Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: Sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. Because of these things the wrath of God is coming. You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived. But now you must rid yourselves as all such things as these: anger, malice, slander and filthy language from your lips. Do not lie to each other since you have taken off your old self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of it’s Creator. Here there is no Greek or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all and is in all.

Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, cloth yourself with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. (Colossians 3:5-14)

Whoever coined the phrase of “old dog new tricks” in reference to people must have never read the New Testament. It seems the pages of the New Testament are packed with stories of tyrants, prostitutes, thieves and the like being transformed into shining examples of integrity and sacrificial love. In the passage above Paul is painting a picture of what change looks like when Christ takes his place as lord in someone’s life. It may seem like a list of do’s and don’t that he’s asking his readers to fallow to be right with God, but we know that this is not what it is, from reading the chapter before this. Paul never strays from the message that its Christ’s indwelling presence in the believer’s life, that is the origin of this process, of being renewed in the image of the Creator. What he is doing is painting a picture of what the presence of Christ looks like as Christ doesn’t just teach the old dog new tricks, but actually changes the Dog. So what Paul is saying in essence, is that since you’ve had a spiritual heart transplant and now you live in the light of God’s love and grace, don’t let the old life lingure, Make decisive choices to say goodbye to it and live out of the love and truth of Christ’s indwelling presence. And for 2000 years this message has been proving that the power of God’s grace stands the old saying “You can’t teach an old Dog new tricks” on it’s head.

Ingredients of True Spirituality.

Since you died with Christ to the basic principles of this world, why, as though you still belonged to it, do you submit to its rules: ‘Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!?’ These are all destined to perish with use, because they are based on human commands and teachings. Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence. (Colossians 2:20-23)

In the letter the Apostle Paul wrote to the church in Colossae, he addressed some of the problems that the church was encountering as a new community of Christian faith. He uses his letter to teach them what true Christian Spirituality is and to avoid the fake spirituality of legalism.

Repentance and faith, submission to Jesus as the Lord, making space to let the mind, will and emotions of Christ become an inward reality and adopting the new language of gratitude are all marks of what Paul calls true spirituality. His focus is that we are changed by God from the inside out, and that this change comes through these elements, not following rules or traditions made up by people.

One of the easiest things for us to do is to become a legalist. What I mean by legalist, is that we adopt a certain set of rules that we are able to keep (thinking it pleases God) and then we usually judge everyone else by our rules. The problem with this type of fake spirituality is that it not only makes us self-righteous and hard to live with, but it also has no power to really change us on the inside. Christ came that we might actually have a real connection with God, and that from this connection, there would be seeds planted in humanity that change us into what we are created to be, and the hope of what those seeds will one day fully become. Paul’s letter in essence is a warning not to go back to legalism; it does make people look shiny on the outside, but those who live with a legalist know it’s not what’s on the inside. He encourages them to keep their connection to Christ as their means of true spiritual growth, letting him change the inside as we become what we were meant to be, from the inside out.

Faith or Addiction

When life is tough or unfair we all come to questions in our mind about the reason for those trials. Sometimes it seems impossible to make any sense of the events and circumstances that shock us and bring us to our knees in grief. I’m reminded of the story of Nehemiah in the Bible. We can see in the first chapter of the book of Nehemiah a man who’s wrestling and grieving with life and God. Nehemiah was a nobleman and an educated man in the nation of Israel, who now finds himself as a slave in the courts of a king whose army had killed, raped and burned his hometown to the ground. He now finds himself as the cupbearer for the king; A crash test dummy to test the drinks for poison before they get to the kings lips. Grief and humiliation of this sort is the kind that shakes a person to the core, but as we see when we read through the book, Nehemiah becomes one of the most inspiring leaders of hope as he is granted his freedom to return to his burned out city to rebuild. Nehemiah wasn’t in denial about what had happened to his home and family, his grief was very real, but it was his faith that the God of heaven had not abandoned him in his grief that allowed him to face reality again with hope. I’m sure there was the temptation to throw in the towel and allow the wounds of his heart to be drowned by some form of an addiction, rendering him useless to his future as a leader of hope and inspiration. It seems we all come to places of decision like this in our lives. We are faced with the tough questions about God:

Why didn’t you keep my parents from divorcing?

Why didn’t you stop the abuse?

Why didn’t you prevent the accident?

Pastor Eugene Peterson has said…. God will answer no such questions, no matter how often and how passionately we ask. Instead, he invites us to weep with him and receive his mercy. And he roars in anger with us and calls us to take up his sword to wage war against that which broke our heart. It is faith, in the God who has joined us and grieved with us, just a Jesus did, and that transforms our broken heart of grief and anger, to a heart that is enabled to face reality with more honesty, hope and passion. This is why the apostle Paul has said “we don’t grieve as those who have no hope”, but we have a relationship with the God who came as a man and was no stranger to our grief. With this hope we are no longer alone in our grief and our anger is transformed to passion, waging war on that which would crush hope in the lives of others. Without hope, the nearest soul numbing addiction, so often becomes our epitaph.

The Medium is the Message

“He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have supremacy. For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross” (Colossians 1:15-20).

As a teen I would pick up a Bible from time to time and try to read something out of it. I was always perplexed as I read a bunch of jumbled stories and teachings that seemed to make no sense at all. “How can anyone say this book is God’s word?” I thought. Does God expect the average teen to be able to make sense of all these random stories and sayings? It all seemed like a strange mystery to me, until one day it seemed that someone had given me a key to the mystery. It was like I understood for the first time what the apostle Paul was saying in the verses above. I finally understood that all of these stories and sayings were pointing to the One who unlocks the mystery of God and history. As I began to pray and reach out to Jesus it was like a wave of refreshing reality flooded my soul. Truth had made an entrance point into my life and it wasn’t a philosophy or a theory, but a Person. I understood that Christ was the perfect image of God and that through him, there is restoration of the distance between God and people, and when that gap is closed, we start becoming who we were created to be: image bearers. This is an amazing thought: of actually finding our truest purpose and destiny in life. It seems many people tread lightly around Jesus, and for obvious reason. As Nelson Mandela said, “It’s not our smallness and weakness we most fear, it’s our greatness.” When I am faced with the God that sent the perfect One to die on a cross for me, it causes me to tremble. How could God see something of such greatness in me, that he would invite me to draw near to him through the costly price paid on a cross. It may be fearful to think why God would invite us to draw near, but the invitation stands. May we not let fear rob us of answering such an invitation.

Mother, father please explain to me Why a world so full of mystery

A place so bitter and still so sweet So beautiful and yet so full of sad, sad…

Mother, father please explain to me Why forests march to desert speed

While snow-capped mountains melt away

What do we tell our babies, when do we say, oh

Mother, father please explain to me How a man who rocks his child to sleep

Pulls the trigger on his brother’s heart

He digs a hole right to the middle of this storm of hatred

Mother, father please explain to me How it could be so this world has come to be

A precious balance in between Such cruelty and such kindness please

Mother, father please explain to me How this world has come to be

Unequalled in her blessings, oh, I see Unbridled hatred so extreme, please tell me

Mother, father please explain to me How this world has come to be so

Twisted between time and dreams

Oh, mother, father please explain to me

Oh, what’s all this talk about? All this talk about it

Spinning down, down, down, down, down

All this talk about Endless words without Nothing’s done

Mother, father do you know Why one man’s belly overflows

Another sleeps in hungers bed Oh, we trade our world for a piece of bread

Oh Mother, father please explain to me How this rare world’s come to be

A place so full of color yet overflowing Always in black and white

Drowning in the waters of our…

Mother, father please explain to me How this world has come to be

While still blessed in all the things we see

Such a sad, sad home for you and me

Come out, and hold, Come on out you

Come on out you Come and save yourself

Come on out you Come on we’re taking the water

We’re taken the water We’re taken the water

But you know We got the freedom We got the freedom

There’s no God above And no hell below

Oh, it’s here with us It’s up to us To keep afloat

How this sweet world has come to be to keep afloat

Mother, father please explain to me How this rare world has come to be

Oh, let the blue planet Let the blue planet

Mother, father please explain to me

Mother, father please explain

Many of the questions do not warrant a pad answer.  Many of these questions actually require a lifelong discussion.  The “why” questions are the hardest, eh dads?

It was the same 2000 years ago in Israel.  When the New Testament happened and was written Israel had been under persecution and dominance for centuries.  They lived in a time when Rome dictated how to live, how to practice religion and more specifically, how to and who to pray to.  But before we go there the issue of state/prayer goes way back.  Way back.

Hundreds of years, before the times of Jesus, Israel was a nation called by God to bring the story of reconciliation to the world.  The deal went something like this:  God and Israel were a team to make this world better.  If Israel broke the covenant other countries would remind Israel of their fault.  Well, Israel forgot the promise and a nation named Babylon came to remind them.  And remind them they did.  They destroyed Israel’s main place of worship.  Killed half of the population.  Took half of that half back to Babylon, while the others remained in a broken and desolate place.

When the group arrived in Babylon, a man named Jeremiah stood up and said “This is not how things are suppose to be – we forgot the promise.  But don’t just sit around here in Babylon and do nothing – make home’s, plant gardens and pray for the Babylonian leadership.  Pray that they will be successful, fruitful and peaceful”.

Many people did not agree with him.  He believed this is what God wanted.  Jeremiah’s answer to the tough time’s they were going through was to pray.  Pray for blessings upon their oppressors.

Let’s move forward a little in time.

The more the kingdoms that overtook Israel, the more those kingdoms wanted prayer by Israel on their behalf.

Then Rome.  Rome was the “Babylon” of Jesus’ day.  Roman leadership said that “Caesar was Lord and you pray to him.”   But Israel was passionate about monotheism, about praying to the one true God and Rome was passionate about Pax Romana – Roman Peace.  Israel had such a big population in the Roman Empire that Rome allowed them to pray to their own god in order to keep peace, but it had to be on behalf of the King.  This became an issue in the first churches.  The questions, the “why’s” of Rome became something the church had to come to terms with. These churches contained many “non-Jews” whose former religion was based on emperor worship.  Do they need to pray like the Jews?  Should they pray for an authority that thinks they are deity?  Should they pray for strength to start a rebellion?  Why?  Why?  Why?  In the spirit of Jeremiah Paul writes to Timothy the following words:

1 Timothy 2 ¹I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone— ²for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. ³This is good, and pleases God our Saviour, ⁴who wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. ⁵For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, ⁶who gave himself as a ransom for all men—the testimony given in its proper time. ⁷And for this purpose I was appointed a herald and an apostle—I am telling the truth, I am not lying—and a teacher of the true faith to the Gentiles.

Let’s paraphrase this to get the full impact.  “Rome is not really our rulers.  Jesus is.  King Jesus.  But let’s pray for Rome.  Things are not right.   King Jesus even died for Rome.  We are not zealots – let’s not rebel (remember Jeremiah), we are not Pharisees, or Sadducees and we are not the Essenes (let’s not hide), but let’s live in peace in this turmoil, but first, let’s start with prayer.”

Paul does not answer the questions of “why?”  He gives no pad answer at all.  But what he does is admit the way things are and get’s the conversation going by including God in it.  Pray.

We all can plainly see that this world is still not right.  Kids are still asking big questions about the way things are.  Dads, start with prayer.

Our family bought a GPS for the car and I love it.  We can travel through the States, type in “Water Park” and boom, it brings us to a water park.  Awesome!  You want a Tim Horton’s, type it in and boom, you’re there.   Looking for that bike store that someone told you about, the GPS brings you right there – “turn left in 100m”.  It has saved us from going in circles many a times.

Now imagine you want your GPS to tell you that where the local grocery store is and it says “Don’t got there, you might get your car scratched by a cart”.  You tell your GPS that you want to go out for a nice dinner.  It replies “No, you may get food poisoning”.

That just wouldn’t work.  The whole point of GPS is to tell you where you can go, not where you can’t.  And that is the main emphasis that Paul is making when it comes to being under the “LAW” or under the “GOSPEL” in his letter to Timothy.

Paul’s understanding of the law is that it tells you what not to do, where not to go and how not to do things.  Paul’s understanding of the message of Jesus is the polar opposite.  The gospel says:  this is where you can go, what you can do and this is how you can do it!  Of course, there is more to it than this but for Paul’s letter to Timothy, this would be the context to help us understand what is going on.

The main point of our present passage is this:  The Jewish law is like a map which only marks danger.  Let’s read it, try to understand the circumstances that this was written under and then conclude.

1 Timothy 1:3-11 (New International Version)

 ³As I urged you when I went into Macedonia, stay there in Ephesus so that you may command certain men not to teach false doctrines any longer ⁴nor to devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies. These promote controversies rather than God’s work—which is by faith. ⁵The goal of this command is love, which comes from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith. ⁶Some have wandered away from these and turned to meaningless talk. ⁷They want to be teachers of the law, but they do not know what they are talking about or what they so confidently affirm.

 ⁸We know that the law is good if one uses it properly. ⁹We also know that law^[a] is made not for the righteous but for lawbreakers and rebels, the ungodly and sinful, the unholy and irreligious; for those who kill their fathers or mothers, for murderers, ¹⁰for adulterers and perverts, for slave traders and liars and perjurers—and for whatever else is contrary to the sound doctrine ¹¹that conforms to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, which he entrusted to me.

Timothy was placed in Ephesus to get a church that was falling apart put it back in order. Ephesus was considered the wealthiest and most hip place in the time of Paul.  It had a great harbour, it contained one of the 7 Wonders of the World and it boasted continuously of its great athletic compounds and games.  Actually, they were the hub for great theatres, government buildings (which were also worship centers), commercial markets, baths and gymnasiums, stadiums, medical schools (they trained the best of the best there) and festivals.

And of course, the Temple of Diana (Artemis).  What you need to understand is that no matter where you went it had pagan worship connected to it.  The theatre, the market, the gym, the doctors – everything.

So, there were these people in the Ephesians church who said “The GPS says don’t go there you could blah blah blah….”  In other words, stay where it is safe, where you won’t be influenced and so on.  Why? Because the law says so.

Paul’s view is that “That’s good for the people who never have come into contact with Jesus.  If you want to know what not to do, the Jewish law is perfect.  But it won’t tell you what you should do”.  As NT Wright puts it:  It may be good for people who are always wandering off to the danger areas, who seem bent on going too near the moral cliffs, or trying to cross bridges that will crumble underneath them.   

What are those danger areas?  This is where this little letter gets really cool.  Paul lists some types of danger areas – but he is also playing with words here.  Paul lists commandment’s numbers 5-9 out of the Ten Commandments but brings them to an extreme.  In other words, this list is list of the most perverted places you can go with breaking the Ten Commandments.  Let’s look:

Commandment # 5 – Honour your parents.  Paul’s extreme slant “those who kill their parents.

Commandment #6 – Do not murder.  Paul’s extreme slant “murderers” (refer to my message on the top ten)

Commandment #7 – Do not commit adultery.  Paul’s extreme slant “adulterers and perverts”

Commandment #8 – Do not steal.  Paul’s extreme slant “slave traders”

Commandment #9 – Don’t give false testimony.  Paul’s extreme slant “liars and perjurers”

Paul says, these types of people obviously never had a Jesus moment – so the law is for them.  If you are this “perverted”, you need more than the law, you need Jesus.

The bad leadership in the Ephesus church was probably telling the church “Don’t go to market, or you will stumble, you will break the law” or “Don’t go to town hall or you be disobeying the Torah” or “Don’t go to the gym, or God will be displeased with your lack of commitment to the Ten Commandments”.  Pauls reply to this is “They do not know what they are talking about.  God wants you to be salt and light in those places.  Not the law, but the gospel.  Bring God’s glory to those places”.

Church, we are not called to be an introverted Jesus club.  We are called to go into the world with the glory of God with us.   Well, this is what Paul says to Timothy that all things need to “conform to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, which he entrusted to me.” 

Let’s go there church, let’s go there.

Does this seem harsh?  Yes maybe, but for a book published in 2008, I did not expect to read the same stuff I did 8 years ago.

But there was some stuff  I did like about the book.  And of course some more things I didn’t.  So, let’s change momentum here and bring out the positives.

My thinking in buying this book was this:  I am a pastor who deals with people who feel let down or have given up on Christianity.  And this book does reach out of those type of people… and I will definitely pass this book on to them.

Here are a few pastoral highlights.

Highlight #1 – faith is not a system of beliefs but a relationship

Highlight #2 – meeting physical needs is directly connected to spiritual needs (holistic)

Highlight #3 – sin management vs. story involvement (read the book for definitions)

As a pastor, I  can use this stuff, and I really think people who are struggling could use it too.

Here are a few pastoral lowlights.

Lowlight #1 – Pagitt spends a chapter on deconstructing “systematic theology”, and yet uses that same system to make his case for holistic living.

Lowlight #2 – He tends to say that the bibles narrative is “holistic”.  He uses the word “integrated” to describe the main theme of the bible.  Wright would strongly disagree (and so would I)

Lowlight #3 - Pagitt goes nowhere with this book.  Great, it’s okay to practice yoga and write books in coffee shops, but what was the point?  Maybe he did this so he can write another book about the same stuff.  (sorry for my sarcasm)

My thinking is that this book was written for the person searching.  Well, if there is someone searching the used book shelf, they can buy my copy.  Again, sorry for the sarcasm.  Read it and judge for yourself.  I have to admit though, I was reading Wright’s “Justification” at the same time – night and day, night and day.

The other day I was listening to a radio program that discussed the power of the exclamation mark.  The purpose of the show was to help the listeners understand that the exclamation can be both overused and underused thanks to text messaging, email and facebook.  The punctuation mark once had some punch to it. Now it is overused making it seem cheesy or, underused, making it seem harsh.

Let me show you how this is true in both cases.  Have you ever seen a text message or facebook message of a tween?  “OMG!!!  LOL!!!  !!!!!”.   That would be considered an overuse of an exclamation point.

The undeuse of the xclamation mark would look something like this (let me set up the scene for you):  An employee is asked to put together a business strategy for the upcoming fiscal year.  Hours and hours went into this business plan by the employee.  Finally the document ends up on the desk of the CEO a day early.  The employee is beaming with pride and anxiety as it is delivered.  The employee leaves a note for the CEO to text the employee with some thoughts on the business plan.

Two days later the employee receives that message.  It says:  Great.  We’ll talk.

Can you imagine what the employee was feeling when receiving that message?  They are wondering if this is good or if this is bad. An exclamation point would change the whole feel of that message.

The person doing the radio commentary of the exclamation point said that the power of the punctuation marked died when talking and the hand written letter died.  I think he made his point.  It’s true, we don’t write many letters anymore.  But there is a positive side to our lack of writing letters.  Since we don’t write letters much anymore, when you do get one it has great impact.  You feel extra special (or extra angry depending on the contents of the letter).

This month we are going to look at a letter written to a young Pastor who was left in charge of a church with tons of problems.  His name was Timothy and the person who wrote the letter was Paul.  Paul was mentoring two young pastors actually.  Their names were Timothy and Titus.  When Paul started a church in a town called Ephesus, he had left and it had fallen apart.  So he goes back there with his young apprentice (Timothy) and writes this letter of encouragement to him for Timothy is now in charge of this messed up church.

The odd thing about this letter though, is that it really was not for Timothy.  This letter was actually for the church.  The contents were to be read by Timothy, but explained to the church in Ephesus.   A church that had huge issues.  What were those issues?

Issue 1:  Paul wasn’t around much.  If the guy who started the church, taught the church and influenced the leaders is either somewhere else starting a church or is in jail, issues tend to come up.  As  the old saying goes “When the shepherd’s away the sheep will play”.  This letter is not just to encourage Timothy as pastor, but to get the leadership to be responsible while Paul’s influence is from a distance.

Issue 2:  Because Paul was not present, wrong teaching (which meant wrong teachers) infiltrated the church.  There is some debate whether there was “Gnosticism” going on in the church, but the letter seems to point out that there were people who were semi-Gnostic plus Jewish who were trying to water down the Jesus story.   In other words “escapism” and “law” were being preached instead of freedom in Christ.  Paul did not hold Timothy accountable for this diversion.  Instead he held the leaders of the church (overseers and deacons) responsible for this issue and they needed to fix it.  What you need to understand is that church did not just take place in one building on one day.  Ephesus had many house churches that Timothy was the pastor of.  But all of these houses had overseers and leadership.  They were the ones that were responsible for making sure that each house stayed doctrinally correct.  Timothy taught, prayed and loved, the overseers and deacons kept things going straight and narrow.  They had missed their call.  Actually, in the first letter to Timothy, Paul calls out two people who were diverting the true gospel message (1 Tim 1:20).

Issue 3:  The church seemed to believe (like many churches in that day) that Jesus was going to return any minute.  And that was true.  But Paul recognized something that was awry and encouraged Timothy to encourage the church for the long haul.  In other words “Don’t be idle waiting for the great day – keep living, working, loving…”.  This issue I believe is connected to issue #2: Gnosticism.

This letter is a letter that was meant for a church going through a shift.  A church going through a crisis.  A church that needed people to step up to the plate and be leaders.  This letter was a letter that was to encourage a young pastor to keep on keeping on.  A pastor who was entrusted with a message of love and life.  This is a letter that said to a congregation “Don’t go back to the way things were”.  As NT Wright puts it:  Don’t go back to the default setting.  What were the default settings?  Law and escapism.

Paul gave the church the amazing news that there is a better way at life.  Keep working that out!  Timothy was placed there to keep that message alive.  Really, that is the point of his letter.  (Note the proper use of an exclamation point).

 My sources for this series are as follows:

IVP Dictionary:  Paul

Paul for Everyone:  The Pastoral Letters by NT Wright

NIBC, 1and2 Timothy, Titus  by Gordon D. Fee

Hermeneia:  The Pastoral Epistles by Martin Dibelius and Hans Conzelmann