lent 2024
I remember very clearly a seminar that I attended at our church when we lived in Florida. The auditorium was bursting with over a thousand people, and the seminar was being simulcast in churches around the country, so we watched the speaker on a big screen. This was the first time I had ever experienced such an event, and it made the talk even more impactful and memorable.
The speaker was not like any preacher I had ever heard. He was more of a motivational speaker than a Bible preacher. I don’t remember any of the verses he read, but I do remember the “catch-phrase” that he repeated over and over again. He would say it, then repeat it, and then he would have us repeat it back. Then he would have us stand up, and he would shout out part of it, and we would shout out the rest.
It was one of those, “get everyone excited about what God is going to do” talks, with a lot of enthusiasm and shouting! And I got wrapped up in it, and got excited about the message, and it had a deep and lasting impact on me. What was the catch-phrase? What was the BIG IDEA of the seminar that day? I remember it so clearly:
“God always works in the positive. God never works in the negative.”
It was an all-day seminar, and I am sure there were subpoints and stories, but that’s all I remember. And that’s what I took away from the seminar that day. How important it is for us as Christians to have a positive attitude as we seek to have God work in our lives. Because “God always works in the positive. God never works in the negative.”
And although I am sure the speaker had good intentions, and thought he was promoting a biblical message, looking back I now realize:
That is a lie.
Yes, a lie. Not just a little bit off, not just a slight misreading of the text, not a gray area or disputable matter, not just a different interpretation or opinion, it’s a straight up, bold-face, from the father of lies and from the pit of hell: LIE.
And I took the bait. I swallowed the lie: hook, line, and sinker. And in the years that followed, I suffered the consequences of believing that lie. I worked so hard to always stay positive, and never dwell on, or even admit to anything negative. And I took life by the collar, and seized the day, and grasped the upward-mobility and success promised to me by the god of the power of positive thinking. Needless to say, this did not serve me well, and over time, God graciously and mercifully, eroded away this sand on which I was trying to build my life.
I discovered that more often than not, God does His best work in the darkest places, in people’s weakest moments, in times when people doubt Him, and in situations when they are the most down and depressed. God gave Abraham and Sara the child of Promise, and He used their doubts and blunders to show His grace. Jacob was a mess. He was fearful, conniving, and scrappy. He was continually trying to strike bargains and demand blessings in his relationship with God. But God showed up, and worked amazing things in his mess of a life.
We think of David as a great king, but he was a horrible, really horrible parent and his lack of attention to his own household led to so much pain, division, strife and bloodshed. His conflict with his son Absalom almost led to his downfall. But God worked in the middle of it all. Jonah cries out to God from the belly of a whale. David cries out to God from the valley of the shadow of death. Jeremiah cries … all the time. Really, I don’t see how anyone can read the Bible and think that God always works in the positive, and God never works in the negative. It actually seems to be the other way around. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs in the Kingdom of Heaven.
On Wednesday, I went to a church service where a pastor put ashes on my forehead and told me “Dust you are, and to dust you shall return.” The purpose of this is to remind me of the reality of my death. I will die. I am dust, and my body will return to the dust. The purpose of the ashes is to remind us that God usually does His best work in the darkest times and the most dismal of places. For hundreds of years, followers of Jesus have been observing a season called Lent. The purpose is to remind us, in vivid terms and powerful symbols, of our fallenness and the corruption and curse that our sin has brought upon all of creation. But God …