Life After the Island...

It's been two months since I graduated from the Kanakuk Institute. My eight month journey living in community and studying God's word cover to cover has to come to an end. I'm so much more in love with Jesus and with serving His people than I was a year ago. I didn't know it was possible to love such a diverse group of people so much, knowing their faults, hangups, and habits (and they knowing mine). Together we walked through the refining fire of God's truth (and oh, does that fire burn when the truth scrapes away your comfortable preconceived notions and sinful habits!). Now we're armed and equipped to take that to a desperate world who asks, "What is truth?" (John 18:38).

To say my soul was sanctified, my purpose was narrowed, and my vision was sharpened is an understatement.

But launching into the ocean of life after the island is no dreamboat. 

It's hard work.
It's a litany of endlessly same days. Bills to be paid. The rigor of routine and far earlier bedtimes. Things I had the luxury of forgetting for one sweet season.

Instead of waking in the morning to study God's word for four hours with my dear friends. I roll out of bed (groaning, breakfast in hand or not at all) and head to work. Instead of eating dinner accompanied by music, laughter, and conversation, I eat alone. Instead of returning home to participate in whatever was certainly happening while I was gone, I turn on the TV or open a book.
And, most painful of all.

Community isn't handed to me. I have to chase it. And I have, seemingly down every byway and back alley of Branson. 

Everything in my world is a little bit more grey without those colorful folk to brighten every moment.  The cast of incredible characters who populated my life with their chatter, their wisdom, their love and their encouragement have been scattered. They aren't gone...but our next reunion will probably be in heaven.

It was always meant to be that way. These seasons are flashes of the joy of the kingdom to come, not the real thing. 

I now work full time at a bank. The cut and dried numbers and sales goals are not food to my soul. They often seems to be means to an end... the end of another long day, another bill paid, and the safety of a productive and quiet life.

But my soul is already yearning for an adventure. It groans within me, reminding me that safety and quiet were never my desire. I sit at my desk and remember the days of freedom to study the Word and live in organic community with joy. I dream of the next part of the journey..the day I lay numbers aside to embrace what the Lord has for me somewhere across the world. And that day will come.

But what about embracing right now? What about embracing the opportunity to live in what is arguably the oddest community in middle America? A beautiful community of 10,000, spread out over breathtaking hill country, which happens to be home to 2.5 million visitors a year and every kitschy tourist attraction the mind could envision (and then some). A place where beneath the veneer of money and malls, storefronts and smiling visitors, lies deep pain- drug abuse, homelessness and a host of problems only God is big enough to handle. A place where the local church struggles to understand and embrace the varying needs of its community. A place where meeting a single twenty something who is unaffiliated with Kanakuk is a little like finding a unicorn. My strange little home.
It could be a matter of weeks, months or years before the Lord calls me away again. I've always been a sort of purposeful wanderer- and years of traveling the world, and moving across states into house after apartment after duplex after condo after hotel room have taught me that everything in my life is temporary. When my heart longs for settling down, for a true home, I am reminded that my home is in heaven, and Jesus has already gone there to prepare it for me.

We're all vagabonds this side of eternity. 

It is my joy to spend every day seeking new and unique ways to bless others with every resource and ounce of spare energy I have. There are semi-homeless camp counselors to be fed on their nights off work. There are dozens of junior high and high school students at my church, who I love as my own siblings. There are kids who haven't  understood the gospel yet. There are women in my workplace, in my fitness classes, in my coffee shop, in the grocery store I shop in each week who desperately need to hear about the love of Jesus. This is why I stayed.

It's my privilege to be obedient in this season. To be joyful and constant in prayer with my eyes on the reason I walk this road. It's not my favorite road, the landscape is a little less varied than I hoped...but it's what God has and I'm going to embrace it. Just because I might be on another mission field in the near future, doesn't mean the mission hasn't already begun here in the most unexpected place.

Friends, would you pray that God would sanctify me and bring me satisfaction in Him during this new season? Pray that He would direct me to the people, the places, and the ministries that He would have me in? Ask that He would give me wisdom and discernment as I pour into the high school and middle school students and families in our church.

As always, I massively appreciate visits, phone calls, and any updates I can get on how to be praying for you. I have an abundance of free time now. (Okay, that's a lie...but my schedule no longer revolves around seventy other people).

Everyone and their mother is always welcome at my dinner table. So if you're reading this, let's share the table or a cup of coffee in the months to come and talk about everything God has been doing.

Grace and Peace,
Jade

"There Are Far Greater Things to Come Than Any We Leave Behind"

What a wonderful week it has been. The new semester at KI is in full swing, and it's hard to believe we've just completed our fourth week. Graduation is a mere 2.5 months away, and the learning process has been intense, to put it mildly. This week we took a long look at the book of Hebrews which is, in my opinion, the most theologically dense book of the New Testament save Romans. I had always been a little confused and a little in awe of this mysterious thirteen chapter letter, written by an unknown author to a varied audience of Jewish peoples. As one theologian famously said, “Only God knows who wrote Hebrews.” Yet the councils on biblical canonicity, the groups that met to decide which books were deemed inspired and thus to be included in the Bible we have today, gave little or no argument as to the validity of the book. Why? Because it's so good. It clearly connects the Old Testament sacrificial system with the New Testament system of Christ's sacrifice once for all people that eliminated the need for these temporary sacrifices for God's people. Here are a couple of new lessons I learned from the text this week, I hope you're encouraged as I was. Go read Hebrews. Do it now.

1. The Old Testament sacrificial system was never intended to be anything other than a shadow of the day God would come and fulfill His plan, not just to cover the sins of mankind, but to remove them entirely. We see the sacrificial system inaugurated in Genesis when God provides temporary coverings of animal skin for Adam and Eve after they attempt to cover themselves in the shame of their sin. Later, after the giving of the Mosaic law, the Jews elected a high priest, who would enter the inner part of the temple (the dwelling place of God), known as the Holy of Holies once a year on the Day of Atonement. He would make a sacrifice his own sins and for the sins of all Israel, in order to preserve the people's covenant relationship with God. Yet God said from the beginning, that what He desired from His people most was their hearts. The outward signs his people gave as signs of obedience- sacrifices, circumcision, etc. were to be merely symbols of an inward change.
   
   
2. God is so faithful. He knew the people would need to sacrifice time and time again because they would always violate His law. Hebrews says that “without the shedding of blood there can be no forgiveness of sins.” Yet God made a promise that one day, a New Covenant would come that would be better than the old- the laws written on stone tablets would be written on the hearts of His people. That day came at the death and resurrection of His son, Jesus Christ.
   Exodus 19:10-11 says, ““For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord:I will put my laws into their minds, and write them on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And they shall not teach, each one his neighbor and each one his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest. For I will be merciful toward their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more.”
   
   
    Peace and blessings y'all. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions about the Institute, what we're learning, or about God's Word. I'd love to help!

God From God, Light From Light

“What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us. ... Worship is pure or base as the worshiper entertains high or low thoughts of God. For this reason the gravest question before the Church is always God Himself, and the most portentous fact about any man is not what he at a given time may say or do, but what he in his deep heart conceives God to be like. We tend by a secret law of the soul to move toward our mental image of God.”

 A.W. Tozer, The Knowledge of the Holy  

Happy New Year! We’ve finished our first week back at the Institute. I’m in awe of what God has already done. There’s no way I could be in a better community right now- every single one of my classmates, every staff member, and every person in our community has sharpened me and changed my life irrevocably. We have less than a hundred days left to soak in this time of growth and community. I couldn’t be happier to begin 2015 this way. I turned 26 a few days ago, and had the blessing of having my classmates surprise me with cake and a dance party on our first night back together. It was a wonderful beginning to a time that’s going to pass as if it were a moment. While I walk forward with very little knowledge of what my life will become after April, I have confidence in a never changing God who has a perfect plan, and makes Himself known to me day by day. 

This semester, we’ll focus most of our time on New Testament teaching and theology. We began with a study of the Trinity. Next week we’ll study the book of Romans, and the following week, the life of Christ. We’re in a twelve week inductive study of the book of 1 Peter (what, you haven’t spent twelve weeks reading a five chapter epistle before?) The culmination of our semester will be a project called Belief Statement Panels, in which we defend all the major beliefs of Christian theology, backed up by our knowledge of scripture before a panel of pastors and community leaders. We’ll spend the next two months preparing for these by writing statements that summarize different aspects of theology and discussing them in small groups during class. Anyone exhausted yet? I’ve been experiencing 2015 for all of nine days, and I’m not sure any nine days have ever been so pivotal. The Lord is sometimes slow and gentle with me in His teaching…this month is not to be one of those times. 

This week we learned about the Trinity. Arguably one of the most confusing issues in all of Christian theology, a sticking point for people of other religions who insist that calling God “three persons” means that we worship three Gods. We spent three days with Dr. Glenn Krieder, a professor at Dallas Theological Seminary as we sought to understand this concept better. I took several major things away from our conversation. One thing I was not aware of before is that there is not a single definitive proof text that points definitively to the trinity. This does not disprove the Trinity, for God is referenced as three persons all over the New Testament. I also wasn’t aware that the evidence for Trinity in the Old Testament is not as easy to find either, because the Trinity wasn’t revealed to mankind until Jesus was born. 

So what does the Trinity mean to us today? It means everything. The Trinity- God in three persons- the perfect communion of three equal, yet distinct persons is an essential to orthodoxy. We can’t preach the gospel without the trinity- God created a people in his own image, designed for perfect relationship with Him. But we had to choose to follow Him and we chose our own way, believing the lie that something else was better (idolatry). God was not surprised by this, but instead enacted a plan to send his Son Jesus Christ into the world to live a perfect life, fully human and fully divine, to die a criminal’s death to pay for the sins of all people. When He rose from the dead, he promised His followers a helper, the Holy Spirit of God to live inside of them- comforting them, guiding them and teaching them truth.

While the Trinity is, ultimately, a mystery that is beyond our comprehension, we can rest in the knowledge that we worship a God who created us, loves us and has made Himself known to us progressively through scriptures and through all of history. 

Tools for Your Apologetics Tool Box

This week in class, we had the opportunity to hear from Kerby Anderson, a radio talk show host and author of many books on apologetics and world religion. We discussed in detail how to engage people who are from different faith traditions and the core tenets of each of those- Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism and Mormonism. We then discussed the ideas of postmodernism or relativism and how those relate to the newer culture of atheism that is prevalent in the Western world today. Finally, we discussed ways to engage the millennial generation (our own- those born from 1980-2000) in the context of media and technology that invade every part of our lives. It was a rich several days, and I’m thankful for what Anderson called the tools to put in our toolbox to engage a lost and broken world.

That summary aside, I want to focus for a moment on what I’m truly passionate about- how to engage people who lack an understanding of absolute truth, particularly those of Hindu and Muslim backgrounds. 

As many of you know, I have a major passion for seeing God’s truth come to people of cultures around the world. It was three years ago nearly to the day that I returned from six months of service in South Asia. The pervasiveness of the Hindu religion is such there that it affects every single aspect of government, city planning, music and media, and family life. To be born in this area of South Asia is to be Hindu. I devoted the majority of my time in college to understanding the religions and cultures of the world and reading thousands of pages of theory about how to engage them with the gospel. Yet  when it comes to actual, practical conversation with those of other religions, I had very few. Then I moved overseas. Talk about a shock to the system. (If you’d like to read more about those days of my life, look further back on this blog to posts from 2011 or let me tell you a story or two!) The HIndu or Muslim framework of understanding not only came across boundaries of language difference, but from an entirely different view about God, the role and value of man, the sacredness of life, and how we should live. I learned that my friends spent all their lives trying to earn the favor of a gods who may or may not choose to save them. Salvation is utterly man centered and based upon obedience to complicated tenets and traditions. Indeed, what I was most bothered by was that most of my friends did not understand their holy scriptures at all, but seemed to blindly follow the traditions of their people for ages past. 

It is important to understand two things about most major world religions, especially those of the east

1. Decisions of faith are NOT made in a linear, logical fashion which is dictated by a neatly outlined set of dogmatic principles. A Hindu might worship all, several, or none of 330 million gods. A Muslim might believe the sanctity of the Qu’ran to his core, but have no idea what it really says. What IS important is the traditions of your people and keeping those in order to preserve the honor and separateness of your family, your people, and your culture. 

According to our teacher, Kerby Anderson, it does not bother a Hindu person in the least to spend their days as a doctor or scientist and then go home to make an offering to the elephant god. Their faith is not based upon logical compatibility, it is based upon tradition that is deeply entrenched in every part of who they are. 

2. Decisions are not made based upon the will of the individual, but on the good of the community. It matters little what the individual believes about how they should practice faith, what career they should have, even whom they should marry. They are always bound to what their parents and the leaders of their community say. This system of accountability filters down to every level of life. When you ask a person of Hindu, Muslim, or Buddhist faith to consider the truth of the gospel of Christ, you are asking them to leave their family and their community. To abandon the traditions of their faith is disloyalty. This is why many of my friends have been disowned permanently by parents, spouses, even their own children when they choose to follow Christ. 

In light of understanding these two major things about the life of a person with an Eastern faith tradition, we must understand how to ask good questions and how to present the gospel clearly. One of the major things I learned in witnessing to Hindus and Muslims is that you can present the gospel in a way that does not immediately attack their faith (which is who they are in many ways). The gospel and God’s love speak loudly enough that it’s good to present the stories of God’s word and his character and ask them questions about what they’ve learned, rather than providing a long sermon on every reason religion x is incorrect. 

Mr. Anderson said there are two main reasons Muslims who followed Christ cited as what drew them to Him- God’s love and eternal security. I feel that these reasons are common to those who leave any religion to follow Christ. Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists, and Mormons are never able to be certain that they will achieve salvation. They follow rules and traditions that enslave them to fear that they may not be good enough. Not only this, but the gods they worship do not unconditionally love them. These are the key differences between the faith of a Christ follower and that of another religion. It’s important to remember that each of these followers of other religions were created to worship the God who dwells within us, and they long to be known and loved by Him. It’s our responsibility to announce this love and truth to them as we build relationships, ask good questions and walk carefully so that the love of Christ is clearly communicated. 

My Family Tree

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! 
        What a rich season it is. The chill in the air this month has often made me want to complain, but every time I take a dive out into the frigid air, I'm reminded of how much God wants to wake His people up. I want to continue this journey of sharing what I'm learning with you. I cannot tell you how beneficial my time in studying God's Word has been this year. I could tell you story upon story, so please, if you want to know more or have any questions at all, let me know!

        This week we had the privilege of hearing from my favorite teachers, Chad Hampsch, about the incredibly rich and complicated 2,000 years of church history that have come since the writing of the Bible was completed. Rather than list information about epochs of time, I'd rather talk about some themes I saw in our history and how God has worked through all of it. But why study church history? Why not just know the Bible and be done with it? I see several reasons for devoting one's time to studying those who have gone before us in faith. 

• First, we need to know our family tree. 

• Just as most people know what kind of biological heritage they came from, so the Christian must be aware of the heritage they have in faith in the family of Christ. The Bible says that our family in Christ is of a higher priority than our earthly family and it is also eternal. This is not to say that God doesn't place us where we are in time in the family we are in for a distinct purpose, but it is to say that Christ is the priority over any human relationship or commitment. 
• If we know where we have come from, we can see how God has been working over thousands of years to bring a sinful and broken people back to the knowledge of Him.
• The Bible wasn't even translated into the common language of the people until about 500 years ago. We have to recognize the immense privilege it is to have the entire completed word of God in our own language and give honor to those who gave their entire lives, even unto death, to make this possible. 
• Second, we need to understand why the world is the way it is.

• If we can put our finger on the pulse of Church history, we can put our finger on the history of the world. The institutions of the Western world are deeply rooted in Christian tradition. Not only this, the problems in the Western world are problems that began due to frustration with the church and a departure from absolute truth- that is, the gospel of Jesus Christ. I could overwhelm you with example upon example of how we have seen error in the Church turn into a tidal wave of hurt in society. This rippling effect of the breakdown of truth and compromise upon and adding to the gospel of Jesus Christ has created a culture in which absolute truth is rejected absolutely. Spirituality is praised, relativism glorified and religion rejected as archaic and nonsensical. Yet the inherent logical error is this- postmodernism says "My truth is my truth. Your truth is your truth. There are many ways to understanding." But if everything is true, then nothing is. The essence of truth is that it stands no matter who speaks it. Jesus Christ is the only way to understanding and the only way to truth. We have 2,000 years of millions of men and women who have died for a faith that glorifies man not at all and places each of us under the loving sovereignty of the God who loves us. What an honor to die in such service. 

• Our teacher, Chad, said, "Man couldn't write the Bible if he tried, and he wouldn't if he could." There is no way that people would invent a religion that asks you to take up your cross (instrument of torture), abandon selfishness, love others, reject the comfort and the sin of your life and place total trust in God. It rides against everything our flesh has to say, everything that is natural and common to people. Christians must be able to defend from historical evidence and the attestation of thousands of accurate Bible manuscripts that our faith has both meat and veracity! 

Here are just a few of the many ways I see that God has worked in Church history:

• Where persecution abounds, the church only grows. We see this in the book of Acts when the Jewish authorities are befuddled at the fact that killing Jesus Christ did not kill His message. In fact, thousands of converts were added to the kingdom of God in just a few short years. His message spread across the world, and touched peoples and continents that were absolutely pagan and should never have come to a knowledge of God. 
• We see this later in the time of the Reformation, where a hunger for the truth of God's word motivated Martin Luther to decry the Catholic tradition that men need mediators other than Christ. The works that Luther published, commentaries on Scripture were read by common men and women across Europe, and the message of the gospel exploded and created the Evangelical faith as we know it. 
• We see John Wycliffe, committed to the printing of Bible's in every person's language, who was killed for his faith, and yet today, the Wycliffe Bible Translators have helped to accomplish the translation of scriptures into 1,300 languages. 
• With the dawn of the Age of Reason, philosophers and thinkers such as Voltaire predicted that Christianity would die within the next hundred years. (Today, the French Bible Society prints and distributes every Bible in France from Voltaire's home. Talk about God's sense of humor!) 
• In countries where Christianity has long been declared illegal, the church only grows. There are an estimated 200 million believers in China. It is said that the Communist government will have to declare Christianity to be legal in the next ten years, lest it take over the nation. 

• God is serious about his plan to use the church as a the redemptive organization for the world. We need to be serious about getting behind what the church is doing. The only true change that can occur in people's lives is from the inner change the gospel brings- when we try to legislate morality, it doesn't matter because nothing truly changes. If church is a place where you sit for an hour each Sunday and listen to a man talk and listen to some other men sing and hear a list of do's and don'ts to make your life better- then we're attending a speaking function ora social club. If the church can reject this idea of moralistic therapeutic deism- the idea that God exists to give you a list of to-do's and to make you feel better- the gospel will explode on earth. Our brother, John Wycliffe said it well, 

“The gospel alone is sufficient to rule the lives of Christians everywhere...any additional rules made to govern men's conduct added nothing to the perfection already found in the Gospel of Jesus Christ” -John Wycliffe

        God doesn't need us to accomplish His purposes. He chooses to use us. He chooses to give us personal ownership in the process of making His kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven. He chooses to give us the great task of making Him known as we learn to know Him. Don't run away from the Church, friends. Be a part of a local body that preaches the Word accurately. Be a part of a community where truth is declared and accountability to the Word of God is paramount. Be a part of the change we will see in people's lives and hearts when the love of God overtakes him. The battle for unity in the community of Christ is one of the greatest challenges of our time. But it's so worth it. He is coming back to judge and to rescue, let's declare His coming. 

"And this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come."

Matthew 24:14

In Wrath, Remember Mercy

“The Bible contains the mind of God, the state of man, the way of salvation, the doom of sinners, and the happiness of believers. Its doctrines are holy, its precepts are binding, its histories are true, and its decisions are immutable. Read it to be wise, believe it to be safe and practice it to be holy. It contains light to direct you, food to support you, and comfort to cheer you. It is the traveler’s map, the pilgrim’s staff, the pilot’s compass, the soldier’s sword, and the Christian’s charter. Here Paradise is restored, Heaven opened, and the gates of hell disclosed. Christ is its grand subject, our good the design, and the glory of God its end. It should fill the memory, rule the heart, and guide the feet. “Read it slowly, frequently, and prayerfully. It is a mine of wealth, a paradise of glory, and a river of pleasure. It is given to you in life, will be opened at the judgment, and be remembered forever. It involves the highest responsibility, will reward the greatest labor, and will condemn all who trifle with its sacred contexts.” --Gideons International pocket Bible

If you're like me, you've spent a great deal of your life reading the Bible and skipping through a certain section in the middle, known as the prophets. It wasn't until college that I really began to understand that God intended each part of His word to be relevant and resonant with His people across the centuries. The 17 men of God, called prophets, who cried out to the unrepentant Israel and Judah before the time came for them to be destroyed by conquering empires wrote words that are relevant to the church today. Why? Because the issue of man's sin and total depravity before God has never changed. Because God has never stopped pursuing His people and asking them to repent and turn back to Him. Because there are many words they spoke that have yet to be fulfilled.

Two weeks ago in class, we had the great privilege of hearing from Blake Holmes, a member of Watermark Church's staff, about the prophets of the Old Testament. This was definitely my favorite class topic so far because it's the one I've known least about. Blake gave us some great principles for interpreting the prophets, which I'll share at the end, and then went through an overview of each of the 17 prophets- who they wrote to, when they wrote, their main message, and where we see their prophecy quoted or fulfilled in the New Testament. It was nothing short of fascinating. My favorite part was that each time we finished a prophet, we paused to discuss how we would apply the message of the prophet to our situation today. For instance, Hosea is about God's unrelenting love for the nation of Israel despite their unfaithfulness, which is similar to that of a prostitute, or an unfaithful wife. So the question he asked was, who does this book minister to today? It ministers to anyone who feels they've messed up or gone so far away that they cannot be redeemed by God, like they're the exception to God's grace. We, like the people of Israel, all have 'prodigal' situations, where we're far from God, he pursues us, and we're redeemed and forgiven by him.

We see the purpose of the prophets in 2 Chronicles 2:18-19 “And they abandoned the house of the Lord, the God of their fathers, and served the Asherim and the idols. And wrath came upon Judah and Jerusalem for this guilt of theirs.Yet he sent prophets among them to bring them back to the Lord. These testified against them, but they would not pay attention.” So the prophets were not just men of fire and brimstone, telling everyone they were condemned to hell- they were meant to bring people back to the Lord. The ministry of God's prophets was a frustrating one. We see very few examples of the people repenting, even when the Lord's word is made so clear to them? Why? They had abandoned God to worship other things and were consumed with sinful pride. I think their situation is very reflective of ours today. And though Christians in the West may not have an empire coming to conquer them (depending on which latest conspiracy theorist you ask), there is One who will come to judge the living and the dead and He will destroy evil once and for all. That includes the destruction of those who do not follow Him.

We have the privilege of having the whole word of God, the full counsel of His will revealed to us in a way that the prophets never did. Will we respond to God calling out to us, or will we cast out the prophets as an irrelevant part of God's word? We see across the prophetical books that in God's wrath He always remembers mercy. This is a hugely important thing about the character of God- His wrath and judgment are sure, but the moment we cry out to Him, He saves, and that salvation is irrevocable.  

For the King and His Kingdom

The Ozarks are ablaze with the glory of fall. I have been all over the world and I know I've never lived in such a beautiful place. Our busy season of eighty degree days and crisp nights is reaching a frenetic pace. Between working twenty hours a week, my internship with the youth group of First Baptist Branson, twenty hours a week of class, small group Bible study, and untold hours of studying for tests, writing papers, and completing projects, I am surprised I'm awake enough to write at this moment. Apparently, the city of Branson keeps a similar rushing through life pace in its holiday preparations. The Christmas tree on the Branson Landing went up in early October. The holidays known as Halloween and Chrismas receive only a passing mention, if acknowledged at all.

This week we had a wonderful teacher come for three days to teach about the United Kingdom Era of the Old Testament. We traveled through the books of 1 and 2 Samuel, 1 and 2 Kings and 1 and 2 Chronicles, which tell the story of 120 years of a united Israel under the rule of Saul, David and Solomon. For years, I've gotten lost in the details of this period of biblical history because I only knew the more famous episodes. It was so good to have a teacher paint a clear picture not only of the text itself, but the lessons to be learned from the lives of these three men and the prophet Samuel who advised them.

When the time of the judges over Israel had ended, the people begged God for a “real king.” Of course, God wanted to be their king, they should have been under His authority alone. I think it's interesting how many times God allows us to have things that we ask for that really aren't best for us. The king the people chose, Saul, was chosen because of his good looks and charisma, not his heart. Despite everything Saul had going for him- his wealth, his heritage, his position among the people, and an anointing from God- a litany of bad decision making led him down a destructive path to his downfall.

Following the humiliating rejection of Saul, God chose the great man after his own heart, the humble and courageous David, son of Jesse to be king. David has always been an interesting person, becaue where he succeeded, he shone beyond belief, and where he failed, he caused chaos. Even the smallest decision of someone as influential as David can have an incredible impact. The thing I love best about David is his humility. When he sins, he always repents and reconciles to God correctly. He would probably agree with Paul in calling himself “the foremost” of sinners (1 Timothy 1:15). That's what makes him so relatable and our God so much more real to me- He forgives astronomical sin when we are truly repentant and turn toward him.

Yet sin is never without consequences, and the bloodshed on David's hands during his reign prevented him from being able to complete the longed for temple of God. That was for his son Solomon, whose reign produced some of the best architecture of all time. Solomon was an interesting character. His half heart for God made him strong in many areas and weak in others.. Solomon was truly the wealthiest man of all time- he puts the Bill Gates' and the Warren Buffets of today to shame. Not only this, he had full access to the resources of wisdom from the God of the universe. How could he have failed? We can see the crux of Saul's demise in a part of the law given to Moses in Deuteronomy 17,

“You may indeed set a king over you whom the Lord your God will choose. One from among your brothers you shall set as king over you. You may not put a foreigner over you, who is not your brother. Only he must not acquire many horses for himself or cause the people to return to Egypt in order to acquire many horses, since the Lord has said to you, ‘You shall never return that way again.’ And he shall not acquire many wives for himself, lest his heart turn away, nor shall he acquire for himself excessive silver and gold.” Deuteronomy 17:15-17

Saul was destoryed by his wealth, the wives he accumulated and the worldliness with which he lived. Imagine what an impact for the kingdom of God Saul might have made if he had been as fully devoted to God as his father David was! Yet still he left us with the treasures of three books of scripture- the Proverbs about wisdom, Ecclesiastes that speaks of meaning, and Song of Solomon that uniquely portrays romance and marital love from a godly perspective. After Solomon's death, the kingdom of Israel was divided between the North and South under the poor leadership of Solomon's son Rehoboam (who, like Saul, was far more concerned with what the foolish general populace thought than listening to wise counsel.).

What can we learn about the character of God from these men? I believe that everything that happened to the people of God in the past is relevant to us today because it serves as an example. (1 Corinthians 10:6, “Now these things took place as examples for us, that we might not desire evil as they did.”) The sin we are burdened by has not changed. The God we serve, who overcame our sin has not changed either. Here are a few lessons the chronicles of the United Kingdom teach us about God.

1. God honors those who honor him. He brings blessings for obedience and judgment for disobedience.
   God blessed the times that all three kings obeyed. He also judged them for their disobedience. He blessed Saul, then rejected him when he considered what the people said to be more important than what He said. He blessed David, but there were consequences for his moral failure, such as the death of his first born son with Bathsheba. He blessed Solomon with great wisdom, yet told him at the end of his life that the kingdom would be ripped from the hands of his son because his wealth and wives were more important to him than anything else.
2. It is not a person's position that gives them influence, but their character as it is informed by God's direction.
   David's position in life was not one of wealth, he was a lowly shepherd boy, last among many sons and would have received very little inheritance from his father Jesse. Yet God looked at the character of his heart and saw what He desired. (1 Samuel 16:7)
3. Sometimes God will give you what you ask for, even though it's not what you need to show you it won't satisfy.
   God gave the people of Israel a king in Saul, perhaps in part to show them how worthless a mere man really was in comparison to the One True King.
4. You cannot live in disobedience and justify what you do before God. We see this in the story of Saul in 1 Samuel 15, when he is asked to destroy the godless Amaelikites completely, yet only obeys partially, arguing that he was going to sacrifice the best of their livestock. How often do we only partially obey what God asks and then expect him to bless us?
5. When we focus on God, our circumstances shrink. When we pray we must fix our gaze on God and glance at our request. God should not receive a courtesy call out in our prayers
   We see this prominently in the life of David- when he met the eyes of a ten foot tall warrior who had the entire Israeli army cowering in fear, he didn't see impossibility, he saw someone who was defying God who needed to be brought low. When he gathered with the disenchanted and desperate in the cave at Adullam as he fled from Saul, he fixed his eyes on God, asking for deliverance.

I can hardly believe we're ending our seventh week in school, with just six short months to go until graduation day. What a blessed season of life it has been. What a true blessing it is to spend hours a day, poring over the mysteries of the word of God. Pray for me, friends, that I might learn the truth so well in these days that I can teach it with confidence, by the power of the Holy Spirit, to anyone I encounter.