dying to self | Stray Thoughts

These are some of the good reads found this week:

The One Belief That Can Keep the Hurt from Crushing You, HT to Lois. “Hard seasons don’t just bring pain; they demand explanations. And if we’re not careful, we’ll grab the nearest one just to make the ache feel manageable. And this is where we can get ourselves in trouble.”

Remembering Who We Are When We Disagree, HT to Challies. “Where God’s Word allows freedom or the use of wisdom in applying biblical principles to complex situations, we must maintain a humble posture and remember that the people with whom we disagree are not adversaries to be defeated, but brothers and sisters in Christ.”

The Spiritual Discipline of Unlearning, HT to Challies. “Much of our growth in Christ does not come from learning something new. It comes from unlearning things we already believe, assume, or practice. If learning is addition, unlearning is subtraction. And subtraction is usually harder.”

Say No to This: Tiny Deaths, Eternal Gain. “When was the last time you had a craving and didn’t fill it? How long has it been since you had the urge to check your phone but stopped yourself before picking it up? What was the last item you almost added to your cart but then scrolled past? In what recent conversation did you choose to hold your tongue because you knew you should stop talking?”

Three Things that Make Temptation Flee, HT to Challies. “There are many things that want to steal our joy and affection in Christ. There are sins and temptations that plague us more often than we’d like to admit. But for the Christian, there is a real sense in which these temptations no longer lord over us. We are no longer bound to obey them anymore. Even on this side of heaven we experience real victory over sin and temptation. Those are glorious seasons when our hearts are lifted to heaven and we do the things that we really want to do. What are those things that make sin seem so silly? What is our frame of mind when temptations lose their shimmer?”

If We Create Nothing, What Is It All For? “We were created by the wisest, most creative, most intricate, and most beautiful Creator—God. We were also created in his image, Imago Dei, which means that we have some of his attributes in us. This is why so many of us humans long to create in some way, whether we are writers, painters, homemakers, designers, engineers, or one of so many other wonderfully creative things. We also were created to work. All we endeavor to do takes hard work. We are designed to accomplish this work through and to the Lord.”

The Goodness of Caring for Other People’s Children. HT to Challies. “It is right and good to have ‘skin in the game’ with young people, whether or not you are related to them. That will not solve all our social crises, but it would help us move in the right direction. Think about how often children, even from happy and supportive families, find their calling or advance professionally due to someone outside of the family. Young people succeed when they are invested in by adults, relatives or not. Yet we do so little to acknowledge or encourage that.”

On the Public (and Passionate) Reading of Scripture. “Let us read Scriptures with the gravitas and passion they deserve. How do we do this? Try these seven suggestions to reinvigorate your public reading of Scripture.”

Aging. I don’t know this author, and I don’t usually link to Facebook posts. But a friend shared this from another friend. I thought it was so good, I printed out and have read parts of it several times.

Aging with Joy, HT to Challies. “Between now and the moment we die, we are walking into an unknown country. No matter how many steps you have taken to make it feel secure, it’s not — not in this world. Now, how do we do that? How do we enter that unknown with joy and dignity and hope?”

Should Heroes Save the World or Find Themselves? “A hero is no longer someone who sacrifices himself or herself for the good of others. Rather, a hero is someone who puts himself first. The hero’s quest is no longer slaying the dragon or saving the princess or ending the war. The hero’s quest is now to go on an important journey of self-discovery.”

Sadness that brings you closer to God, is better than happiness that pulls you from him.

I mentioned Amy Carmichael yesterday: she was one of the first missionaries I ever read about, and her life has had a tremendous impact on me as well as on most who read about her. She would have been appalled at the thought of any attention directed toward her, but a look at her life is reveals what it is to walk closely in love and obedience to God. She was a missionary from Ireland who worked in India from 1895 to 1951 without a furlough.

One of the lessons from her life that has stayed with me over the years (in my mind, at least: it is still far from being worked out in practice as often as it should be) comes from her earliest days in India. In Amy Carmichael of Dohnavur, author Frank L. Houghton records that Amy wrote that one of the group of missionaries she first worked with was

unfair and curiously dominating in certain ways and words. One day I felt the “I” in me rising hotly, and quite clearly — so clearly that I could show you the place on the floor of the room where I was standing when I heard it — the word came, “See in it a chance to die.” To this day that word is life and release to me, and it has been to many others. See in this which seems to stir up all you most wish were not stirred up — see in it a chance to die to self in every form. Accept it as just that – a chance to die.

“And [Jesus] said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me” (Luke 9:23). Often we think of dying to self in the big, martyr-like ways. Yet it is in those everyday situations where, as Amy aptly put it, the “I” in us “rises hotly” that we need to deny self.

(You can see a list of other posts in the 31 Days of Missionary Stories here.)