Unintentional Seduction

Mention the word "seduction," and tawdry images from the Victoria's Secret window at the mall or television shows like Desperate Housewives might come to your mind. However, despite how the term is normally used, seduction need not be sexual.

A person can be seduced into doing any number of actions--theft, gossip, idolatry, murder. They could be seduced by someone's fraudulent scheme or even seduced to participate in a particular lifestyle.

While we may consider ourselves too savvy to be duped by most who would try to seduce us into wrong actions, we rarely think that we could be the seducer.

Lately, I've been stuck in the annals of the kings, studying the last few men God allowed upon the throne before sending Babylon to take Judah into exile. One of the last kings was actually the worst of the worst.

Before God took him to the woodshed of captivity, King Manasseh did everything and anything he could to go against God. In Jerusalem's holy temple, he erected altars to false gods and placed their carved images within its walls. He "made his sons pass through the fire...practiced witchcraft, used divination, practiced sorcery and dealt with mediums and spiritists" (2 Chron. 33:6).

It seems if there were a false god to worship, Manasseh did just that, violating all God's commands in the process.

The problem, though, wasn't just that Manasseh's soul was at stake. Scripture says it was much worse in that his actions led an entire nation to sin: "Thus Manasseh misled Judah and the inhabitants of Jeruslem to do more evil than the nations whom the LORD destroyed before the sons of Israel" (2 Chron. 33:9, my italics).

In 2 Kings, the author writes, "Manasseh seduced them to do more evil than the nations whom the LORD destroyed before the sons of Israel" (21:9, my italics).

The words "misled" from Chronicles and "seduced" from Kings are the same Hebrew word "ta'ah" defined as: "to err, to wander, and to go astray. The meaning of this Hebrew word primarily rests in the notion of wandering about...Figuratively, it is used in reference to one who is intoxicated...Most often, however, it refers to erring or being misled in a moral or religious sense" (Baker & Carpenter 1238).

How apt a description--the seducer's actions intoxicating those around him, causing them to make poor decisions, too.

In other words, Manasseh lived a life that said, "Look at me! I can disobey God and get away with it! All those curses and consequences!? No big deal! God didn't mean us!"

The people watched, were intoxicated by the thought of sinning without consequences, and were led into sin themselves.

The apostle Paul would have described Manasseh as a man who "suppress[ed] the truth in unrighteousness" (Rom. 1:18).

Yes, every person is responsible for his/her own actions; as Paul said, "For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse" (Rom. 1:20).

But even still, I don't want to stand before God on judgment day and have Him show me a sea of faces whom I seduced to sin...whom I misled into hell.

With our every action that goes against God's Word...

With our every sin that "seems" to go unpunished...

When we live lives that disobey God, we unintentionally seduce others.

How terrifying to think that right now, we could be misleading others--our neighbors, our family, our friends, our children, our spouses--into mirrored paths of sin.

*Baker and Carpenter. The Complete Word Study Dictionary: Old Testament. AMG, 2003.

I Don't Love Jesus

My four-year-old bounced off the desk as I sang to him the first few bars of "I love you a bushel and a peck."

"Where did you learn that, mommy?"

I told him of my daddy's father, Grandpa John. The nearly ever-present grin. The mischief. I was in college when he died and couldn't attend the funeral. It was a death that left behind a silence where his laughter and those oft-sung words once were.

With the word "death" spoken, Wyatt launched into one of those impromptu discussions I would have been more prepared for at breakfast than right before bedtime.

During the conversation, I said, "You love Jesus, right?"

Wyatt responded immediately. "No."

That wasn't a response I expected. An image of a "Bad Mother of the Year" trophy loomed in my mind.

"Yes, you do," I insisted, then asked the question a second time. Consistent as always, Wyatt's answer still didn't change. "No." Then, in that sing-song childlike voice, he added, "Weeellllllll...I try to love Jesus. But then my heart goes real, real fast. And then I'm naughty. I don't want to be naughty, but I still do naughty things."

Later, after the conversation was over, I was met with the still silence that only comes after lights out to a two-year-old-twin-filled household. The more I thought about it, the more I realized this child was right and I was wrong.

I say I love Jesus. I believe that with my being. But many times, that love is an empty statement much like those mandatory paper valentines I would receive from each classmate in elementary school. In truth, my actions belied those words.

Loving Jesus isn't difficult. Jesus describes very succinctly what should be our greatest priority: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment" (Matt. 22:37)-8.

In another passage, Jesus explains exactly what it means to "Love the Lord your God": "If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love" (Jn. 15:10).

The definition of loving God could be simplified as "obeying God."

In the Old Testament, God's words to Israel are equally simple concerning how the people were to show their love to God. God explained how He would bless and curse His chosen people based on their level of obedience and love toward Him.

Through Moses, He said, "I command you today to love the LORD your God, to walk in His ways and to keep His commandments and His statutes and His judgments" (Deut. 30:16).

The interesting thing is that God knew His people didn't have a chance of loving Him on their own in this manner. So, He declared,"Moreover the LORD your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your descendants, to love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, so that you may live"(Deut. 30:6).

Through the Holy Spirit, God has circumcised all Christians' hearts so we can love Him with all our heart and all our soul. But like Israel, our hearts still have a tendency to stray--even if in just the smallest of ways.

And with each straying is a little bit less "all", a little less love for God.

We say we love Him; yet, do we regularly spend no time in prayer with Him daily? Are our schedules so packed that we have no time to minister to others? Do we casually disobey one or more of His commands because we think it's not a big deal? Do we still participate in some "harmless" sin even though God's Spirit has prompted us to stop?

Do our actions reflect our saying "I love Jesus"?

Or should our honest answer really be, "No."

To Love the Unworthy

It started when I was in college. For reasons I still don't understand, God breathed into me a spirit of discernment concerning people. Since that time, He has told me many times "beware," "hold back,"or "stay alert."

But I haven't always listened, choosing instead to think that the voice must be wrong...choosing to instead to live in denial of what my heart knew. After all, everyone else liked the person, so what was my problem? As you can imagine, I've reaped many a hurt from not paying attention to my "God-sense."

Awhile back, a man and a woman came into my family's life. Everyone around us welcomed them with exuberant, open arms, but I held back. The bells and sirens were going off again. From the very start, I felt something was wrong, even if I couldn't put my finger on it.

As the months passed, though, God prompted me to show love to these people. I was confused, unable to reconcile what I believed were Godly warning bells with Godly instructions to reach out anyway.

So, I pulled a Gideon, asking God for confirmation that I was, indeed, to demonstrate His love in a specific way towards this couple. Before I turned in that night, He did just that.

And I obeyed. More than once, I sacrificed my time, prayers, money, and talents to show one man and one woman that God's love is real.

I sacrificed, knowing that I would not get anything in return from them for they had nothing to give...and secretly, I hoped the bells were wrong.

Over the past month, though, some of the truth has begun to surface. I felt used, like my gift of His love was in service of a scam. And I asked God why He had me get involved at all?

His answer was firm, but swift--who was I to question whom He wanted me to show HIS love to? After all, was I deserving of His love? Had I anything to give Him in return for all the love He had bestowed upon me through others?

He then directed me to 1 John 4: "Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him....Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another" (1 John 4:7-11).

To show others love is to show others the love God gave a completely undeserving you and me when He sent Jesus to die for our sin.

Likewise, to deny others His love just because I believe them unworthy or undeserving of it is not possible if God lives in me as master of my life. In fact, a few verses later, John puts it quite bluntly, "Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar" (v. 20).

We are called to love, and HE is the reason.

I love how the NIV version puts it: "Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them...In this world we are Jesus" (v. 16-17).

In this world we are Jesus.

Even if we know a person can never give us anything and that it will always be a "take-take" relationship...

Even if we believe our act of love would be better served elsewhere...

Even if...

Yes, we are to love with our eyes wide open, not with an ostrich-like head stuck in the sand.

But still, we are to obey His voice, for you and I are called to love as Jesus loves.

When the Star Disappeared

What must the wise men have thought as day after day, their journey continued with no end in sight? What must their families have thought when their loved ones decided to set out on the journey in the first place? Who in his right mind would leave home to travel by faith, following not a map, not a handwritten message, but a shimmering pinpoint of light in the night sky?

The magi traveled such a long distance to find the king of the Jews, initially going to Jerusalem--where one would expect to find such a king.

Scripture says, "magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem, saying, 'Where is He who has been born King of the Jews? For we saw His star in the east and have come to worship Him'" (Matt. 2:1-2). They weren't looking for Herod--self proclaimed king of the Jews. No, the one "born king" was the one they sought. But in Jerusalem, they came up empty.

MacArthur says the verb tense "saying" implies the magi asked not once, not twice, but repeatedly, continuously as they walked around the city, "questioning everyone they met."*

In Jerusalem, no one knew of such a king's birth. But just the idea of a "born king" set the city on edge: "When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him" (v. 3). One definition for "troubled" in Strong's is "to strike one's spirit with fear and dread." That's how I imagine Herod felt.

King Herod has made me scratch my head a bit this Christmas season. He's the one with the legacy of sending soldiers to murder all the little boys in Bethlehem. With a heart full of murderous intentions all along, why trust foreigners to bring him the intel? Or why not send his own trusted envoy to accompany the magi? For someone wanting to squash the competition, it makes sense. But for reasons only known to God, Herod sat and waited until he realized he'd been duped.

Meanwhile, the wise men kept moving, this time directed not by a star, but by Herod and the chief priests to Bethlehem: "and the star, which they had seen in the east, went on before them until it came and stood over the place where the Child was. When they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy" (v. 9-10).

This isn't the way I remember my Christmas story. Why rejoice at the star? Hadn't they been following it across the desert for miles and miles and miles? By now, wasn't it as familiar as their camel's gait?

I don't think so. Their "exceedingly" joyful rejoicing seems to imply that the star had, at some point, disappeared and now had returned. If that is the case, then what faith must the magi have had to continue on their journey with no visible light as their guide?

And although Scripture doesn't say it, what exceedingly rejoicing joy, what unspeakable joy the magi must have felt to see their journey of faith rewarded with sight of Immanuel, God with Us.

This upcoming year, God may ask you and me to set out across the desert, following His light. At some point, the visible guiding light may disappear and we may question our actions. We may question if God is really even there, if He cares at all.

Keep walking. Keep pursuing Him with your everything. And at the end of the journey, we will see His light face to face.

*The MacArthur Bible Commentary, p. 1121.

Remember the Lamb

I pass our family nativity, each time pausing just a moment to glance at the herd of sheep. One, two, three, four, five...plus the two held by the shepherds. Seven sheep.

Each year, our family adds one piece to the nativity. This year's addition was the woman at the well. Today, she pours water for Mary's donkey. This coming spring, she will stand by a well, waiting for Christ to change her life.

A few years ago, though, was the year for sheep. Five of them came in one box, so they technically counted as "one" piece. At that time, the lambs outnumbered the people circled around Mary and Joseph.

Each year I set them out, I think "that's quite a lot of lambs," but five days ago, I realized how wrong I was.

It's not too many lambs....it's not enough.

This week, one of my favorite bloggers, Jennifer Dukes at Getting Down with Jesus wrote a guest post on another blog, reminding her readers of the Passover Lamb and how God's story has continued through the ages and still isn't finished.

Ever since, I've been dwelling on the babe in the manger, on His role as the Lamb of God.

In preparation for Passover, Old Testament tradition required that on the tenth day of the Hebrew month Nisan, the people were to choose a sheep or goat "year-old mal[e] without defect" for sacrifice so that God would literally "pass over" their sin (Ex. 12:5). Then, each family was to take that sheep in the house and care for it "until the fourteenth day of the month, when all the members of the community of Israel must slaughter them at twilight" (Ex. 12:6).

One lamb for the sin of each family. MacArthur says this would have meant the sacrifice of at least a hundred thousand Passover Lambs*

A hundred thousand lambs. But not just once. A hundred thousand lambs each and every Passover year.

Yet still, it wasn't enough to save the world from sin, to reconcile mankind with God the Father.

But then came one in a lowly manger, a perfect, spotless lamb.

And one Passover, He hung in agony on the cross, until 3 p.m. when the shofar blew, announcing the time when a lamb would be sacrificed for the whole nation of Israel.**

At that exact moment, He intentionally gave up His life as a sacrifice, saying, "'Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.' When he had said this, he breathed his last" (Lk. 23:46).

Five lambs. A hundred thousand lambs. A million lambs.

Ironically, they weren't enough. But one was and is enough.

As Peter reminds us, "For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect" (1 Peter 1:18-19).

In the hustle and bustle of Christmas, take time to remember the Lamb.


* MacArthur. The Murder of Jesus: A Study of How Jesus Died, p. 47.
**Ray Vander Laan. The True Easter Story: The Promise Kept (video, 2000).

A Natural Response

I had already decided not to post this week.

With three children and me all catching the stomach flu on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, then my husband succumbing to its grips on Saturday, my time with God this week has been very little, too little to give you some human-contrived lesson from the Word.

Don't get me wrong. Each of my days has been littered with a hundred short bursts of prayer for healing, for strength to make it another hour, for please not another load of laundry tonight.

But God speaking back to me? If He did, my ears didn't hear over the sick cries of three children as I reeled from my own sickness.

This afternoon, as I cared for those three now-recovering children, as I fussed over a still very sick husband in bed, literally out of nowhere, the apostle Peter popped into my mind.

I lay down for a ten minute breather, remembering (vaguely) the story of Peter's mother-in-law. I guess I've always just thought of the disciples as men with little to no family responsibilities other than themselves. Stupid thought, I now realize. If Peter had a mother-in-law, then Peter had family obligations.

I wondered how did he do it? How did Peter--the disciple, one of three in Jesus' inner circle--how did he fully follow Christ yet still have time to take care of a sick mother-in-law?

I shook my head in wonder and defeat, knowing all too well that my following Christ this week has seemed much, much less than "fully" as I've taken care of my sick body and a sick family.

But then I took the next step and looked up the passage of Scripture. Mark says, "Simon’s mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, and they immediately told Jesus about her. ³¹ So he went to her, took her hand and helped her up. The fever left her and she began to wait on them" (Mk. 1:30-31).

Luke says upon her healing, "she immediately got up and waited on them" (Lk. 4:39). Matthew, too, reports the healing...and the woman's waiting on them once she is healed.

Three out of four gospels record this story. And all three emphasize (1) the intensity of her sickness (a high fever), (2) Jesus intervening by completely healing her, and (3) the woman's act of serving Jesus once she was healed.

It's the third part God wanted me to see.

She was healed. She served...not out of necessity, but out of gratitude for what the Lord had done for her.

When God healed me this week, I began serving my children, my husband...what I thought was a required action, and in one way, it was.

But in another way, I serve my children and my husband because I am called to love as Jesus loves...and one way to show my gratitude for His healing me is to serve Him by agape-loving those around me even when they are really, really unlovable.

The same idea applies in other realms of our lives. When God does a work in our lives, whether that work is physical healing, financial healing, or spiritual healing--our natural response should be to serve Him...immediately.

Image: copyright of Corbis images.

I'll Have a Cynical Christmas

Maybe it's the economy. Or maybe the road construction blocking every route across the Amite River to the city shopping districts. Or maybe...

Last week, I made two forays into the melee. The little Christmas shopping I do is long ago finished, but that doesn't mean I'm going to hibernate until others return to a sane shopping pattern.

As I made my routine purchases, as I chatted with the cashiers, as I waited in longer lines than normal...I was amazed to find it missing--

The spirit of Christmas.

So far this year, outside the walls of my home and church, I've yet to find that cultural Christmas spirit of joy, peace, and love that manages to mysteriously infect the masses during this season of the year.

Sure, there are always a few Grinches complaining. But among Christians and non-Christians alike, I've always been able to see a greater than average number of broad smiles that reach the eyes, hear laughter resonate around me, feel the graciousness of others reaching beyond themselves.

But not this year.

I've seen impatience, irritation, bitterness, and just plain apathy. But most of all? I've seen, heard, and felt the cynicism--the pervading belief that nothing is going to get better because nothing ever does.

And that concerns me--not the thought that things might continue in a downward spiral, but the cynical attitude about life in general, an attitude that even some Christians seem to have.

Has not our God made promises to His children? And has not God been faithful to fulfill all His promises?

Consider two instances of cynicism from the pages of history:

The prophet Jeremiah most likely prophesied to a pretty cynical audience--the people of God living in exile from their homeland. The exiles probably thought God had abandoned them and believed they might as well just "make the best of it" because things wouldn't get any better and they would never return home. As the book of Esther shows, many did just that--made a new life for themselves in Babylon.

But God said, "'For I know the plans I have for you,' declares the LORD, 'plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future'" (Jer. 29:11). He spoke promises of a return to Jerusalem...for those who followed Him in faith.

Earlier in history, the patriarch Abraham and his wife, Sarah, battled cynicism as well. When Abraham was 90 years old, God said his wife Sarah would bear the child of promise. At this news, "Abraham fell facedown; he laughed and said to himself, 'Will a son be born to a man a hundred years old? Will Sarah bear a child at the age of ninety?'” (Gen 17:17).

Cynical laughter. A lapse of faith that God could work beyond human limitations to fulfill His promises.

Sarah wasn't much better than her husband. When three "men" appeared at her house "in the heat of the day," Abraham told Sarah to hurry up and make some bread to entertain their divine visitors.

I can just imagine Sarah murmuring angrily to herself as she mixed the flour and oil--making bread wasn't exactly something a woman wanted to do in the middle of a hot day, even if the visitors were heaven sent.

Later, as she eavesdropped, she heard the visitors say she would bear a son within a year: "So Sarah laughed to herself as she thought, 'After I am worn out and my lord is old, will I now have this pleasure?'” (Gen. 18:12).

Again, this cynical laughter, this lack of faith in God's ability to overcome anything.

Cynicism is an easy response to the world around us. But it's not just an attitude problem. Instead, it shows a deeper problem with a person's heart and soul.

Cynicism is the opposite of faith. It is faithlessness in God.

Granted, things may not get better. The economy may not recover. Society may not do a 180 in regard to its morals.

But that doesn't mean we throw in the towel and sit, complaining in our own cynicism.

Instead, we get down on our knees. We pray. We ask. And we wait in faith that God will move in our best interests...in His time.