One of the ways Jesus is scandalizing me

As I've been praying with people lately and inviting Jesus to show up, He has been offending me at times...

Praying with one man, I asked Jesus where He was in the room and I saw Him kneeling at the feet, "submitting" Himself to this man. I thought, "No, thats not right. We submit to You, Jesus." Then the thought came to me, "The Son of Man did not come to be served but to serve."

Even as I write that I still feel the resistance in me. We are to serve Him - right? Not my will, but His - right?

Praying with another man, I again saw Jesus kneeling before him and told Him, "No." He said He wanted to wash his feet. I still resisted what I was hearing/thinking and He said, "Unless I wash you, you have no part of Me."

The other night in worship we recognized that the resurrected Jesus was among us to visit us even as He visited the disciples in the upper room. So we asked Jesus to show us how He wanted to visit us. After sitting to see what He would say to us, several people said they saw Him dancing and worshipping over us, celebrating us, telling us how glad He was that we had come. We were there to worship Him and He was there to receive our worship but also to bless and lavish His love and affection on us.

I am continually amazed at how Jesus breaks the box of my understanding which is way too small for the risen Jesus.

Asking Jesus

A friend called me the other day about a decision he was trying to make. He had talked with his small group about it and was getting conflicting advice. He called me and presented all the options he was considering and the pros and cons, and asked me what I thought. I said, "This may be an obvious question and you've probably already done this, but have you asked Jesus?"

He said, "No, I asked my small group and I'm asking you."

"I think it is better to start by asking Jesus and if you have questions about what you are hearing, then ask your small group for confirmation. But we need to start with Jesus."

He said he hadn't done that and agreed that we should. His question was around some money stuff, so I prayed, "Jesus, You've heard our conversation and You know all our baggage around money - guilt, stewardship questions, self-justifications. Would You please move that aside and tell us what You want us to do with this question?" Immediately my friend said, "I heard Him say..."

It was a beautiful moment that I realize doesn't happen often. Our thought is always to ask others before we ask Jesus. Why is that? I think it is because:

• we don't believe Jesus speaks to us in real time, only in the bible. But the bible says (John 10) "My sheep hear My voice" - not "My pastors, My teachers, My super-spiritual friends." My sheep -thats all of us.
• we are afraid we already know what Jesus will say to us and we want to do what we want. This is largely the case. If you boil down Christian faith to two words, they are trust Jesus. Mostly I think that we still live out of the first lie in the Garden which is, "God is holding out on you, He is not for you but against you, so you need to grasp for and hold on to whatever you are going to get." The good news is that God is for you and not against you - He is a good Father who gives us good gifts. We need to replace the lie with the truth. That is not to say that if we ask for something He won't have an answer different than the one we are looking for. He is not a rubber stamp, He is God. That is where the trust Jesus part comes in, when He is saying something that requires faith on our parts, whether to step out or to wait.
• we don't trust ourselves to hear clearly. Good. We are to test every spirit. The minute we realize that Jesus does speak to us, we soon discover that His is not the only voice out there. This requires us to discern (throw out the bad, hold on to the good) and to submit what we are hearing to others that we trust and ask them to ask Jesus and hear what they are hearing. But we can have fun, too. As we step out with what we are hearing, we will find that Jesus is calling us co-workers and friends.

The most helpful book I've read on this is Brad Jersak's Can You Hear Me? Tuning In To The God Who Speaks. This book has done more to transform my daily interaction with Jesus from basic Christian obedience to a dynamic interaction.

Jesus and gangsters

The other day a couple Latino gangsters came by to hang out - Juan and Jesse (not their names). My co-worker, Chris, walked in on Jesse chilling in our Family Support Center. Jesse said he always feels at peace there, but whenever he thinks of coming by he always gets distracted by something coming up or by dark thoughts and ends up not coming. So Chris starts praying for him, just blessing the good stuff he is feeling there and has an image of a banqueting table covered with glorious food and the invitation from God for Jesse to eat, eat.

Jesse pictures this but quickly the plate in front of him is pushed away and replaced with a plate with a five-pointed star in the center - this is a satanic symbol. Chris invites me to join in praying and the more Chris prays, the more Jesse gets distracted and agitated. He talks about thoughts of murder and feels like he wants to jump up and hit people and run out of the room.

I tell him, "We can pray for you and you might feel some measure of relief from that, but you need to pray and ask Jesus to come in to you and to help you." So he does and things get worse for him. I have this thought about a "deliverance" type prayer that leads you in claiming Jesus as Lord, to confess and repent of your sins, to receive washing through the blood of Jesus and to break off all demonic assignments.

I bring it into the room and hand it to Chris. He reads it quietly and agrees that we should lead Jesse through it. He reads it out loud so Jesse would know what he was agreeing to. At that moment, Juan says, "Hey man, I gotta bounce (go). I'm late to see my girl." (Juan has left his girl hanging for hours in the past...) Jesse says the same, that he has somewhere he suddenly has to go. He says he could come back another day and we can spend the whole day praying. We ask him if he'd be willing to take five minutes and he relunctantly agrees with Juan scowling at us. Jesse repeats after Chris with a few breaks to explain terminology. At the end they are ready to go. Chris asks Jesse if he feels any different and he says, No. Then Chris asks him if he is still having evil thoughts in his mind and he says, "Hey, I haven't thought of those in a little while."

There is still more work to do with these guys, but it was beautiful to see Jesus moving to bring His shalom into gangsters.