Is it really 'choice ground'?

Whoever walks with the wise becomes wise, but the companion of fools will suffer harm. (Proverbs 13:20)

Do you remember the story of Abraham and Lot - both with growing flocks, herds, and wealth? The time came when they needed to separate their flocks and herds because of what ranchers might have called 'overcrowding' of the animals. They were 'over-grazing' the lands, so they needed to find 'independent' grazing grounds. As you may recall from the story, Lot chose what looked best for himself, his family, herds, and flocks. He moved lock, stock, and barrel into a land way to close to the sinful people of Sodom, a mistake that would cost him dearly.

The company of fools soon rubs off on those who spend enough time with them. Before long, Lot was so accustomed to the 'culture' of the day that he didn't even confront sin any longer. His choice of grazing ground may have been a little self-centered as it was 'choice ground', but that 'choice ground' did not take into consideration the companions he would be surrounding his life with over the long run. Whenever we choose what we might think as 'best' or 'better' just based on the surface impression, we might find ourselves getting a little too chummy with sin's influence! 

He could have remained closer to Abraham, still providing enough space for their combined herds and flocks, but he chose to separate from those who could provide him moral support and a growing faith. The company of fools somehow doesn't do much to support our spiritual health, much less encourage its growth! In the long run, his children took spouses from among one of the most sinful people of the world at that time - ensuring the loss of their lives when judgment came down on Sodom. His own wife would suffer the fate of being turned into a pillar of salt. Probably one of the least taught 'sins' of Lot was the engagement of his unwed daughters in incest with their own father. 

Truly, the company of fools influences more than just our own lives - it affects those we might call 'family' and our close friends. Maybe this is why God calls us to guard our hearts and to choose our companions well. The closer we get to the influence of those who do not walk closely with God will ensure we are exposed to things, ways of thinking, and actions we may not have ever considered if we were to keep companions with those who walk closely with God. Just sayin!

Are you a social influencer?

 So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you. (Romans 12:2)

How many times do we find ourselves going along with the crowd just because we have become so 'well-adjusted to our culture'? We move toward the newest trend, all because we are listening to the voice of the crowd. We take on more debt than we should, all because someone said we couldn't live without something. We might be more 'well-adjusted' to our world than we imagine. If we act upon the influences within the world instead of taking time to see how it is God would have us act, we might just be more 'adjusted' in the wrong direction!

Fixed attention really is a hard thing for some of us. I have two grandsons who have ADHD and I know exactly how this affects them. The earliest signs were of the fidgeting every mealtime, the intensity they would put into one task while completely neglecting all others, and sometimes even their unending outbursts over what seemed to be pretty silly things. The more we learned of the issues ADHD kids faced, the more we realized this intensity of focus was not always a good thing. The child could 'over-focus' on one thing, regardless of all the demands made to pull away from the object of their attention, they just couldn't do it. I wonder how many of us have some form of 'spiritual ADHD' - focusing so intently on some of the things God tells us to avoid, but finding it harder and harder to pull away from them because they have us so consumed in their hold?

Fixed attention is a good thing when the direction of our focus is in the right direction. We need this type of intensity of focus, but used in the wrong way it can harm us. Culture used to be defined as the 'betterment' of a society via education or training, but today it might be defined as that which is 'learned'. Culture - good or bad - is modeled and learned. We move toward or away from some ideas, concepts, and challenges simply because of what we have been 'taught' via example, words, and social influences. Is it any wonder today that we call the individuals who have a huge 'social following' in media as 'social influencers'? Their intent is to create a 'culture' of followers. Jesus wasn't opposed to followers - he was just opposed to us following without intent, purpose, and allegiance aligned with his example! Maybe our greatest goal in this world today should be to become those types of 'social influencers' who actually lead others to fall deeply in love with Jesus. Just sayin!

Are you influential?

Andrew Young reminds us, "We rise in glory as we sink in pride." He also reminds us, "Influence is like a savings account. The less you use it, the more you've got." Two seemingly different statements, but there is something that is consistent in both - WE are not to be at the center. Pride may not be what we label our sense of 'importance', or our desire to be 'noticed', but pride is a result of us being a little bit too close to the 'center' in our lives instead of Jesus. Influence is something we might desire to have in life, so those around us are positively affected by whatever it is we say and do. If the reason we desire influence is so that others will take notice of something we have done, pride may be just a little too closely related to what we believe to make us 'influential' in life. The greatest 'influence' comes not in us being noticed, but Christ being noticed IN us.

When you heard that Good News, you believed in Christ. And in Christ, God put his special mark on you by giving you the Holy Spirit that he promised. The Spirit is the first payment that guarantees we will get all that God has for us. Then we will enjoy complete freedom as people who belong to him. The goal for all of us is the praise of God in all his glory. (Ephesians 1:13-14)

We belong to Christ, not the other way around. He sends his living Spirit to reside within us because he is working to change us - moving us from glory to glory. It isn't US doing the work of transforming our lives - it is God IN US doing the work to transform us into his image. Ego at the center really shuts down the work of God in us because the 'rebuilding' of our lives comes to a halt when we take up the work of 'self-transformation'. God asks for us to allow him to do the work of building us up wherever our character needs restoration. The hope of glory exists because God is doing the work of regenerating our spirit. Do you know what it means to have something 'regenerated'? It means there is a complete moral reform that takes place! It means there is a remaking that is taking place to bring about a 'better form'. The 'former' existed, but not to the degree of glory that the 'reformed' will!

Transformation begins in the spirit of man, but then God goes about the work of transforming our souls. This is the life-long reformation work that God undertakes within us - daily helping us to overcome bad habits, giving us new direction on how to make the right choices, and helping us sort out all the 'mess' we find in our lives because we have a sin nature. God doesn't rip out our soul and give us another one - he reforms our soul. He helps us make better choices that reflect he is at the center of our lives. He helps us build one right choice upon another until it becomes habitual that we choose wisely. In time, our soul is transformed - selfish ambitions, prideful choices, and egocentric focus are put aside, replaced with God's intentional purpose, his 'influence' shining through in right actions. 

We don't transform ourselves. We don't create a new image. God is the one who does the transformation that allows the image of his Son to become clearer and clearer in us until the influence we have in life is not ours, but HIS. Just sayin!

Influential, isn't he?

In my distress I prayed to the Lord, and he answered me and rescued me. He is for me! How can I be afraid? What can mere man do to me? 

(Psalm 118:5-6 TLB)

What can mere man to do me? That is a powerful question many of us never really take the time to explore. The more accurate question we may want to ask ourselves is, "What has mere man been doing to me?" What is it you have come to believe or accept simply because someone told you, or because of their "threats" you now behave a particular way in response to those threats? There is a fine line between our behavior and our beliefs - we aren't usually too far off in our behavior when it comes to these two things!

May I meddle for a moment this morning? Way too many of us have some "fear". We don't want to "rock the boat" at work because we fear we may lose our job even though we are clearly aware of practices or behaviors that have become "common place" that ought not to be accepted. We don't step up when we see a need in someone's life because we fear how it is they may receive our assistance, perhaps even becoming "too dependent" upon us as their "relief". We have accepted the way others see us and have told us we "are" rather than listening to the voice of God speaking clear truth into our lives as to who we "really are" because of his grace.

It seems "mere man" may be more of a concern in our lives than we might like to admit! There is an influence man exerts in our lives - even if we don't admit it right off, that influence may be what is keeping us "cemented" in certain actions within our daily life. What we accept as truth or "the way it is", even when we aren't really aware we are doing it, makes our choices of behavior that much more dependent upon the actions of others than upon the actions of God in our lives. Therein comes the rub - our god is man and not God! We fear man and don't reverence God by giving him the right place in our lives. His right place? Any place where truth begins to invade the space where the fear of man has occupied!

If the influence of another, or of the circumstances you find yourself in exert more influence in your life than God's Spirit is right now, then this is the wrong influence to be honoring or obeying. It is important for us to get the right perspective on what man or the circumstances can "really" do to us. God is God and he remains supreme to either that human influence or the influencing pressures of the circumstances! If we want to be free of their influence, we start looking to a different source for our influence! Just sayin!

Change begins with each influencing thought

Don’t change yourselves to be like the people of this world, but let God change you inside with a new way of thinking. Then you will be able to understand and accept what God wants for you. You will be able to know what is good and pleasing to him and what is perfect. (Romans 12:2 ERV)

It is hard not letting the world change us, isn't it? We see so much that influences the way we feel about ourselves, from fashion to weight reducing surgery. We come across all manner of bad news meant to "inform us" and then the occasional story meant to "inspire us". We hear reports of war, threats of power-hungry men seeking notoriety in not so friendly ways, and even stories of terrible choices made by others that leads to astronomical outcomes ranging from suicide by the bullied and mass murders by the angered or insane. The world has a way of changing us in direct proportion to the amount of the world we allow to get inside of our minds, emotions, and hearts. The ability to resist the force tugging at our soul to conform to any outward influence is to ensure the right internal influence remains front and center in our lives.

Every thought must be brought captive - we must not dwell upon the things that influence us externally, but focus on those things that God places in our hearts to act as "steadying" influences in our lives. As with a compass, God's influence beckons us to "true North" - toward the things that bring him honor and those which build us up, not to those things that tear us down. With every desire to move toward the world's influence, there is an equal, but more reliable desire to move closer into God's presence and grace. Even though the compass points North, the traveler still has the ability to choose any "degree" of passage they like, though. We are not going to resist the influence of the world if we get nothing more than the input of the world, though. So, determining course setting and then ensuring we remain consistently on that solid course ensures we will be able to navigate around or through what would otherwise get us all muddled up.

The change we so desperately need is not external - it is internal. The heart is the seat of all manner of both good and bad intent. The way of ensuring the actions are consistently good is to allow God to change the heart - to change the way we think. The way we think is influenced by what we "let into" our lives. If we are letting in the Word on a regular basis, we often will fall back upon what our understanding of God's desires and instructions are for our lives. If we let in worship music, those words will resonate within the times frightening thoughts might want to creep up. What gets inside affects what we become - plain and simple. Guard what you allow in and you will be more ready to resist the wrong influences in your life. Change begins at the core of man - in the heart. The heart and spirit unite as one, in turn becoming less and less influenced by the world's "bad news" and "bad intent" and more and more by the stable forces of grace, love, and peace. Just sayin!

From without or from within?

I don't know about you, but it is hard for me not to be changed by the things I see and hear around me all the time.  These influences wreak havoc on my thoughts, pulling at my emotions, and challenging my beliefs all the time.  It is a daily battle to just take a stand for what I believe to be right and then to actually remain standing at the end of the day sometimes!  It is easy to be changed into something we are not, simply because we aren't paying close attention to the influences which are pulling on us so frequently throughout the day.  By the end of the week, you could probably miss how much you have "adapted" to those influences until you really take the time to examine just how closely you are doing what you truly know God wants you to be doing.  We have to be on our guard to not let the world change us, but to go frequently to God, allowing him to change us from the inside out - influencing our thoughts, emotions, and ultimately our actions by his grace.

Don’t change yourselves to be like the people of this world, but let God change you inside with a new way of thinking. Then you will be able to understand and accept what God wants for you. You will be able to know what is good and pleasing to him and what is perfect. (Romans 1:2 ERV)

How is it we are changed by the world?  We have to recognize the answer to this before we can possibly realize if it is God changing us, or the world's influences changing us.  If you want to find your way to San Diego from Phoenix, you have to possess at least a rough idea of where San Diego is in the first place.  If you just knew if was in California and not that it was in the Southern most portion of California, you might drive a long way out of your way to get to where you wanted to be going.  This is why is it important to recognize the things which are influencing our choices - life is more than just knowing we are moving in the right direction.  Often we think movement is nothing more than being assured of the end result of where it is we want to be going.  I may know I want to end up in San Diego, but if I take the I-17 North out of Phoenix, I will end in Flagstaff, nowhere near the sunny beaches of California!

How do we recognize if it is God changing us?  I think this might be more easily understood or recognized.  Why?  We have confirming truths which remain consistent no matter what comes our way in life - truths which we can use as "judgment points" to consider whether a certain action or belief is really "right on" when it comes to what God wants for his kids.  We also possess the "niggling" presence of the Holy Spirit who lets us know when something is askew in what we are doing or entertaining in thought.  The challenge comes in us paying attention to the truths we have at our disposal in the Word of God and the niggling urges of the Holy Spirit to run from some things and run toward others.  Just a word of caution here - we can make the Bible say anything we want it to say simply by excluding certain passages or even by us saying those truths are not "relevant" to today.  If we "cherry pick" what we believe, we are not going to know the safety we need to know in life.

It is also important to realize that the influences of the world work on us from the outside, while the influences of God work on us from the inside.  If we can see the change coming because of the things we are hearing, seeing in those we hang around with, etc., we have to examine those carefully because they may not all be the best of influences.  I am not questioning our every move here - just reminding us to be cognizant of the presence of "transforming influences" in our lives.  As I watched the news last night, they featured a couple of experts in psychology who were saying one of the newest shows to hit the summer viewing schedules was actually too harsh and very damaging to the minds of children.  It made me wonder if this show with animals come into overwhelming power on the earth, overrunning humankind was actually maybe more than a little damaging to even the minds of adults!  If kids can be influenced and have bad dreams, where does that leave us adults?  Maybe we can do a better job of separating reality from fantasy, but I think we might just hold onto a little of that fantasy in the recesses of our brain.  In fact, I still can recall scenes from monster movies I saw years and years ago!  Our minds are like traps - what we let it will eventually find a place of influence!

Looking again at our passage, when the influence of God and his Spirit are within us, we will begin to separate the good from the bad, the pleasant from entertaining, and the good-enough from the perfection we desire.  His influence within helps to purify our motives, leaving us less likely to entertain compromises.  But...in order for his influence to be the main influence we "entertain", we need to be sure we have given him the central part of our lives and are frequently spending time getting familiar with how he works, what his voice sounds like, and what he uses to get his truths through to us in a world with a whole lot of competing voices!  Just sayin!

Won't you be my neighbor?

"I am Lady Wisdom, and I live next to Sanity; Knowledge and Discretion live just down the street.  The Fear-of-God means hating Evil, whose ways I hate with a passion—pride and arrogance and crooked talk.  Good counsel and common sense are my characteristics; I am both Insight and the Virtue to live it out."

(Proverbs 8:11-14 The Message)

When I went through Bible School, my professor taught us that "Wisdom" in the Proverbs is really a reference to a person - not just something to be gained.  I had never really considered that before, but I came to realize that he was right.  You see, Wisdom is really referring to Jesus.  The more of Jesus I have replicated in my life, the more wisdom I begin to possess.  From that perspective, I'd like to "unpack" these verses a little.  Wisdom (Christ) produces certain other "characteristic traits" within us - sanity, knowledge, discretion, insight, and virtue are but a few of these traits.  Whenever anyone tells me that they want more Wisdom in their lives, I rejoice because I know they really mean that they want more of Christ's character to be reproduced in them!

Wisdom's "neighbor" is Sanity.  To really understand this, we need to understand what "wisdom" really represents as a character trait.  It is the ability to know what is right and wrong - but most importantly, it is the ability to take the right action based on that judgment of right and wrong.  Another term for this is insight or discernment.  Sanity is the soundness of mind that leads to the soundness of judgment that we exercise when we are living by wise choices.  So, now it makes sense how "Sanity" is the neighbor of "Wisdom".  

According to our writer, Knowledge and Discretion live just down the street from Wisdom and Sanity.  Knowledge is more than just an awareness of the facts that we get from examining something closely.  When we think of knowledge in the spiritual sense, we are referring to the ability to comprehend or discern a matter, the intention of heart, etc.  Knowledge has a neighbor - Discretion.  We all have a free will - we can choose to act as we please, or be influenced by the neighbors we keep!  When the ability to comprehend or discern is cultivated from a spiritual perspective (seeing things as God sees them), it makes sense that we will choose to act with a good judgment.  That is what we call discretion.  

There is a neighbor on the block that is pointed out as not "belonging" in the neighborhood.  That neighbor is "Evil".  Do you know how we serve the "eviction notice" on Evil?  It is by developing a good relationship with the other "neighbors" on the block (Wisdom, Sanity, Knowledge, and Discretion).  The fear of God is the beginning of Wisdom.  Evil has some children in its house - Pride, Arrogance and Crooked Talk.  We have to make a conscious decision to not allow those "children" to influence our lives.

Wisdom has some children, too.  They are "Insight" and "Virtue".  Insight is a rather "gifted" child.  Insight has the ability to apprehend the "true" nature of a matter and to make decisions based on that comprehension.  Virtue has a strong "moral" character - exhibiting the uprightness of character that God desires to see in each one of his children.  I think these are the "kids" I want to have hanging out at my house, influencing my life!

Just wanted to invite you to evaluate who your "neighbors" are today.  If you find that you are in the neighborhood of Evil, being influenced by Pride, Arrogance, and Crooked Talk, it might be time to move!  We truly are influenced by the company we keep.  Wisdom cries out, "Won't you be my neighbor?"