Extreme Passion
From the Series—Extreme
October 1, 2003This evotional continues our Extreme series.
Last week I took my son, Parker, camping for his eighth birthday. We got up to Cape Henlopen State Park around 6:30 PM, set up camp, roasted some hot dogs and then we went on a night hike to the Great Dune Observatory that overlooks the Delaware Bay and Atlantic Ocean. It was a clear night so you could actually see the lights from Cape May, New Jersey across the bay. Parker said, “Look, dad, it’s Europe.” I almost didn’t have the heart to correct him! We got up at 6:30 AM the next morning to watch the sunrise. Then we explored some dunes, went lizard hunting, and caught some hermit crabs on the beach.
If I had to describe our camping trip in a phrase I’d describe it this way: never a dull moment. There is something about a camping trip that turns everything into an adventure. You aren’t just eating. You’re adventure eating—you cook your food over the campfire. You aren’t just sleeping. You’re adventure sleeping—you’re in a tent under the stars. And you’re not just walking. You’re adventure walking—there were mysterious sights and sounds all around us. When you go camping it turns everything into an adventure!
Can I suggest that that is precisely what a relationship with Christ does? It turns everything into an adventure. Dick Foth says it this way. “When you follow Jesus, all bets are off. Anything can happen.”
In John 2, Jesus is going up to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover. I’m sure the disciples thought it was going to be a routine Passover, but it turned into anything but routine. Jesus turned the Temple upside-down and inside-out. Jesus pulls out a homemade whip and starts turning over tables and driving out the money changers. By the time he’s done it looks like a bar room brawl just happened. And I’ve got to think that the disciples are in a state of shock—their jaws are dropped.
I don’t think they saw this coming, but that’s the point of this passage. When you follow Jesus there’s never a dull moment. Jesus was and is predictably unpredictable! I love the way Oswald Chambers said it. “To be certain of God means that we are uncertain in all our ways, we do not know what a day may bring forth.” But that’s what’s so exciting about following Christ. There is an element of surprise. That’s one difference between practicing a religion and pursuing a relationship with Christ.
Wild Goose Chase
If you’ve been around NCC for a while you know that I love the name the Celtic Christians had for the Holy Spirit. They called him the Wild Goose. That may sound a little sacrilegious at first earshot, but what a great description of being led by the Spirit—it’s a wild goose chase. Listen to the way Jesus describes the Holy Spirit in John 3:8. He says, “The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”
Ron Rolheiser says, “Isn’t it the task of the Holy Spirit to introduce some madness and intoxication into the world? Why this propensity for balance and safety? Don’t we all long for one moment of raw risk, one moment of divine madness?”
John 2 is one of those raw risk divine madness moments. Jesus turns a routine Passover into anything but. Most churches are way too routine. Acts 2:43 says the early church was “filled with awe.” There was an air or expectancy. They couldn’t wait to see what God was going to do next. A.W. Tozer said, “When we come to a place where everything can be predicted and nobody expects anything unusual from God we are in a rut.” We need to get out of the rut.
The longer I walk with Christ the more I think that spiritual maturity has less to do with figuring out the future than it does a moment-by-moment sensitivity to the Spirit of God. I’m not saying we shouldn’t make plans. But I think John Chancellor had a point. He said, “If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans.” A few weeks ago I was going through some old boxes and I actually found a twenty-five year plan for our failed church plant that I talked about in last week’s evotional. Winston Churchill said, “Planning is important. Plans are useless.”
If you think about your life five or ten years ago, most of you would have never guessed you’d be doing what you’re doing or living where you’re living! And you may have plans for the future, but your life will be radically different than what you thought five or ten years from now! But that’s ok. Spiritual maturity has less to do with figuring out the future and more to do with moment-by-moment sensitivity to the wind of Spirit. I don’t think that spiritual maturity results in higher degrees of predictability. I think it results in higher degrees of sensitivity.
Double Dare
In John 2:16 Jesus says, “How dare you turn my Father’s house into a market!”
A few years ago there were some classic commercials about Terry Tate, the office linebacker. The commercial shows a normal working environment and then Terry Tate, the office linebacker, comes flying across the TV screen tackling people. A colleague leaves a paper jam or puts recyclable garbage in the wrong trash can and Terry Tate levels them! Terry Tate says in the third person, “If something isn’t right, Terry Tate is going to condense the nonsense.”
I can’t think of a better description of this passage. Jesus goes in to the Temple to condense the nonsense. Sometimes you can’t remain silent. Sometimes you can’t look the other way. Sometimes you’ve got to do something. The Temple was supposed to be a sacred place—a place to worship Almighty God. And the people were worshiping the almighty dollar. They’d turned it into a marketplace where they could make a quick buck.
To say that Jesus is upset is to put it mildly! I think “ticked off” would be a more accurate interpretation. And I’ll be honest, for the longest time this passage caused some internal dissonance. It didn’t seem to fit my Sunday School caricature of Jesus. It just didn’t seem like Jesus should “fly off the handle” like this. But then I connected the dots. Ephesians 4:26 says, “In your anger, do not sin.” There is nothing wrong with anger. In fact, sometimes it’s wrong not to be angry about the right thing. Romans 12:9 says, “Hate what is evil.”
Aristotle made a great observation. He said, “It is easy to fly into a passion—but to be angry with the right person at the right time to the right degree in the right way—that is not easy.” Jesus does just that in this passage! It’s a righteous anger that someone has hijacked the purposes of God and turned the Temple into a market.
Passion
The disciples are in a state of shock watching Jesus wield the whip and turn over tables. And it’s almost like there is this eureka moment. John 2:17 says, “The disciples remembered that it is written: ‘Zeal for your house will consume me’.”
In recent months there has been a buzz about Mel Gibson’s movie The Passion. I haven’t seen the script so I can’t comment on the biblical accuracy of the movie, but let me share something. Every movie I’ve ever seen about Jesus has left me empty for one simple reason: none of them seem to capture the intensity of Christ. Most of them accurately depict what Jesus said and did, but the missing ingredient is passion. Jesus wasn’t just the wisest or kindest person who ever lived. He was also the most passionate person who ever lived. In fact, he was so passionate that the last 24 hours of his life are called “the passion.”
Dorothy Sayers said, “To do them justice, the people who crucified Jesus did not do so because he was a bore. Quite the contrary; he was too dynamic to be safe. It has been left for later generations to muffle up that shattering personality and surround him with an atmosphere of tedium. We have declawed the lion of Judah and made him a housecat for pale priests and pious old ladies.”
To be like Jesus is to be consumed by zeal. Here is one of my core convictions: followers of Christ ought to be the most passionate people on the planet. The word enthusiasm comes from two Greek words: en and Theos or “in God.” The more we get into God the more passionate we become! For what it’s worth, the fourth Lateran council of 1215 accused the Franciscans of “excessive enthusiasm.” We ought to be guilty as charged.
I think that is one thing that sets a relationship with Christ apart from religion. Most world religions are focused on the elimination of desire. The ultimate goal of Buddhism is to exist without desire. I think the goal of a relationship with Christ is the exact opposite. John Eldredge says, “Jesus provokes desire; he awakens it; he heightens it.”
C.S. Lewis said that God “finds our desires not too strong, but too weak.” He said, “We are half-hearted creatures fooling around with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us.”
Transformation
I think in too many instances spiritual maturity has been reduced to information—the transfer of knowledge. I’m not saying that isn’t important. It is. God doesn’t want half our mind. He wants our right brain and left brain. But I think spiritual maturity has as much to do with transforming the heart as it does informing the mind. It’s not just accumulated knowledge but changed desires. In his book Uprising, Erwin McManus says, “When you make God your primary passion, He transforms all the passions of your heart.” He says that passions become “the best compass for your spiritual journey.”
Here’s the ultimate goal of a transformed heart: wanting what God wants. Psalm 37:4 says, “Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart.” The word “give” means “to conceive.” In other words, when we’re living for God’s glory, new desires are conceived in us. God literally downloads new desires into our heart until we want what God wants!
Energy
Nothing is more deenergizing than sin. Here’s a one definition of sin: a waste of energy. You waste God-given energy on something it shouldn’t be spent on. Lust is a waste of energy. You waste energy coveting something you can’t or shouldn’t have. Pride is a waste of energy. We waste lots of energy pretending to be who we aren’t. Sin is a waste of energy. You waste your energy on things you shouldn’t be spending your energy on and then you have to spend even more energy on things like guilt and regret and anxiety.
Nothing is more deenergizing than sin. But the flip side is true as well. Nothing is more energizing than doing the will of God.
There is a fascinating dialogue in John 4. The disciples were concerned about Jesus because, evidently, he hadn’t eaten in quite some time and he was burning the candle at both ends. Imagine the expenditure of energy involved in casting out demons, healing the sick, showing compassion to the outcasts, teaching the crowds, defending his actions to the Pharisees, and adjudicating the disciples’ infighting. But even after a full day of ministry, not to mention miles of hiking through mountainous terrain, Jesus would often get up early, stay up late or even pull an all-nighter. How did he keep that pace? Jesus revealed an alternate energy source in John 4:34. “His disciples urged him, ‘Rabbi, eat something.’ But he said to them, ‘I have food to eat you know nothing about.’ Then his disciples said to each other, ‘Could someone have brought him food?’ ‘My food,’ said Jesus, ‘is to the do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work’.”
When you read “food” think “energy.” The thing that energized Jesus was doing the will of God. The reason Jesus was the most passionate person who ever lived is because he never wasted any energy (he lived a sinless life) and he always did the will of the Father. The way you stay passionate is by staying in the will of God.