Covenant of Love

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No one likes to be wronged; to be treated unfairly. When there is a sense of a grave injustice being done to us, like when someone sits in our seat at church or takes our parking spot. When someone offends us by doing something and acting someway towards us which we don’t appreciate. They get “lippy”; they show no “respect”. We get angry.

After all, who are they to treat us like this? And it quickly becomes evident that the sin of self, that old sin of pride which the scriptures refer to as “the flesh”, has been incubating just beneath the surface (yes, me too from time to time).

Reading through 1 Corinthians, the situation I just described was a mild case compared to what Paul was dealing with there. In the city of Corinth Christians where actually taking each other to court they were so mad at each other. Someone offended this person or that person; someone wronged someone else; another person was cheated by someone and everyone was getting offended by everybody else.

Paul takes a step back to observe this sorry state of affairs before he finally pleads, “brothers…

“Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be cheated? Instead, you yourselves cheat and do wrong, and you do this to your brothers.” – 1 Corinthians 6:7-8

Paul is flabbergasted by the way the body of Christ is treating one another. “Why not rather be wronged”. That is not “be wrong”, it’s “be wronged”. Allow yourself to be offended. Water under the bridge. Let it go.

Ask yourself, “Is the situation worth the relationship?” Shall we be divided because someone has offended us? If so, then we are dividing the body of Christ.

“Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it.” – 1 Corinthians 12:27

Christ cannot be divided. To be a follower of Christ is to rather be “wronged” then to divide the body of Christ. It is to love your brother (and sister) and place them before yourself. “Have this mind in you” Paul councils, “which was also in Christ Jesus”. He continues:

“If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being likeminded, have the same love, being one in spirit and purpose. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourself. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others” – Philippians 2:1-4

When was the last time you allowed yourself to be wronged?

MSNBC reports a story titled Chile Earthquake May Have Shortened Days. Apparently the Chile 8.8 earthquake last week (one of the worst in recorded history) may have altered the Earths “figure axis” by about 3 inches and actually shortened Earth days by about 1.26 microseconds (millionths of a second).

The News anchor on T.V. announced it like this: “The earthquake in Chile literally sent the Earth for a loop, turning it on its axis and altering the length of a day forever!” – very dramatic.

I never realized that an earthquake had such an ability and it made me – sitting comfortably here in Windsor Ontario – think about the end of the world. North Americans are obsessed with the “End Times”, but in reality, I don’t think I want to be around for it. Frankly speaking, I’d rather come back with the Lord then be here if all hell breaks loose.

What are your thoughts about this?

2009 2010 is the fastest year yet for me. I cannot believe it is already almost March (1/4 through the year!) and still I have a difficult time remembering to place the “1″ before the “0″. Unbelievable!

Why?

What makes this year different from all the other years?

• It feels like 9/11 happened just yesterday.
• It feels like my father is still alive; like I could pick up the phone and call him at this very moment.
• It feels like I just met my beautiful wife, that we’ve been married for only a few months (we’re in our third year).
• It feels like my cat of sixteen years is still a kitten.
• It feels like I’ve just had my tenth birthday and my present are two baby turtles named Leonardo and Michelangelo.
• It feels like I just return home from Bible College.
• It feels like I just bought my first car.
• It feels like I just came home from youth group, that I can call Bob for advice, and Jason just to hang out.
• It feels like I just heard my brother-in-law (Joe) receive a standing ovation for singing I Surrender All by Clay Cross.
• It feels like, it feels like, it feels like…

Oh how time flies.

My wife’s grandmother once said, “no matter how old you feel; no matter how old you are or how your body digresses; on the inside your soul never ages“.

So true isn’t it.

On the inside I feel no older than when I was a child. But on the outside life is moving quick. Too quick.

And everyday this is a reminder to cherish the things that matter most. To not take people for granted. To always ask, “is this situation more important than the relationship?”

Do you also find life is moving by too fast?

Monday you may have noticed some changes to Covenant of Love. The transition went something like this:

OLD——————————————->NEW

There was something about the design to the left that bothered me (maybe it was the picture of me in the banner); I felt that the “feel”, the color scheme and basic design, was too dark and I also felt that the page was too cluttered.

So I developed a new design that focuses less on me (no picture), and more on my heart. There is now only one column rather then two, but the same primary elements remain the same (for example, to find the posts on View Points, just click on “Categories” and scroll down).

We are creatures of habit and I already received some feedback from people who preferred the first design over the new one; and I can’t promise that their will not be more changes (I’m thinking of increasing the font size). Someone else told me that the new design lacks the “personal” element of the first and that the blog is “too professional” now – “less black and white” they said.

I’m looking for your feedback. Please leave a comment below telling me whether you like the new look, don’t like it, prefer the first design, and why?

In marketing you learn a lot of cool things, like the difference between a customer and a client.

Both a customer and a client are defined as “one who buys goods or services“. But that is where the definition of a customer ends and that of a client begins.

The Difference?

The word customer dates back to the Middle English word for “custom” as a way of doing things. The word client on the other hand dates back further then Middle English and is derived from the Latin word cliens which means dependent or follower, to come under the protection of another. (Source)

A client is further defined then as “one who depends on the protection of another“.

The Godly Difference

This is really a fascinating distinction to be made: a customer is one who has gotten into the custom of doing things: going to church, paying tithe, reading the bible, and so one. Furthermore, a customer is someone who goes to make a purchase but who wants to remain self dependent; go to God for healing if you’re sick; go to Him for money if you’re in dire financial straits, go to him if you need prayer for someone or something and so on. But after you make your transaction you want to go your separate way and to do your own thing.

In other words, a customer’s relationship is superficial with the one they make their purchase from. They don’t expect much and they don’t give much. They just do what’s necessary to get what’s necessary.

A client on the other hand is someone who also makes regular purchases, but a client is much more than that. A client is one who comes under the protection of the one he has made a purchase from. It is relational. It is intimate. It is ongoing. It does not depend on doing things in the form of customs, traditions or habitual practices. It does things out of love.

But we need to be careful here, careful not to judge between a customer and a client too quickly. Because we need to keep in mind that the primary definition of both is “one who buys goods or services”. And so the real distinction between the two lays not so much in practice as in attitude.

Both a customer and a client may go to church weekly. They both may be involved in prayers and petitions. They both may tithe (though the client would probably avoid the term “tithe”). They both may seek help from God during dire financial straits. They both may study theology. The difference is that one may do all of these things out of habit, customs and traditions. The other, out of love and a sincere relationship.

The first is a customer. The other, a client.

The God of the Bible is a God who works in Covenantal relationships. To be “in Christ” is to be in that covenantal relationship. It is to come under the protection of a God who invites: Come and dine.

It is to be a client of the Almighty.

I want to be a client of the Almighty.

How about you? Are you a customer of God? Or a client?

The Weird Ancient World

I’m reading Christianity in the Greco-Roman World by Moyer V. Hubbard and I just finished the chapter titled Religion and Superstition. I find it amazing the kind of superstitious practices that were widespread in the ancient Roman world. Practices like burying a frog at an intersection to prevent a fever or pouring wine under a table after hearing a cock crow [p. 26], or a mother who vows that her sick son will stand naked in the Tiber River on the day of the fast if Jupiter will save him.

I find it comical that the Romans had a god of the door post, a god of the beehive and a particular god who cures hangovers [p.20-21] among a myriad of other deities available to the shopper.

We want to laugh at such ridiculous nonsense – and we do, but then we turn on the evening news and…

The Weird Modern World

Then I sat down the other day to join my family in watching the news and what do I see? Dozens of excited folk running around dressed up like groundhogs anticipating the next mornings, uh well, prediction?

You know the tradition? If the groundhog sees his shadow then wa-bam, six more weeks of Winter (Who’s Winter? Are we talking globally? Do all groundhogs in the world have a vote? Who selects which groundhog gets to make the prediction?). In any case, in at least at one location the groundhog has seen his shadow 98 times in the past 112 years – I think by now he knows what’s coming and sees his shadow just to get a joke out of us.

Then the news began to talk about the Super Bowl that starts in a few days, the stats for this are simply crazy: 151.6 million (yah that’s not a typo) total viewers on average sat down to watch it last year. To put that number into perspective, Canada’s total population hovers around 30 million! So 5 times the entire registered population of Canada sits down at once to watch a bunch of men in tights run around hitting each other for several hours – woo hoo! (I wonder what future archaeologist will say about this weird North American phenomenon?)

Many people often say that they watch the Super Bowl for the commercials. Well for 3 million dollars a pop (at only 30 seconds) they better be good!

In Perspective: Then and Now

As I reflect upon these recent events it has occured to me that we – as a culture – really haven’t come all that far in the past two thousand years.

In short, we have no right to mock the weird customs of the past because, well in many ways, we’re still there. (Ever bury a St. Joseph statue in your yard to help sell a house – if not it may surprise you how common this superstitous practice is today).

When they chose new gods, war came to the city gates, and not a shield or spear was seen among forty thousand in Israel.

My heart is with Israel’s princes, with the willing volunteers among the people.

Praise the Lord!

You who ride on white donkeys, sitting on your saddle blankets, and you who walk along the road consider the voice of the singers at the watering places.

They recite the righteous acts of the Lord, the righteous acts of his warriors in Israel – Deborah (Judges 5:8-11).

On my way home from work the other day I decided to get a coffee. Pulling into the parking lot of a popular Coffee shop and making my approach to the drive-thru, I found myself nose to nose with a truck which was also turning into the drive-thru at the same time from the opposite direction.

We stared each other down for about three or four seconds (which seemed like an eternity) before the person in the truck must have realized that although “technically” I began my approach about a millisecond sooner, and was coming in from the “normal” direction (he was coming from around the back), I was letting him go first.

When I pulled up to the drive-thru window, the employee handed me my coffee, and as I reached out to pay for it he informed me that the man in the truck had already done so.

It happened yesterday and I’m still blow-away. The man in the truck did exactly the opposite of what society teaches us to do, which reminds me a little bit of the Kingdom. The Kingdom of God is the Great Reversal of the order of this world. Don’t take the head of the table, Jesus tells us, but take the foot and offer the head to the little guy. Don’t pray in public for all too see, go find a closet. In my Kingdom, Jesus says, only the last come in first place.

What is Kingdom living in a fallen world?

Kingdom living is buying coffee for a stranger you never meet.

A Reflection on this Martin Luther King Jr. Day:

Martin Luther King Jr. had a dream. So did the Apostle Paul. King’s dream was for freedom from Tyranny. So was Paul’s. King’s dream would only be realized when “we let freedom ring”! So would Paul’s. For King, that freedom had to be proclaimed in every village and hamlet, every city and state. This was Paul’s mission too. For King it was a dream that all God’s children would join hands and sing “free at last!” So with Paul. But for Paul, this freedom would be realized only when the One who brings freedom is realized.

The answer to the social injustice rampaging around our world is not in proclaiming the concept of freedom, but in proclaiming the Person who brings Freedom. The answer to the social injustice today is still – as it always has been – Jesus the Messiah, the savior and King of the universe.

“When we let freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, “Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!” – Martin Luther King Jr. (Click Here)

There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. – Apostle Paul (Galatians 3:28)

So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. - Jesus of Nazareth (John 8:36)