Saved

Spiritual Training Cycle: Connection (wk. 1/13)

Reading: Romans 5:6-11

When my daughter was 18 months old, she nearly drown. When they tell you that drowning is a silent killer, believe it. My wife and I were enjoying a weekend afternoon at the community pool. My daughter was in the pool with me using her arm floaties to support her. She hopped out of the pool, I turned my back for a quick moment, and before I knew it, a man was rushing into the water behind me. I turned back around and there was my daughter lying face down in the water. She had taken off her floaties and decided to jump back in without them. We quickly got her to the pool deck and shortly thereafter she flashed a big smile and we all knew she was going to be ok. My daughter had been saved.

If you’ve ever been in a life-or-death situation, then you know. If you haven’t, you should thank God for that right now. When Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin collapsed on a football field earlier this year, it got real serious real fast. Suffering a cardiac arrest, medical personnel spent almost half an hour getting him resuscitated and stabilized before being transported to a level one trauma center. The world held its breath for three days until Hamlin was able to make his first written communication. He scribbled on a clipboard, “Did we win?” I know I breathed a sigh of relief when I heard that. Hamlin had been saved.

For some of you, your souls are in a life-or-death matter. And while you don’t feel like Hamlin did when he lay on that field, the outcome for you is just as serious. Scripture refers to this as salvation. Salvation is the work God does to move you from death to life. Now, you probably don’t feel dead. Well, maybe if you just had a big workout, but you know what I mean. Death is a condition we are helpless to overcome on our own. When Scripture talks about being dead in our selfishness and transgressions, it means there’s nothing we can do on our own to fix that.

The result of our state of selfishness is separation from God. And if something isn’t done about that, or if there isn’t some type of intervention on your behalf, then your soul will flat line. It will flat line with emptiness which no possession can fill. It will flat line with regret when work is who you’re really married to. It will flat line with jealousy when everyone else is married with kids and you’re still single. Eventually, your soul will permanently flat line when you leave the earth. You need to be saved. And that’s the lifeline God offers through His Son, Jesus.

In Romans 5:11, the Apostle Paul writes:

“But we also boast in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.”

Reconciliation. In other words, the gift of new life. When we put our faith in Jesus, His defeat of death is our defeat of death, which results in new life. A new life that we can’t achieve on our own. And this is the life God wants for us. It’s the life Jesus refers to when He says, “I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full” (John 10:10).

In most life-or-death situations, people are relying on someone to save them. Whether that’s medical personnel, firefighters, the other guys on your special operations team, or your dad when you’re 18 months old and take your floaties off and jump in the pool. We’re relying on someone to save us too. His name is Jesus. Jesus saves. And His salvation saves the only life you can’t – your own.

Questions for Reflection:

Have you ever had a near death experience or helped save someone who was? What was that experience like for you?

What does being saved by Jesus feel like?

Now

Spiritual Training Cycle: Submission (wk. 13/13)

Reading: Acts 16:16-34

Patience. If this post could also play music I’d have “I Want it Now” by Queen playing as you read this. “I want it all, I want it all, I want it all, and I want it now.”

What a humbling character trait to have, patience. I remember my mom repeatedly telling me when I was younger, “patience is a virtue.” Thirty plus years ago I was forced to have more patience compared to children and adults today. Dial up internet. A busy signal. No cell phone to keep me entertained while waiting in line at the post office, grocery store, or in the doctor’s office. I had to physically look up anything I wanted to know from a giant bookcase of encyclopedia Britannica’s or go to the library and be there for hours. Today everything is at the touch of our fingertips or the recognition of our voice. Most everything today is extremely convenient and fast. We hardly have to wait for anything – except the hard stuff. Like our prayers, or our relationship with God, or the answers to said prayers…. where are they? We want it all; and we want it now.

When it comes to your life what do you typically choose to do? Take matters into your own hands because you want it all and you want it now, or do you trust the process, take your time, pray for guidance, peace, patience, and God’s direction?

Back to the “patience is a virtue” thing – I don’t agree with that. I think patience is a skill. It’s something we must practice. It’s a skill we learn to develop over time, through both trial and error and trusting the process. Practice gives us plenty of opportunities to use and apply patience. If you’ve stepped into the gym even just a handful of times you’ve experienced what it means to be patient with your goals. It sucks sometimes. I know.

Bodybuilders don’t just go from the couch to the stage in a day. Preparing for a bodybuilding competition takes time. Weeks. Months of patience. Egg white after egg white, it’s a very mentally, emotionally, and physically exhausting prep. But over time, with help from a coach, trusting their guidance, putting in the work, and staying the course, those muscles start becoming a little more defined and filled out. The body starts getting leaner. And the results from all that patience become visible.

In CrossFit I can think of two examples, ones I have struggled with before. The snatch and the muscle up. In the snatch you are lifting a barbell from the ground to overhead in one movement. In the muscle up you are hanging from a pair of rings or a pull-up bar and pulling yourself up and over the rings or bar in one movement. Both of those movements are highly skilled, and both take time and practice to perfect. If you rush either, it can get ugly fast. However, if you don’t rush it and wait until just the right time to pull or turn over, there comes a split second of time when the barbell feels almost weightless, or your body seems to just float over the bar/rings. It’s an amazing ah-ha moment when it all comes together!

There is discipline required in the waiting; just as there is in developing our spiritual skills. Like the skill of patience, or the skill of praying repeatedly to God. It’s in the waiting where we build and chisel our character, where we wrestle with our selfish desires for immediacy.

In Acts 16:16-34, we see how God used patience to chisel the character of the apostle Paul. Locked in a dungeon and destined for death, Paul began singing hymns and praying. The patience to trust God that Paul developed over the course of his life was in full play. And when his cell door broke open and the chains fell from his hands and feet, God used Paul’s patience not just to save himself, but to save others as well.

Central to the passage is the jailer. Paul and Silas could have hauled ass when they were freed. But they didn’t. Why? Because they knew the jailer’s fate was death if they fled. So, they stayed instead. The result? Salvation for the jailer and his entire family!

Their patience brought salvation. Patience saves. What does patience save us from today? It saves us from saying something we can’t take back. It saves us from acting on unhealthy impulses. It saves us from rushing to conclusions and making false assumptions.

Just like our patience saves, God’s patience saves. His patience is saving not just the jailer, but all who will patiently get to know Jesus and one day make Him their Lord and Savior. Patience is powerful!

If you’ve made it this far and you’re feeling angsty because you know you struggle with patience or wanting to know all the answers, or even just what to do next, stop. Take a deep breath. Humble yourself. Talk to God. Trust His timing. Be still and know that He is God and you are not. It’s ok to not have all the answers or all the things right now. In the waiting, use the time to work on yourself knowing good things take time, and the wait is worth it.

Questions for Reflection:

Has there been a time in your life when you struggled with being patient, you jumped the gun, and can now see how things may have turned out differently had you waited with discipline and discernment?

How can you work on ways to build the skill of patience in your life when it comes to following Jesus?

The Path

Spiritual Training Cycle: Submission (wk. 12/13)

Reading: Romans 8:18-25

This August, one of the biggest events in the sport of CrossFit was underway, the 2023 NoBull CrossFit Games. Every year thousands of people gather around to watch some of the fittest athletes on earth compete. The one difference in watching the CrossFit Games compared to other major sporting events is that everyone is represented. You get to watch teenagers compete in the same colosseum as seniors. You see elite athletes doing legless rope climbs on the same field as those with legs made of prosthetics. Watching the CrossFit Games gives hope to anyone aspiring to make a life change for themselves after watching those who have already done it.

However, if you’re on a fitness journey, you know there are plenty of struggles to overcome. There’s the early morning alarm if the only time you can work out is before work. There’s the wake up and weigh yourself fatigue when the numbers don’t seem to budge. There are also the restaurant substitutes to make when you want to cut back on carbs, but free chips and salsa are so hard to resist. Getting the dream physique or total body makeover takes more than just hope – It also takes patience.

While watching the CrossFit Games can inspire hope in all of us, it’s not a hope that we too will one day stand on the podium as a champion. Well, at least not most of us. Rather it’s a hope to remind us the path we are taking leads to something good. Hope helps us stay patient on the path to fitness no matter how hard it gets.

We don’t just need hope in the gym, we also need hope in life. And when that hope is found in Jesus, things change. Because Jesus is the ultimate champion, He did the impossible – He defeated death. And His win becomes our win when we put our hope in Him. It’s a future hope the Apostle Paul talks about in Romans 8:18. It’s a hope that keeps us on the right path even when things don’t seem to be going our way.

I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.

This plays out in our spiritual lives when we find ourselves back sliding in the habitual sins or selfishness we thought we had taken care of years ago. Even in those moments, there’s still access to the same hope in Christ. There will come a day when the reality of sin will be no more. Until that day, we have patience on the path God is leading us along. His hope becomes the foundation of our patience, including patience with ourselves.

Maybe we are struggling to have patience with God when our prayers are unanswered, so we give up on talking to Him. We might be starving in our faith for a deeper relationship with God, but we are more distracted than ever online. Even when we can’t see God’s hand, we can still know His heart. If He didn’t spare His own Son but gave Him up for us all, how much more can we assume that His timing is perfect and that He loves us (Romans 8:32).

When things don’t happen in our time and our way, we can have patience in God’s timing because He is faithful to lead us on the right path back to Himself. The CrossFit Games is like a metaphor for the Kingdom of God. CrossFit invites anyone and everyone into the sport of fitness. In the same way, God invites anyone and everyone into a relationship with Him leading to fullness and true meaning in life. With Jesus at the top of the podium, we can have enduring patience in the journey, knowing that we will one day be seated with Him because He has already won. And that is something to be patient for.

Questions for Reflection:

Where do you excel in patience?

What are you trusting God with right now?