Focus (10/21/24-10/22/24)

The title I have assigned to this study is “Practice!”  I suspect that for many of us, the idea of practicing has carried negative feelings since our youth.  If I think back to those early years when I was playing clarinet in the school orchestra, or even before there was thought of being in that orchestra, and only learning the first rudiments of how to make this instrument sound anything near to pleasing to the ear, practice was the last thing I wanted to do.  Where was the fun in that?  No, no, I wanted to be at play, not at practice.  Come to later years and the change is not so great as one might like.  I don’t want to practice, I want to already have it mastered.  I want the end goal, but I don’t want to deal with the work that goes into making that end goal a thing one could realize.  To put it as the old song goes, “Everybody wants to go to heaven, nobody wants to die.”  Everybody wants to be accounted good, but nobody wants to put any work into it.  We might require a somewhat narrower scope of everybody, but let us suggest that in our church body, everybody wants to be found pleasing to God, but nobody wants to deal with the repentance and change that make one pleasing to God.

I know that’s an overstatement in many ways.  Many of us seem almost to revel in that agony of repentance, and I don’t suppose there’s anything wrong with that, if the repentance is real.  If it’s about appearing holy, whether to others or to yourself, though, how is this not the same hypocrisy that plagued the Pharisees in their search for piety?

Let me offer another thought on the matter of practice.  Practice is only of value if you are practicing the right way to do whatever it is you’re doing.  The whole point of practice is to engrain things in muscle memory, whether that muscle memory consists in training your body to respond without the need for thought, or whether it’s the shaping of character, if you will, a moral muscle memory.  But if the thing you’re doing is consistently wrong, those muscles are still memorizing, only they are memorizing error.  There is the challenge of, “And such were some of you” (1Co 6:11).  We all of us, without exception, come into the house of God with priors.  I don’t think there is even an exception for the one raised in a Christian household from birth, knowingly belonging to the Lord as long as he or she can remember.  There’s still an issue of habits that need losing.  There’s still the issue, daily, of the world seeking to make its own imprint upon your character, your way of thinking and acting.  Don’t think you’re immune to that pull.  You are not.  And those doing the pulling, seeking to make their imprint upon you, know that full well.  And they hope you remain unaware of it.  It makes their job so much easier.

So, we are called to practice.  We are called to the gym of spiritual discipline.  And we are called to visit it daily, hourly if need be.  The first step to practice, though, is to train our thinking, perhaps simply to get our thoughts back on the goal towards which we are striving.  And so, we have this first call to action for these two verses.  I rather liked the simplicity of the CEV’s presentation in this case.  “Don’t ever stop thinking about what is truly worthwhile and worthy of praise.”  Now, we have, of course, a much lengthier list of things to contemplate here, or at least of the characteristics of such things as ought to occupy our thoughts.  And let me tell you!  Sometimes it takes a great exertion of will to seek those things out.

As I have already said, the world wants to load you up with anxious concern over all the awfulness around you.  The constant drumbeat of any newscast is to put before you a litany of woes.  Our television shows, by and large, invite us to explore what awful things our fellow man is capable of.  Our music, anymore, celebrates the violent, the deviant, the reprobate, and it’s been doing so for a very long time.  Only, as it has become more acceptable, it has become more depraved, trying to keep pace, trying to stay edgy.  Does art reflect the culture still?  Did it ever?  I think there were times when art was more aspirational, seeking to lift us to better thoughts, higher thoughts.  Any more, it simply seeks to shock, to put on display the keener awareness, the libertine pursuits of the artist.  It wants to shock rather than uplift.  If anything, it wants to drag down, to wear you out until you give in and applaud the awful.  To quote one who used to be a favorite of mine, “There’s more of us ugly folks than you are.”  I am paraphrasing somewhat to remain presentable.  But you catch the drift.  We are vile, but we outnumber you.  Your attempt at purity is pointless.  You are outnumbered and we will run you over in due course.  That was and is the message of the culture.  And how are we supposed to combat this?

Exactly as Paul is instructing us!  Stop focusing on what they seek to get you to focus on.  Instead, focus on God.  If we heed the call to never stop thinking about what is truly worthwhile and worthy of praise, there will be no place left to gnaw on the encroaching awfulness.  Look.  We are currently in the season when folks all around us are celebrating death and evil under the guise of Halloween.  Now, to be fair, many of them have not thought of spiritual significance.  It’s just a bit of fun, an opportunity for candy, if you’re a kid, or drinks together, if you’re an adult.  It’s a chance for the adults to be what is construed as entertaining.  Few enough have any thought as to the significance.  And even amongst Christians, there can be a tendency to join in.  Oh, we may try and clean it up just a bit.  We’ll only allow costumes with a Christian theme, perhaps.  Or, we’ll call it ‘trunk or treat,’ to try and maintain some vestige of separation.  But it’s the same.  It cannot be played with, finessed into acceptability.  And shame on us if we try.  The day is so wholly pagan in its point, even if the origins lie in warding off evils, it is the pagan, appease-the-idol approach to the matter.  There is nothing of God in it.  Sorry.  There just isn’t.

But what happens to us, if we care?  We are hammered by it.  It has become just as crassly commercialized as Christmas, and like Christmas, each year it seems the efforts start earlier, the lawn displays get gaudier and more overblown.  It’s ridiculous, really.  But, it’s also a weight on the conscience, on the awareness.  And with its current propensity for eye-grabbing display, it seeks to drag us from our proper perspective.  How can I think about what is true and honorable and lovely when this hideous display of awfulness is on every neighbor’s yard?  How can I rejoice amidst such darkness?  But that’s exactly what we’re called to do.  Think on God!  Think on what is true, not the lie surrounding you.  Think on what is right, not the sinful urgings of media and a society trained by media.  Think what is lovely.  Contemplate those things that are worthy of veneration, matters of excellence.

Now, some days, it seems the most one can do is take in the beauty of the trees (trying hard to ignore the fact that the beauty we see is coming from the leaves dying and the trees in retreat for the winter).  But we can look at it differently.  God has arrayed them in beauty.  Even in this season of withdrawal, even, to our tastes, more so in this season of withdrawal.  And it is not without promise.  We know that as the leaves turn and fall, the time is not so very far off when new leaves will begin to bloom.  We know this season of withdrawal is but a season, and more!  We know Him who causes the seasons to come and go in their proper times, and promises that they shall ever do so.

We can look at the sky.  Now, some of us can’t, having imbibed too many claims of the government or the military now controlling the weather and using it against us, or how airlines are for some reason constantly spewing chemicals into the air with evil intent.  But honestly?  It’s a beautiful sky, sometimes the more beautiful for the ragged display of cloud fronts.  Even with the fury of hurricanes and tornados, there is something wonderful in the display, at least if it’s not destroying house and home.  And, let me offer this as well.  Even in the recovery there is beauty, and that, of a different nature.  We have, perhaps, been caused to focus on the failures of government, and even, of late, to wonder if those failures aren’t malevolent and purposeful.  But then, one could choose instead to observe the best in people, as neighbors, and those at distance, seek to bring aid where it’s needed, pulling together in community.

You see, in each and every event we have a choice of focus.  We can concentrate on the awful or we can rejoice in the beautiful.  And we need to allow this book we call the Bible to instruct us as to what is awful and what is beautiful.  I think that’s in part why Paul supplies us with such a pile of descriptives here.  Don’t set yourself as the arbiter of what is true and honorable.  Let God’s Word train your sense of truth and honor.  Become a discerning consumer not just of media, but of your own senses.  Whatever is happening around you, whatever is before your eyes, occupying your time and your senses, “Fix your thoughts on what is true and good and right.”  That begins the TLB’s presentation of verse 8.  Think about what is pure, not what is corrupt.  Think about what is lovely, not those ugly things we are assured outnumber us.  Think about what is good about others, even (perhaps especially) those others who are outside the body of Christ at present.  I like the conclusion of the TLB’s rendering as well.  “Think about all you can praise God for and be glad about.”

You know, there’s a reason this verse is so prominent in Christian life and thought.  It’s a reminder we constantly need.  There was a season in our life, my wife and I, when despondency had really set in.  Chronic illness will do that to you, whether you are the one who is ill, or the one in a supporting role.  What to do?  I can recall times when I would leave my wife listening to one song on repeat, drilling home the message.  “Nothing else matters but You, Lord Jesus, but You.”  What was the point?  I mean, I hate repeated song play.  I don’t even like it on the frequence of repeat common to radio, or when our pre-service music at church is playing the same two or three songs every darned week.  Enough already!  But in this case, it was driving towards what Paul urges here.  Get your mind off the trial and onto God.  Stop looking at the darkness and step into the Light.  Heck, take the old Bob Newhart advice.  “Stop it!”

It’s too easy to settle into cynical ill humor.  It’s too easy to go dark.  It’s too easy to simply settle into the slough of despond, as Pilgrim’s Progress presented it.  Don’t be Eeyore.  Things aren’t irredeemably awful.  You have God on your side, at your side.  He is still fully in charge, and fully in control.  Whatever evils are transpiring around you, whatever ills beset you, He remains your constant friend.  He who called you will not leave you abandoned by the way.  He will see you through to His kingdom.  You are His child, the apple of His eye. 

Would you like something good and lovely and true and praiseworthy to contemplate?  Try this, from the section of Isaiah we read last night.  “Behold,” says your God, “I have inscribed you on the palms of My hands” (Isa 49:16).  The whole earth is called to rejoice because, “the Lord has comforted His people, and will have compassion on His afflicted” (Isa 49:15).  He has not forgotten you, nor could He.  Even what has seemingly been taken from you, even loss of children, shall be redressed and made right.  You will be in wonder for the fulness of His restoration.  My, oh my!  This was not written to a people at the height of their devotion to God, but really, to a people in their nadir.  Exile was on the horizon, for their failure to heed God’s call.  But all was not lost.  This is God, God Who called, and as I so often remind myself, God does not lose sheep!  Whom He has called, He foreknew and predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son.  He predestined.  He called.  He justified – already done and settled!  And He glorified – gain, done and settled (Ro 8:28-30).  This is who you are.  And it is who you are because He is who He is.  Don’t ever stop thinking about this!  This is truly worthwhile.  This is truly cause for praise.  This is true and good and right, pure and lovely, and most assuredly something you can praise God for and be glad about.  He has done it!  It is finished!  Peace is established, and enmity at an end.

Listen, whatever the world is throwing at you today, whatever sorrows beset you, this hasn’t changed.  You dwell in the future certain.  This world, as we are reminded, is not your home.  It’s an encampment at best, an outpost to which we have been assigned for a season.  But we are citizens of heaven, sons of the Most High God.  Better days are coming, and we can live in the realization of that fact even now.  We can choose what we focus on.  And we can choose to train our focus to remain on Christ our Victorious Lord.

I want still to consider briefly some of these things we are called to keep in focus.  We have, for example, the contemplation of what is right.  But what is right?  If we are settling for what is right in our own eyes, then we run the risk of doing a repeat performance of Israel in the time of the judges, and to be fair, I think many a so-called church is traveling that course today.  But what is right?  What is right is that which is ‘wholly conformed to the will of God,’ as Thayer defines it for us.  Indeed, he sets it in terms of personal rightness, as one whose way of thinking, whose feelings, and whose actions fit that qualification.  Put it that way, and we must soon conclude that there is no one we know who fits the description, apart from Christ Jesus Himself.  We do, however, find much around us that is right in this sense.  If nothing else, we have His Word, the Scriptures, the exposition of God’s will, which is certainly a fine place to set your contemplations.  Are there other things you could consider as being thus right?  I think perhaps we might have to cast our thinking forward to the time of His kingdom fully and visibly established to perceive such things.  And that, too, is a healthy place for our thoughts to travel, so long as we stay within the lane of true revelation.  Recall, please, that the first quality Paul commends to us is truth – whatever is true.  Truth has this sense of being out in plain view.  I expect it has relation to that favorite term of mine, alethia, with its idea of outward expression being at one with inner reality.  In that sense, it is the exact opposite of hypocrisy and deceit.  It is what is real, but it is also what is clear to be seen.  What I see ruled out here is vain imaginations.  Those are not the place for our focus, because there, we are subjecting ourselves to high potential for deception, even if we can suppose those imaginations purely the work of our own minds.

What is pure?  Well, certainly in the realm of food we understand the concept, don’t we?  What is pure has no additives.  What is pure has had any contaminants removed.  Taken to the spiritual realm, the place of holiness, it describes that which is clean, free of defilement.  You, beloved, have been washed.  That’s the counterpoint to Paul’s observation of the Corinthians, that they had in fact been the unwashed, and visibly so, in their own recent past.  He has just rattled off a list of those characteristics that preclude entry into God’s kingdom, and comes crashing down with this.  “Such were some of you!” (1Co 6:11).  Had he left it there, this would be utterly devastating.  But he didn’t.  He continues.  “But you were washed!  But you were sanctified!  But you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God!”  That’s it.  Washed and sanctified – the filth of sin has been scrubbed away, and His mark set upon even as upon the ancient high priest: “Holy Unto the Lord.”  This is who you are.  This is who He has made you to be.  And the same is to be said of each of your brothers.  Does this mean we have been perfected?  Clearly not.  We have only to look at our own day, any one of them, to recognize that this is not the case.  Or, if it is, then there is not a Christian living, nor has there ever been.  Even Paul or Peter or John must come up short by this measure.  So, we look for those things that are pure, and again, it seems we have the One Who is True brought sharply into focus as our proper contemplation, and then, too, the Word He has given us by which to know Him.

What demonstrates excellence?  Well, first, we must recognize that we’re not simply talking about quality construction, or the things that make this or that person loom large in the public conscience for all that they have achieved.  The heroes of the day, such as they are, may not necessarily fit the bill.  We are considering matters of moral content, moral character.  What, in your surroundings and experience, presents to you a display of particular moral excellence?  We are far beyond a fine sunset, or the burst of color in the leaves of autumn.  They are impressive, but there is nothing particularly moral about it.  Even in contemplating the artistry of our God in creating such a display, yes, it’s beautiful, but what has it got to do with His moral excellence?  We must look elsewhere.  We might look to some brother or sister who is particularly inclined towards good works.  I might think, for example, of some of my retired brothers who give of their day to visit those who are widowed, or hurting, or serve to bring provision to the homeless.  In this case, I will lay aside any questions about the cause of homelessness, or the worthiness of the recipients.  That’s another debate, and I’m not sure it’s really suited to our considerations as men of faith.  But there is an act of moral excellence.  Is it because they are being self-sacrificial?  Well, that certainly lends weight to the act, or to its impression on us, doesn’t it?  But one could self-sacrificially lend oneself to things that are in fact reprehensible, and I can’t imagine we would find cause to praise God in that.  So, as we consider what is excellent, yet again I find myself back to the Word of God, that we may, by its teaching, train our views as to what truly constitutes moral excellence.  And then, perhaps, we may be drawn as well to consider how we can come to fit that constitution ourselves.

Isn’t that, in fact, at least one aspect of having our minds dwelling on these things?  The more we consider them, the more we are likely to perceive the lack in our own character.  And as we grow in our perceptions of just how desirable these characteristics are, will it not give us a stronger desire to truly have such character in ourselves?  What is worthy of your praise?  What do you value or esteem?  What do you believe?  All of this is wrapped up in that last characteristic Paul puts before us.  And as I say, as we establish what it is we deem to be praiseworthy, more, as we allow the word of God, and the character of God, and the will of God to define for us what is praiseworthy, to shape our appreciations such that they align with His, the more we shall desire to be that which we deem praiseworthy.

Shift it back to such things as get our focus in the earthly realm.  As a musician of whatever meager talents I have come to possess, I recognize and appreciate those musicians who have particularly excelled in their skill, their artistry, their capacity to infuse emotion into their work.  I would try to slide that in under the head of ‘any excellence,’ but again, were I to assess these players by their morals, I expect I would find them wanting in the extreme.  As somebody put it the other day, love their product, but by no means look to their lives as examples to emulate.  By no means!  But what comes of these appreciations?  Do they spur me to better practices?  Not really.  If this were my profession, I suppose it might be otherwise.  And there is, to be sure, something to that old bit of training that suggests if you wish to play better, surround yourselves with those who do.  It’s similar in the workplace.  If you want to improve your skills, it simply won’t do to be the best around, or to think yourself so.  Join with talents beyond your own.  Recognize complementary skills.  And by them, be encouraged in your own growth.  Isn’t that life in the church?  We are surrounded by brothers and sisters who have their own unique strengths and weaknesses, their own gifts.  And God assures us that each and every one of us has something – from Him – by which to benefit this body.  None of us is so far advanced as to have nothing further to learn from our fellows.  None of us is so weak in faith or understanding as to have nothing to contribute.  This morning, in a very short time, I shall go to be with my brothers for a time of joint consideration of God’s Word, and every week, we experience this.  It’s not one man teaching and the rest sit humbly to receive his wisdom, it’s each of us bringing our own unique insights to bear on this marvelous word of God, that we all may learn and grow by one another.

So, we come to the matter of dwelling on these things, as I seek to wrap up this first part of the present study.  “Let your mind dwell on these things.”  But it’s not some monkish contemplation that’s in view.  Here, there is as well the idea of shaping one’s purpose.  Purpose to be these things.  Believe these things, that they are intended to define your own character, as God continues the work of reforming you in the image of a son, a true son.  See where He is working, and come!  Work alongside your Father.  Enjoy this opportunity for companionship with Him, observe Him, learn from Him, and by doing so, become just a bit more like Him today.

Beloved, if your thinking is weighed down by the world, then it is primarily because it is on worldly woes that you have been focused.  You’ve been thinking about those things.  No wonder.  They press in upon us every hour, don’t they?  It’s hard even to drive from house to church without being hit with reasons for anger and dismay.  But the call is to lift your eyes.  Come back to Psalm 121.  “I lift my eyes to the mountains, and consider:  From whence shall my help come?”  Does it come from those mountains?  Are they my security and aid?  Will altars on the mountaintops supply my need?  No!  But, “My help comes from the LORD Who made heaven and earth” (Ps 121:1-2).  Mountains?  Sure, they’re impressive enough, I suppose, but I belong to the God Who formed them, Who caused them to rise up in the first place, Who says to the oceans, “Thus far, and no farther.”  He is my help.  He who set the planets and stars in motion, and keeps them on their course as He has for so long as there have been stars in the sky, or a sky through which to see them; He is my help, and my certain help.

He is also the One who sets me on my course, and takes care to ensure that I remain on course, restoring me to the Way should I veer off.  He brings me back to thoughts of these things.  He it is who encourages me to get my mind off of those things and focus on these.  Turn your eyes upon Jesus!  Is that not our strong encouragement?  And what is the promise?  Do so, and the things of the earth will grow strangely dim.  They will diminish in importance.  They will be accounted as but dung, not worthy of notice.  For God is all, and that being the case, godliness becomes our all.  Let us look heavenward for our hope, and strive heavenward in our growth.  And that, beloved, brings us round to the other half of this passage.  Having dwelt, do.

Respond (10/23/24-10/24/24)

We have two commands in these two verses, the first to think, the second, to do.  Both come to us as present imperatives, which point to future indefinite actions.  But here in particular, it is well that we should keep in view the constancy, the continued action of the present tense.  Let your mind dwell on such things as these constantly, and thus focused, practice them.  Now, this brings me to consider a question as to the composition of our passage.  When we come to, ‘the things you have learned,’ in verse 9, is this as distinct from those things we are to stay focused on, or is it a callback to them?  Most of the translations make verse 9 a separate sentence, and as such, there may be a mental queue of sorts that causes us to switch.  Reading the KJV this morning, I see that there is also a shift from ‘these things’ in verse 8 to ‘those things’ in verse 9, which only reinforces the sense that focus has shifted, that we are considering a different set of things.  However, it’s the same word in both places, tauta, which the lexicon helpfully establishes as a ‘near’ demonstrative pronoun.

All that to say that I believe the focus has not shifted at all.  Rather, Paul is continuing a thought which might be said to have begun at the beginning of chapter 3 with its warning against those pushing an alternate set of things as defining the faith.  It becomes more explicit as his argument progresses, so that we read, in Philippians 3:1, “Follow my example, and heed those who live according to that pattern of life you see in us.”  We are now at the culmination of his instruction, the completion of the thought.  Finally, having considered my instruction and my example, having applied my teaching to this business between Euodia and Syntyche, and talked of what your character should be, we come to ‘these things,’ these things which should be ever before your mind’s eye, these things which you should be seeking to perceive as you go through life, and then, as he concludes, these things you have learned from me, seen in me.  These are my example.  These are my character, the character Christ is forming in me.  And that same character is forming in you.  You cannot force it into existence.  You can’t work up character in yourself.  You can, however, come alongside your Father as He works.  You can begin to establish new habits, new habits of thought, new habits of compassion, new habits of action.

This is, after all, what it means to walk, when we read that instruction to walk worthy, as he states it on other occasions.  Let this become your habitual manner.  Let it become second nature to you to live such that these descriptors fit your case.  Would you not desire to be recognized as true, one who is as he appears to be, one in whom there is no hypocrisy, no duplicity?  Would you not wish to be known to be honorable?  Compliant to God’s commands?  Free of sin and sinful proclivities?  Do you not, after your fashion, already strive to be deemed reputable and praiseworthy?  At work, are you not inclined to operate in a fashion that brings others to respect your abilities and your judgment?  In your hobbies, do you not seek to show yourself accomplished?  At church, do you not incline to have your best Sunday face on, to walk as one whom others could reasonably look to as an example of godliness?  I’m not getting at motive just yet, at why you put energy into such thinking.  But I suspect for many, indeed, I would hope for most, this is how we have come to approach life.  We aren’t just shuffling through, quiet quitting, as it’s come to be called.  Neither, I would hope, are we performance Christians, seeking to appear better than we are.  Though, at one and the same time, I would hope we are seeking to appear better than we believe we are.

I recall a friend of mine from the old church, a youth pastor, making the point that if you aren’t constantly raising the bar, you are in fact encouraging sloth.  To meld the two, you are encouraging an attitude of quiet quitting, of doing the minimum necessary to get by.  We have a generation at present that seeks to redefine the work/life balance in this direction.  We don’t want to be corporate slaves.  Well, neither do your parents.  You’ve missed the point.  We who call ourselves Christians are called to a radically different perspective on the subject.  We are called to do whatever it is we do as doing it unto Christ.  Hear it!  “Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to Him through God the Father” (Col 3:17).  Listen!  That’s not just about serving in the church.  It’s much broader in application than that.  “Whatever you do, do you work heartily, as for the Lord rather than for men” (Col 3:23).  That gets right into the workplace mentality.  And given the setting, there’s a good chance that many who first heard this letter were not merely corporate slaves, but just plain slaves.  See where it continues.  “Masters be just with your slaves” (Col 4:1).  This is the counterpoint to what introduced that call to work heartily, which comes on the heels of, “Slaves, obey your masters in all things.  Don’t just give them external service to please men, but obey with sincerity of heart, in the fear of the Lord” (Col 3:22).  That whole section of Colossians is dealing with the varied relationships that define life, the varied roles we are called upon to fulfill.  And in all of them, the message is the same:  Fill that role as doing so for the Lord.  For you are His, and all you do, whether it appears to you like what you think ministry looks like, or whether it is the most mundane of tasks you can imagine, are by His providence, by His arrangement, and come as tasks by which you can show yourself as His own.

So, how do you look at the task before you?  If you are a homemaker, how do you view those daily duties of making a home?  Are they a drudgery or a joy?  Are they a hurdle to be cleared, or an opportunity to represent?  It’s easy to fall into feeling the drudgery and nothing but the drudgery.  Yet another meal must be made, and that will mean more dishes, and that will mean more putting dishes away, only to pull them back out and do it all over again.  The laundry, no matter how many times it gets done, just piles up again.  It just never ends, does it?  And face it, if you come to your morning with that perspective, it’s pretty well guaranteed that the day is going to weigh on you, and you, quite frankly, are going to weigh on anybody who comes in view of you.  A little storm cloud follows you through your day, growing darker, gloomier, casting a deep and disturbing shadow over your countenance, and honestly, when you’re ‘in a mood,’ as we say, there’s little doubt but that you make sure everybody around you is clear about that.

How many cartoons do you come across of the child verging into tantrum territory.  I’m mad at the world, and the world darned well better beware of the fact.  One false move, boy, and I’m going to explode all over you.  It’s humorous in cartoon form, primarily because we’ve all seen in.  We’ve seen that child.  It was not funny at the time, but we recognize the childish nature presented in the scene.  What’s perhaps a bit harder is recognizing that sometimes, that child remains active in us.  We still have that propensity at times to be so worked up, probably over some triviality, or perhaps simply over the never ending pressures of the to do list, who knows?  And too often, we’re ready to blow, and making darned sure everybody around us knows it.  And typically, like the parents of the child on the verge of tantrum, it’s those dearest to us which will bear the brunt of it when we blow.

Against all that come these instructions.  Do it for the Lord.  Live for Him.  Represent!  Stop focusing on all the negative and start looking for the positive.  Now, this is not Norman Vincent Peale’s power of positive thinking.  This is not a call to look at life through rose-colored glasses.  It is, in fact, a call to see reality.  However much of a mess the world may be, however dysfunctional the family or the workplace, the fact remains that you, child of God, are enveloped in the goodness of God.  You are granted to know Truth, to experience, going back to the previous verse, peace beyond comprehension.  You can perceive the right course through whatever confronts you.  You can face the challenge and retain purity.  You can be lovely amidst the strife, and in so doing, you will be building for yourself, for your Lord, a true reputation for excellence, for moral excellence.  It’s not all, “look what I have done.”  That’s the mindset that spoils the work.  No.  It’s simply be.  Character doesn’t have to advertise.  Character is.

There is that old adage about how the dog you feed is the one which grows stronger.  That comes into play here.  As you think, so you do.  It’s the basic math of character.  If you think doom and gloom, you will be doom and gloom.  If you jump immediately to the worst possible outcome in everything you observe, you will naturally assume the worst in everything.  You lose hope.  How could you not, if you’re certain that everything you see is nothing but evidence of evil done, or portent of evil to come?  If, instead, you train your thoughts in another direction, in the direction of what is true and good and lovely and pure and worthy of praise?  Well!  You begin to see more and more that is praiseworthy.  Better still, your character begins to take on the shape of believing the best.  And what does that remind you of?  “Love bears all things, believes all things, endures all things” (1Co 13:8), and love, of course, is the abiding attribute of the child of God.  Faith may pass into pointlessness when we are with God, for we will then be in the experience of unity and rebirth.  Hope fades not for despondency, but because we need no longer hope for what is already ours.  But love?  No.  Love persists.  There will be eternal cause to love the eternal object of our love, Who has loved us from all eternity.  Think on that thing!  That alone should be enough to lift us out of any funk.

But recognize this about our passage here.  This isn’t just therapy.  It is command.  Think and do.  Train your thinking and you will train your actions.  That’s what this comes down to.  Doctrine, while it gets something of a bad rap anymore, is but the training of thought.  It’s establishing pathways of understanding, pathways of perception, and much of that consists in clearing away the trash left behind by our former, sinful perspectives.  And some of those trash piles are deep, compacted, and resistant.  It takes time.  It takes effort.  But like the trails animals may wear into the forest floor, constant travel over these new pathways of perception will indeed make a way where once there was no way.  They will make smooth the path of the Lord through your life.  And they will produce in you a character inclined to what is right, true, good, lovely, praiseworthy.

Understand the goal, here.  We walk in dependency upon the Lord.  This is inescapable, for we walk as those bearing our old selves in tow, and the old self tends to kick up a fuss, like that child we discussed.  It wants its way, and it wants it now.  “Sin is crouching at the door, and its desire is for you.  But you must master it” (Ge 4:7).  Cain heard it first, and failed utterly to master it.  We hear it, too.  Or we should.  His story remains ours, as much as we look with dismay upon his response and his outcome.  The world is a mess, no doubt about it, and something in us still resonates to the mess.  But we must master it.  We master it by first coming to know what is true, second, training our thinking to remain upon what is true, to be truly guided by what is true, and third, to shape our actions by what we know is true.  If we are called to do our work as unto the Lord, it is because that work was supplied to us by the Lord, and in a very real sense, we do in fact work as His servants.  That’s got to shift your mindset, doesn’t it?  If I’m slacking off, I’m slacking off in serving my God.  It has nothing to do with the boss or the spouse or the child or the parent.  It’s about God.  That’s the reality, and the more we can keep that reality in our mental view, the better we shall pursue those sundry duties He has given us to perform, whether they seem to us grand or mundane, whether they smack of heaven or reek of earth.

Perform these things habitually.  Make them your habit.  You know what’s wonderful about habit?  It doesn’t require agonizing consideration anymore.  It barely requires thought, does it?  Habit is what one does without thinking.  We somehow have it in mind that everything we do for the Lord should require such agonizing consideration.  Surely, I need to spend an hour or two in prayer to discern what it is He would have me to do in this situation.  Well, I’m certainly not going to advise you to leave off thinking about Him and what He desires.  I am, however, going to point you to what it means to make something a habit.  You already know what to do.  You’ve been through such things before.  And honestly, not every last activity of the day needs to be fraught with spiritual significance.  You can brush your teeth without soul-searching doubts as to whether this is in fact the right time to do so.  You can dress yourself.  You can do the right thing when some moral conundrum comes along, because you have trained yourself in doing what is right.  Or, if you prefer, you have been trained up by the Holy Spirit in your prior experiences.

We were hearing about Thomas in last Sunday’s sermon, and there is that to his story which is illustrative of my point.  We come to that scene when it’s starting to dawn on the disciples just how dark the coming days are going to be.  Jesus is seeking to comfort them as best He may (and He can do very well indeed!)  “Don’t be troubled, believe in God and believe in Me” (Jn 14:1).  I am preparing a place in heaven for you, but I have to depart to do so.  Know, though, that I will come for you, I will receive you to Myself where I am going.  And then comes this: “And you know the way to where I am going” (Jn 14:4).  Thomas, as pastor observed, says what nobody else was willing to admit.  Hey, Jesus, we don’t even know where you’re going, how can we possibly know how to get there?  But that moves beyond my point, and it does not alter the truth of what Jesus had just said.  You do know the way.  It has been ingrained in you these last few years, and if it is not evident to you at the moment, it shall be in due time.  Why?  Because it’s been ingrained on your character.  Those pathways of perception have been formed in you, and you will continue to walk in those pathways.  They are clear to you now, though you maybe don’t think so.

How do we keep those pathways clear?  Practice!  Set your mind on what is right, and practice!  Stop practicing your errors and start practicing what you know to be correct.  Part of practice is, in fact, breaking off those erroneous acts, to correct the thinking as needed.  If I put it in terms of learning an instrument or a piece of music, which is my natural propensity, to practice playing correctly often consists in breaking off old habits, old muscle memory that has led to doing it wrong, and doing so consistently.  There are fingerings on the saxophone that are for particular progressions, because using the standard, familiar fingerings will make for unwanted blips and bleeps as the notes transition, because it’s just impossible to manage the movements of fingers pressing and lifting such that they perfectly time the deal.  But years of using only the standard fingering mean it’s hard to shift over to using those alternates that so rarely get used.  It takes practice.  It takes becoming so familiar with those circumstances that lead to needing the alternate approach, that the fingers just naturally move to that alternate configuration without a thought.  If you have to think where your fingers need to go, it’s already too late.

Sportsmen know a similar situation, do they not?  The basketball player charging down the court has a whole array of muscle memories.  He’s not thinking about every dribble of the ball.  He’s not spending long agonizing moments assessing the moves of the defense.  He reads them in a flash, and the body responds, as it were, of its own accord; feet shifting the direction of travel, back turning to spin past this one, seeing the hole and passing to a teammate, and so on, and ready, of an instant to take the ball back when it’s passed.  The speed of play precludes thinking out every move.  It has to have been done in advance, and done so many times that now it’s just innate response.

Character works the same way.  It doesn’t have to question in order to do what is characterful.  It just is.  Character doesn’t need to advertise, either.  It doesn’t need to put up big arrows pointing to itself, or insist everybody watch as it performs.  Character is that which one does quietly, without much of a thought, really.  It’s who you are.  The call here, is to continually train who you are, to keep wearing down those new pathways of thought so that you can travel in the Way more readily.  Hear Paul’s exhortation to the Thessalonians.  “Finally,” again a concluding thought as we have before us here, “we exhort you in the Lord Jesus to walk and please God by the ways you received from us, and as you most surely do already walk.  Still; excel all the more” (1Th 4:1).  It doesn’t matter how long you’ve been at it, or how consistently.  There’s always room to improve, for perfection remains the distant goal, not the present experience.  Practice.  Let your actions reflect your beliefs.  Let character be formed in you, and undertake to ensure that the character forming in you is true to God’s design.  Then, act as one secure.

Once again, practice must follow doctrine, and doctrine ought to show in practice.  Know and do; that is the call of life in Christ.  That is the call of this passage, for as this is the stuff of life in Christ, it presents to us words to live by.  Dwell on things that are real and true, pleasing to Him, and well-spoken of by Him.  As you dwell on these things, you will indeed find yourself aided by observing brothers and sisters who do likewise.  Seek out those from whom you can learn by seeing their own practice.  Emulate those who are shown worthy of emulation.  Take the Puritan way, and “Follow me so far as I follow Christ.”  And then, as you follow, you will find you have been shaped into one who can likewise beckon his brothers and say the same.  Practice must follow doctrine, and we might say doctrine is best learned by observing those who practice.  Actions, after all, speak louder than words, as the adage goes.

To all this, Paul attaches what appears to be a promise.  If in fact practice follows doctrine, and your doctrine is true, honorable, right, pure, lovely, morally excellent, and praiseworthy, what follows your following?  The God of peace shall be with you.  But is Paul laying out a sequence of cause and effect?  Does that not put us back into a state of doing works to merit God’s peace?  That cannot be allowed.  God calls, we answer.  God is doing the work in us, and only so is there hope of the work being done.  Oh, yes, we have that call to work out our own salvation, but ever in light of that reality that God is doing it.  Our fear and trembling is not at the thought of failing, but at the realization that He is here working in us.  I think we must perceive the same order of things in this passage.  The God of peace shall be with you.  That as good as stands alone.  You are His, and He is with you. I would almost turn this whole thing around.  Because the God of peace is with you, you will indeed practice these things.  Now, if we embodied these things in perfection, I don’t suppose there would remain need of practice.  And that might indeed lead to a bit of fear and trembling as we consider that He is with us.  Really, Lord?  In my condition?  How can You stand it?  But somehow, He does, seeing us through the lens of Christ Jesus and His finished work.  And so, as I practice, as I stumble, get up, and try again, I can do so as one enveloped in His peace.

Listen carefully.  I don’t need to fear rejection from God.  I don’t need to be looking over my shoulder, checking to see if He’s coming after me in wrath because of my latest slipup.  No!  He knows me, and yet He loves me.  He knows my imperfect present.  He sent His son for the express purpose of addressing those imperfections, after all.  He knows the impossibility of me getting my act fully together.  But He knows, also, that indeed my act shall become fully together, only not by my strength but by His.  Here is the peace of God:  I have nothing to fear from Him.  I have His love.  I have no reason to stress myself out trying to please Him.  I have only to walk beside Him as He works upon me, to render myself pliable to the degree I am able, and to recognize that even in this, it is really Him making me pliable.  I am the receiver, He the doer.  What remains, but what He has told us is good?  Do justice, love kindness, walk humbly with God.  And this, we shall do, as the God of peace walks beside us.

Lord, I pray I am doing justice to what Your word speaks this morning.  Help me to see when those things I am giving attention to are drawing me away rather than building me up.  I know they’re there, and I know the pull of them, yet it seems I need that in the moment reminder, that shout in my conscience to remove myself from that scene.  And I confess I feel a tension between my understanding as presented here, and the phrasing.  It is ever there before me, this resting in You, and yet giving this work my all.  I’m not wholly convinced I have the full, proper response to it yet.  I know I can too readily lean toward complacency, and that will not do, will it?  So, awaken in me what needs awakening.  Stir what needs stirring.  And let me be more wholly Thine today than I was yesterday.  I continue to give thanks for the shift in attitude that I have seen in myself at work of late.  I know it is yet a fragile thing, but You are showing me a more excellent way, and I thank You.  I pray You might show me how to shift things so as to have some of that same shift of attitude when it comes to my household.  You know my need, Lord, and You know what is best.  I leave it to You.  If these early mornings are worth the cost that comes at day’s end, then let it be as it has been.  If it’s time to strike a new balance, show me the way.  But I would be shot of the frustration that comes of seeing my waking hours drift earlier and earlier, and my inability, as it would seem, to do anything to alter course.  But Your will, Father.  Your will.  If it is to be early rising and early to bed, than grant me the grace to do so with good spirit and love.