We need to realize that poverty is not overcome by money and material items, and we will “...always have the poor.” So we can refocus, knowing that we come to bring the news of the Savior, not be a savior.
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The Game of Life.
Several days ago our team here in South Africa was playing a board game called, “Life.” The game is comprised of fairly realistic scenarios that the players encounter, such as going to college, getting a job, getting married, getting fired, paying taxes, etc. It’s actually a really fun game… most of the time. When we played this last time, the game turned brutal. It wasn’t because we turned on each other, but everything seemed to be against us. I chose the route of college, taking out $100,000.00 in loans. “This is an investment,” I told myself. Well one investment turned into another, even when I would pay off one loan another would replace it.
In real life, I actually went through Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace University, and if I learned anything from it, it’s that you NEVER go into debt willingly. Well in this game no matter what I seemed to do, I was put into debt. I would tirelessly work towards getting out of debt, then I would loose my job, and have to buy a new car, or I’d have a hospital accident costing me $40,000.00. No matter what I did, I was having to pay off debts.
Finally the game was coming to a close and every other player had finished, while I still had $200,000.00 of debt. I finally finished and had just enough to pay the rest of it off. Even the rest of the team looked at me and said, “Man you really had to work!” Only one player had it “good” and our first inclination was to rag on her, but when I really thought about it, nothing she did was in her control, or at least a vast majority of it was not in her control. She was simply given a platform to work off of. I really took a moment to think about it and found that there was no reason for me to be angry at her, in fact I wasn’t. I was more content with my measly $40,000.00 that I retired with than she was with her $800,000.00. And it hit me, many of the people that we minister to in the squatter camps are the same way. They have no more control over the life that was handed to them than we did. We were born in America, they were born in South Africa. We were born into families that could afford education, they were not. We were born with into a Western world, they were born into an Eastern world. It’s not the circumstances that determined our joy, what we do with it is what really satisfies.
I heard a quote once that really describes this well, “The poor are still blessed with a hope that wealth will make them happy, the rich live without any kind of hope.” I’m even reading a book called the The Radicalism of the American Revolution by Gordon S. Wood, and it has gone through the radical concept that men should have equality. At the point where all of the world was saying that “God saw it was good to create some men lower than others,” our forefathers recognized that with a whole lot of blood, sweat, and tears any man was capable of leading a country. We are placed in this world with capabilities and blessings, but regardless of our lack or of our excess, we are called to give our all.
This Easter (or Passover) I heard some amazing messages on the account of the woman who poured the perfume on the Lord’s head/feet. It always confused me because after Jesus’ rebuke to the scoffers, He says, “Truly I tell you, wherever the gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told, in memory of her (Mark 13:9, NIV).” I never really understood why He said that her story would be told where ever the Gospel was proclaimed; in fact I would frequently argue that it was not told. However the speaker proposed that it was the DEVOTION behind the act that the Lord was speaking of. Jonathan Edwards best captured it by saying this, “The thing that shocked everyone about Mary’s act of devotion was it’s uselessness. It would have been useful, to Jesus, to have His feet washed because they would have been clean and refreshed, but it was useless to have His feet anointed with perfume. But it was also useless for Mary, because she had already seen God’s power on her behalf. She had seen her brother raised from the dead, she was not trying to get something from Jesus. Here is the difference between Judas and Mary: Judas found Jesus useful, Mary found Jesus beautiful. Judas served Jesus for what he could get. Mary served Jesus to get Jesus.”
It was so incredibly vital as well as the whole week leading up to Jesus’ crucifixion was a preparation (as all Passover Lambs were prepared), that Christ might be prepared for His death, which would be at the exact time that the Passover lamb was to be slaughtered by the priest. The perfume very literally could have soaked into Jesus hair and clothes, especially if it was lavished upon Him. If this is true then as the brutality of the men beating Christ increased so would the delicate beautiful smell that He gave off. Our Lord was no stinking criminal. In His death, even the way He smelled exuded His true identity as a King and as the Messiah we have been longing for.
So out of our devotion, regardless of our circumstances and maybe in spite of them, our Lord is glorified!
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The Call of Missions.
Much of this came out of great conversations with awesome people like Kelley Jackson, Kate Brewer, Andy Boucher, and TJ McGinty. Thank you guys! What is left over is personal study of what they brought to light.
We as Americans and “Westerners” have been evangelized to in more than one way. 356 BC to 323 BC Alexander the Great lived and conquered the world. He was a student of Aristotle in is own day and because Alexander the Great was the student of Aristotle he spread Aristotelian thinking across the Globe. Aristotelian thinking elevated the mind, and the body. Alexander developed the idea of the Gymnasium, the sports clubs, and academic pursuit as an ideal to be desired because of it. This not only permeated his world, but it has been handed down from the Greek Empire to the Roman Empire to the English Empire, to the American Empire. We operate in a Western way of thinking. It makes us logistically prone. Because of the wide impact it has made Alexander the Great what we have come to call a “Hellenized Missionary,” the first actually. This is a person who impacts those within his own sphere of influence to be inclined towards the Aristotelian way of thinking or towards what the Jews coined as “Hellenization.”
In an international business convention in the U.K. participants from the same countries were partnered up and told to put together a business plan to expand their companies based on the teaching they received. They had only a few hours. When they had finished their brainstorming, team conglomeration started with each team unveiling their plans. Every single team from the East had a picture of their business plan. Every single team from the West had an outlined, step-by-step agenda except one, and with further study it was found out that one of the men in that group was born into a missionary family overseas in the Eastern world.
We think in an inverse manner compared to the Eastern way of thinking. Ray Vanderlaan has a method to convey this. He will ask a Western audience to tell him who God is. The audience will usually pause and wait. Then slowly they will begin to reply.
“God is Love!”
“...God is Just!”
“God is Holy!”
He will then say, “Good, now close your eyes and what do you see when you think of those words?” The problem then presents itself. Those are not image oriented words. By themselves they are not free standing images, they must be put into an action dependent on an object to make any sense.
He will then say, “But when you ask a Jew who God is, he will say, ‘God is my Rock,’ ‘God is my strong tower,’ ‘God is my Father!’”
Now those are image oriented words, or better yet those are personal words! They present us with a connection to a real substantial example from which we can derive that God is Love, God is Just, and God is Holy! However we are coming at it from the opposite end of the spectrum or the equation and instead of solving the question as “x+z=y” we use algebra to say that if you subtract “z” from “y” you will get “x” and hence we are going the opposite direction.
So when that comes to missions what happens? What has the potential to happen might be disastrous, and may have already become disastrous, because what the propensity of Western Missionaries is to come into a community full of good intentions to preach the Gospel and to advance the Kingdom, but unbeknown to the Missionaries, they become subject to the Heidelberg Principle. This principle states that any individual observing an “occurrence” has inevitably impacted that “occurrence” with what is innately in that individual. Basically, whatever is in us is imprinted on those within our sphere of influence.
So in an attempt to preach the Gospel we mistakenly attempt to Westernize or Hellenize the community that we are trying to reach. We unconsciously destroy their culture and deny their way of thinking and demand that they change to match our way of thinking. What I’m trying to say should not be misunderstood with a support to Multiculturalism, which has tons of problems in itself especially when we accept horrendous acts such as “Widow Burning” in India (which a horrible practice where a man dies and the widow who is left behind is burned alive with his body), but it is a huge cry to keep from forcing a faulty input into the Gospel when the Gospel is perfect by itself!
Which lands us at the call to missions and our question: How are we called to “Go” and make disciples of all nations even though we have a bias that will present itself to the people we are trying to reach? I believe the answer to the call of missions in light of this rising problem is simple but incredibly difficult! I believe we must forfeit our citizenship of our country, our way of thinking, and truly strive to be citizens of the kingdom of heaven. To strive to “put [our] minds on things above!” To “be holy as I am holy!” To “Follow” the Lord, to eat the dust off of the sandals of our Rabbi because we are pursuing Him so closely! Ray Vanderlaan has spoken in such ways that truly resonated with me on this challenge that our Lord has presented to us with two simple little words, “Follow Me.” So that is our challenge, to give up everything, even the innate foundations of our culture and the way that our world has formed around us!
The Lord calls us sheep, because He is the Good Shepherd. A friend of mine (Kate Brewer) told me that she was doing a study on sheep and found that “they are incapable of evolving as a community.” ... What in the world does that mean!? Well it’s actually quite simple. For example, if you put several monkeys in a cage with shock collars on and a tree full of bananas and you shock the monkeys every time they attempt to get those bananas they will learn not to touch the tree. Not only that, but if you put another monkey in the cage that does not have a shock collar on, the other monkeys, that have been conditioned to not touch the tree, will teach the non-shock collar monkey to not touch the tree! If you keep doing this and swap out shock collar monkeys with non-shock collar monkeys you will eventually get this community of monkeys who have no reason not to get some bananas refusing to eat bananas because they have been conditioned by their peers not to eat bananas! Sheep are incapable of this. They cannot be conditioned in this same way! They will not develop any kind of conditioning like this.
So if the Lord calls us sheep, then I wonder if He is partially saying this so that we might understand how difficult it is for us to change on our own! That we are completely dependent on His work in our lives to change us so that we might be like Him! This solidifies our resolve: We must know God, and we must know Him today that we might follow Him, because He will rescue us, even from our own nature.
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The Gospel Moving West:
(Much of the information on the reformations was found by Blaise Foret and the concept about the Gospel heading west I heard about from Kelley Denison, I wanted to research it and this is what I found)
“And they went through the region of Phrygia and Galatia, having been forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia.” Acts 16:6. In the major exploits of the Gospel, it’s primary journey has headed west with a huge focus.
At Oral Roberts University my Old Testament Introduction Professor, Professor Vance, said that whenever the people of God ever headed East in the Old Testament bad things happened. Even in the Old Testament he claimed there was a pattern.
Paul’s Great ambition was Rome and every time he tried to head into Asia, the Spirit of the Lord prevented him. When Christianity gained it’s own recognition as a legitimate religion in the Roman Empire in 324 A.D. it permeated all of the known world reaching all the way to Spain and Morocco. Then the Viking world was reached after the fall of the Great Roman Empire and they carried it even farther. Saint Patrick took the Good News from his home in the Netherlands west to the Irish and Scottish People. When the Reformation took place in the 1500’s it moved from Wittenberg and Germany, on the shoulders of Martin Luther, John Calvin, John Wycliffe, John Huss, the Catholic Reformation, and the Waldesians, to the Pilgrims, Puritans, and Conquistadors who carried the Gospel throughout all of the America’s. There the first and second Great Awakenings in the 1600’s-1700’s and the 1700’s-1800’s, advanced the Gospel from Copenhagen to the Thirteen Colonies and into the Wild West, lead by Jonathan Edwards, John Wesley, George Whitefield, Count Von Zinzendorf, the Moravians, and the Quakers. And in more modern times the Charismatic Healing Renewal, the Student Volunteer Movement, and Jesus Freaks of the Azusa Street Revival lead by Charles Finney, Dwight L. Moody, Smith Wigglesworth, John G. Lake, William Seymore, and Oral Roberts reached the Western Seaboard of the United States.
Missionaries have been hitting the Eastern world from these movements and from the established world of the Gospel from the West such as the Moravians John Leonard Dober and David Nitschman who were the first missionaries in the Morovian Missions Movement, who sold themselves into slavery to gain passage into India inspiring their Morovian brothers and sisters to go all over the world bolstering some 226 missionaries by 1760. Missionaries that hit Eastern India and China were men and women like Amy Carmichael, Hudson Taylor, and the Student Volunteer Movement Missionaries who packed their belongings in caskets as they headed East from the Americas to die in foreign nations that the Gospel might be preached there. Even the Disciple Thomas headed East into India where he preached the Good News of our Lord Jesus Christ, however these missionaries have not established a home base for the Gospel in the East such as the Western world has experienced until now.
In September 15, 2005 Time Magazine published an edition asking the question, “Just how many Christians and communists are there in China?” In 1958 Yoido Full Gospel Church was founded in Seoul, South Korea by David Yonggi Cho and has grown to possibly be the largest Protestant Church in the world! The next revival is soon in coming and it has reached across the U.S. and may make the jump or it may have already made the jump across the Pacific to Japan, the Koreas, Russia, China, and India, that the Gospel might be established there and the Lord will be glorified by it’s people! These missionaries who have been going to the Eastern world have not been going there in vain, but have been long in plowing the soil preparing the way for the Word to come to them. There are even now forerunner movements in the underground church in China such as the “Back to Jerusalem Movement” where the Chinese Christians are doing exactly what the Moravians and Student Volunteer Movement did: send missionaries to the unreached crossing the span between China and Israel.
Even our own culture recognizes this movement in varies ways such as in The Book of Eli where Denzel Washington plays as the character Eli who is on a quest to carry the Word of God across the US. Whenever he is asked where he is going, he simply says, “West.”
Mark 12:54-56, “He also said to the crowds, “When you see a cloud rising in the west, you say at once, ‘A shower is coming,’ And so it happens. And when you see the south wind blowing, you say, ‘There will be scorching heat,’ and it happens. You hypocrites! You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but why do you not know how to interpret the present time?”
Matthew 28:16-20, “Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. And when they saw him they worshipped him, but some doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and f the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
Galatians 4:1-7, “I mean that the heir, as long as he is a child, is no different from a slave, though he is the owner of everything, but he is under guardians and managers until the date set by his father. In the same way we also when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world. But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.”
So we are called to know God’s heart! To love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, and strength and to love our neighbor as ourself. So we need to live as His children, understand what He is doing by knowing Him and then in turn spreading His message.
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The Saeculum and a Gap in it:
A look at the Development of Men in their Masculinity and Leadership, the effects of the Western World on them, and the way these “men” shape their worlds because of it.
Each of the following “Phases of Life” represented below actually represent the different seasons of the Saeculum. The Saeculum is the name of the Roman or Grecko Roman Calendar given to the Western World or the Hellenized World. It has dominated the cyclical calendars for the Western World and is almost like clock work. The United States has operated inside of the Saeculum for 3 “turnings” (the completion of the four seasons) and is currently in the 4th turning. For instance, ten years from now it will be 80 years since the Great Depression and World War II, 80 years before that was the Civil War, 80 years before that was the Revolutionary War, 80 years before that was the Glorious Revolution, and so and so forth.
The most prominent feature of the Saeculum is probably the seasons in which the generations live in. There are four different seasons (spring - rebirth, summer - establishment, autumn - the unravelling, and winter - crisis) and therefore there are four different generational archetypes born, one from the start to finish of each season (the Artist Generation, the Hero Generation, the Nomad Generation, and the Prophet Generation). If this is at all interesting to you and you would like to truly understand these concepts, go and read The Fourth Turning by William Strauss and Neil Howe. It is very awakening and abrupt. The authors do not claim to be Christians and some of it may need to be put under further scrutiny than other parts of it, but for the most part it is very alarming and it resonates with me.
I am only going to address one of the generations, as it relates to two other books I’ve been reading, and specifically bring light to the development of the men of my generation: the Hero Generation.
Before I do this the two other books that I have been reading are The Way of the Wild Heart or Fathered by God (John Eldredge went back, made some revisions and retitled the book) and The Making of a Leader.
The Way of the Wild Heart specifically addresses the Masculine Journey. This book outlines six stages of life that occur from boyhood to manhood to elder-hood. The six different stages are the Beloved Son, the Ranger, the Warrior, the Lover, the King, and the Sage. Different aspects of these characteristic stages are evident at any given time, but each stage does have a characteristic season that it should dominate. I highly suggest this book! John Eldredge is one of my favorite authors and I had the privilege of going to Middle School and being friends with his son Blaine (who he mentions in his books).
Lastly The Making of a Leader by Dr. Robert Clinton is about Leadership Theory. He outlines the six different durational periods in the shaping of a leader. So if men are to be the leaders in the family, in the nation, and in the world, so much of it makes sense to compare the two development journeys. The six different periods of life for a leader are Sovereign Foundations, Inner Life Growth, Ministry Maturing, Life Maturing, Convergence, and Afterglow. Few leaders ever reach Convergence (a time of exponential outpouring in ministry with an immense magnitude), because it requires several different factors outside of the Leaders control, and Dr. Clinton said that he was only aware of two men who ever experienced Afterglow. This book was very educational and I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Before I get to the culmination of the three books as it pertains to my fellow “men” I reserve the right to be wrong. These are my speculations and I am not at all an expert in “Majoring in Men” (as coined by Dr. Edwin Cole in Maximized Manhood). Simply reading books and taking a couple of classes in Godly Men, does not make me an expert in this field, but it is enough that I need to stop and analyze what I have been learning and experiencing.
Here are the 4 seasons of life and what a man experiences and is subjected to during each of those seasons from the perspective of a man born into the Hero Generation only.
First Phase of Life -
Masculine Journey (The Way of the Wild Heart): The Beloved Son becomes the Ranger
Leadership Development (The Making of a Leader): Sovereign Foundation
The Saeculum Context (The Fourth Turning): Fall or the Unravelling
Second Phase of Life(...You/We are here) -
Masculine Journey (The Way of the Wild Heart): The Ranger becomes the Warrior
Leadership Development (The Making of a Leader): Inner Life Growth/Ministry Maturing
The Saeculum Context (The Fourth Turning): Winter or the Crisis
Third Phase of Life -
Masculine Journey (The Way of the Wild Heart): The Warrior becomes the Lover and the King
Leadership Development (The Making of a Leader): Ministry Maturing/Life Maturing
The Saeculum Context (The Fourth Turning): Spring or the Rebirth
Fourth Phase of Life -
Masculine Journey (The Way of the Wild Heart): The King becomes the Sage
Leadership Development (The Making of a Leader): Life Maturing and Possibly Convergence or maybe... maybe Afterglow (not likely though)
The Saeculum Context (The Fourth Turning): Summer or the Institution
This may look somewhat simple at first glance, and in theory it is beautiful, however when you slow down and realize how far off we are in contrast to where we should be, we can recognize a breakdown of the moral masculine figure in the American society. If that happens then the Saeculum has the potential to breakdown.
When the men of the Millennial Generation were born they were born into the Saeculum season of Autumn or in an “Unravelling.” According to John Eldredge and many leading psychologists, boys need to know that they are the Beloved Sons of their fathers. Not only this, but God’s intention to develop them as the leaders of their families is for them to receive their Sovereign Foundations during this time of their lives. The Autumn season of the Saeculum is called an Unravelling, a time where the generations in power are questioning the “established institution.” While we were children we were receiving the “Sovereign Foundation” to question the established society. Even the media reflects this in Hollywood’s insatiable appetite for portrayals of the society’s own demise as shown in Zombieland, The Book of Eli, all three Terminators, The Matrix movies ... The list goes on. According to the Saeculum these factors are normal to develop a mindset for the Hero Generation in which they will be able to redevelop the institution and make it better as William Wilberforce did in England abolishing the Slave trade during his life or to have the dedication to give their life for something they believed in like Jim Elliot did for the Auk-au Indians. Both of these men were part of the Hero Generation that existed in their turning of the Saeculum. However, we have had a breakdown from fathers to sons. Lou Engle, a popular speaker from the International House of Prayer, bristles on this point, John Eldredge has written multiple books on the subject, and psychologists are raving about the “Father Wound” left in young men’s lives leaving them longing for real male friendships but instead end up filling them with illegitimate means. As a result men have become weak in America, incapable of leading in their families, victims of lives without Christ. The danger comes when we take a look at our global perspective of this. “In the 1990’s while our teenagers were going off to summer camps to learn how to kayak, build fires, and go fishing, Palestinian teens went to camps learning the trades of murder, mock kidnappings, and how to build car bombs” (The Blood of Lambs, Kamal Saleem).
So we are in a cycle and pattern that we may fall out of because of a weakness that has developed in our country, with no security that we will maintain what our own country has fought for, “the American Dream.”
Malcolm Muggregde said, “We look back upon history and what do we see? Empires rising and falling, revolutions and and counter-revolutions, wealth accumulated and wealth dispersed. Shakespeare has spoken of the rise and fall of ‘Great Ones,’ that ebb and flow with the moon. I look back upon my own fellow countrymen, at one time dominating over a quarter of the world, most of them convinced in the words of what was still a popular Psalm, ‘That the God of the mighty shall make them mightier yet.’ I’ve heard a crazed and cracked Austrian announce to the world the establishment of a reich that would last a thousand years. I’ve seen an Italian clown say that he was going to stop and restart the calendar with his own ascension to power. I’ve met a murderous Georgian brigand in the kremlin acclaimed by the intellectually elite of the world as a wiser than Solomon, more humane than Marcus Aralias, more enlightened then a shoqar. I have seen America wealthier and in terms of military weaponry more powerful than the rest of the world put together so that should the American people so desired they could have out done a Caesar or an Alexander in the range and scale of their conquest. All in one lifetime, all gone... Gone with the wind... England part of a small island off the coast of Europe, threatened by dismemberment and even bankruptcy. Hitler and Mussolini dead and only remembered in infamy. Stalin a forbidden name in the regime he helped to found and dominate for some three decades. America haunted by fears of running out of that precious fluid that keeps her motor-ways roaring and the smog settling, with troubled memories of a disastrous campaign in Vietnam and the victories of the Don Quijote of the media they charge the windmills of watergate. All in one lifetime, all in one lifetime ... gone... Behind the debris of these self-styled solemn supermen and imperial diplomatists stands the gigantic figure of one person, because of whom, by whom, in whom, and through whom mankind might still have hope, the person of Jesus Christ. Yes there were many men who tried to be God, but only the one true God who who was willing to become man. (As quoted by Ravi Zacharias).”
Our only hope can be in Jesus Christ and our only security can be in Him because if it is anywhere else, we will be lost. For the men of our nation, Dr. Edwin Cole stated, “Masculinity is synonymous with Christ-likeness,” our challenge is to rise up, in the midst of our circumstances and in the midst of our world’s horrors and to pursue Godliness. To lay aside ourselves and to pursue righteousness.
The Navajo have a seasonal sand calendar that has different colored sands they sift in a circular motion which create different patterns to represent the different seasons. At the end of each calendar there is left a gap between winter and spring. This gap represents to them a decision that must be made to continue the pattern. This decision cannot be made by any human, but must be made by God’s direct intervention. So really the fate of our country is in His hands. The countries that had preexisted in the Saeculum before us were countries like the Italy and Rome, Russia, and the U.K. If you look at what happened to them at the end of those countries you will find that their demises were not pretty. So how can we provoke young upcoming men to be men, or better yet, how can we initiate young men now to be men who will be able to take on the crisis that this nation may face?
How can we do that?
Let me just say that I am not presenting this as a post that says the end of the world is here, but it may be an alternative thought to that way of thinking. We are called to be like the men of Issachar who have an understanding of the times as mentioned in 1 Chronicles 12:32, and act quickly. Christ may have even mentioned the "Winter" or Crisis season of the Saeculum in Mark 13:18 and Matthew 24:20, instructing to pray that the end would not come while it was Winter.
So how can we be ready for the winter? How can we initiate men in their masculine journey, enable them to be the leaders they are capable of being so that they will rise up against the current injustices and calamities of our day? I have some ideas, but we all need to work toward this. Men must be ready to lead and we need to rally them to that point.
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Wisdom from Africa
2 Timothy 4:9-22
In Africa, if a man is about to die he calls everyone he cares about to draw near.
Paul has 2 words repeated verses: 9,21. "Make every effort to come to me before winter!"
Paul was telling Timothy, please hurry! This is a significant time, come before winter stops you.
Paul remembered that winter stopped him several times. He remembered the sailing in Acts 27, when no when paid attention to his warning about sailing that would later lead to the shipwreck.
Every animal gathers food and makes preparation and accomplishes much before winter comes.
Winter is the time of life that will prevent you from accomplishing what you normally accomplish during fall, spring, and summer.
Take an urgency because the time you have is short and even in that, the time you do have has a winter time in the end of it! Wake up and prepare!
"Whatever you build with your gift, your character will destroy it. But whatever you build with your character your gift will compliment it." - Oscar, Kenyan youth pastor.
So take the time to prepare before it's too late to shape your character. This is so that what you become passionate about will come from the right character.
Paul was telling Timothy, "The King's businness requires a sense of haste." hold onto a sense of urgency. MOVE WITH A LACRATY!!!
Kenyan Proverb:
During Rainy Season there was a particular farmer who needed his 100 cows moved accross a river. The cows would go on their own, strong enough to walk through the raging waters themselves. He knew he would be swept away if he tried to cross over the river by hself, but if he could grab a hold of one of the cow's tails it would take him back accross the river. "100 Cows," he would think to himself, "I only need one tail."
The cows started to cross the river and the man just watched. 30 cows went by, but he still said to himself, "I just need one tail." 50 cows went, 70, 80, and the man was just left with 20 but still just said, "I only need 1 tail, I still have time." 90 cows went, 91, 92, 93, and he still waited. 94, 95, 96, 97, and the cows were moving very quickly, the man watched the 98th cow crossed the river, and the 99th stepped into the water. He realized the 100th cow was moving toward the water so he rushed to grab ahold of the tail and just as the 99th cow reached the other side and he reached the last cow he reLized that this last cow had no tail.
God is a God of young people.
Joseph, Gideon, David, Jonathan, Mary, Ruth!!!
The young are just naive enough that they don't realize that some things are impossible.
1 Timothy 4:7-16
Measuring progress -
We desire to see progress. Businnesses want to see Capitol gain, athletes want to break "pr's," and parents want their children's rooms become clean! We all desire a realization of accomplishment.
Paul was telling Timohy to be an example in conduct:
Your conduct must be good Hebrews 12:1, stay away from the sin that so easily entangles. Run! You must be an example now, because God has chosen you to lead right now!
You are an example to the elderly already because God has chosen to use the weak to lead the strong so that He is more evident in History.
We all have potential to sin, to commit evil! If you do not take charge of the potential to sin, it will take charge of you.
1 Corinthians 9:27, "I bring my body under subjection, lest when I preach the gospel, I myself might not be disqualified from the prize." wake up and go after it! It's Game Time! Now is the only time you will ever have so grab hold of it!
Use your gift or you will loose that gift! Use it or loose it, because if you don't, it becomes dead weight! When you walk into a place, that place is supposed to change, because you and a reflective image of God! You are in His presence and You are reflect His direct character! Unleash it! Let go of yourself! If you cage in His character and refuse to follow His example then you rob others around you, don't hold back!
Perservere, for those who perservere to the end will enherit the prize!
