Jericho

Currently Listening to: Dying Star by Ruston Kelly

"At that time, Joshua invoked this curse:

May the curse of the Lord fall on anyone who tries to rebuild the town of Jericho."

Joshua 6:26

Yesterday, I came across a prayer I wrote a few years ago. True to my typical form, it was written on the back of a water bill envelope and crumpled into a well-worn planner. Although I wrote the words, they looked unfamiliar to me. Like I had seen them for the first time in that moment. But as soon as I started reading them, I re-experienced them.

"Father--

Surround me in your Spirit's siege.

Cut off all other resources.

Starve my fears until they are satisfied in your possibilities.

Remember Your way through these gates. And pass through them.

Unframe this fortress built by my own hand.

Demolish these walls of lifeless stone.

Silence them with my sound of submission.

Rebuild them. Renew them.

Replace them with Your presence.

Corner me in Your open fields.

Find me finding You."

At the time I wrote this, I had recently stumbled across the story of Jericho in the Old Testament. If I'm honest, I hardly know anything about this story outside of a Children's Church song. Most of my attention has always gone to Joshua and the Israelites and the beginning of God's promise being fulfilled as His people won their first battle in the Promised Land. But, this time, my mind could not get off the people of Jericho. What were they doing that was so wrong? Defending their own, protecting their city and their loved ones within it? Resisting strange intruders that kept walking around playing trumpets?

What was God telling them? What did their lives look like?

Of course, if you read through the entire story, you will find that after following God's strange directions, the Israelites conquered and destroyed Jericho. As quoted above, the story ends dramatically with Joshua putting a curse on anyone that set out to rebuild the city. But despite Joshua's creepy curse, Jericho was rebuilt and destroyed several more times. In fact, the gospels even tell us that Jesus passed through Jericho on the way to Jerusalem and, ultimately, his death. By that time, the city had become known as a gateway city, a pass-through oasis in the middle of the wilderness for travelers on their way. Old Testament Jericho had gone from a sealed up fortress to New Testament Jericho, an open gateway for Jesus to pass through.

A few days ago, Ruston Kelly's "Jericho" came on my shuffle (Here's a good rule of thumb - never next a Ruston Kelly song). I heard him sing the chorus,

"Rivers weren't made for drowning. Souls were never made to fail. I raised Jericho around me, but these walls were built to scale."

Jericho, Ruston Kelly

Just like that, I was summed up. Exposed. Exhausted.

I felt the weight of my walls, this fortress I had worked so hard to build. Each stone mortared in expectations, disappointment, fear, control. Each wall, scaled to the extent of myself. Each doorway locked, bolted, shut.

And then, it hit me. I had rebuilt Old Testament Jericho.

This Lent season, I've tried to be intentional with journeying into the wilderness of myself, like Jesus did. But I have only ventured farther into the distraction of productivity and performance.

I feel the weight of that fortress, tall and resolute, standing in the desert--asserting its purpose through stubborn walls and skeptical resistance. Choosing the shelter of the familiar over the vulnerability of the Lord's passage.

Here's the deal: there's a Jericho inside of me. I have felt it building my entire life, and I feel it now. Its biggest strongholds keep me standing upright and alone, strong from the outside but fragile and unwilling on the inside. Bricks of expectation piled upon bricks of expectation. Stacked against themselves in piles that feign strength but yield self-importance and confining control. The kind of walls that prevent a passage of the Lord.

I have not heard the empowering truths of the Father. I have not secluded myself away from the clutter to be baptized in the Spirit, to be awake to the possibilities of what it means to be a child of God. A follower of and participant in resurrection. My words are pointed toward obedience, but my feet are scuttling down the familiar stone-clad paths of my own way and my own effort.

I often ask God to be with me. In the morning, as I'm driving, as I enter into other people's stories. I ask Him to simply make me aware of His presence in a way that uncovers something new about Him. But lately, I feel God gently pushing back on that request.

"Alex, be with me. Make me aware of your willingness to receive."

It only makes sense that He would ask what is most unknown and uncomfortable. Rather than a command or call to action to do something, God's big asks of me are verbs that are passive--verbs that can only render me a beneficiary of the Father's presence. Not a sideshow presence, but a presence of empowerment, one that reminds and affirms a child of who they are and what they mean to their Father. A presence that silences hurry and ushers in a posture of surrender. Head bowed, hands open to the possibilities that come alive when you're with Him.

That's the wilderness I want to camp in. That's the desert I want to stand in.

Not Jericho, but Jesus.

I don't know where you are or what the Lord has for you in this season of reflection. But I do know that he's telling me to stop building, and start being. And when the time to build begins again, build New Testament Jericho. The kind of city that Jesus passes through. The kind of city that is a gateway for the presence of the Father and an oasis of grace for its inhabitants.

Happy Lent, fam.

-Alex

// Advent 2019 Introduction: Making Way for a Way-Maker //

God’s kingdom is like ten young virgins who took oil lamps and went out to greet the bridegroom. Five were silly and five were smart. The silly virgins took lamps, but no extra oil. The smart virgins took jars of oil to feed their lamps. The bridegroom didn’t show up when they expected him, and they all fell asleep.

In the middle of the night someone yelled out, ‘He’s here! The bridegroom is here! Go out and greet him!’

The ten virgins got up and got their lamps ready. The silly virgins said to the smart ones, ‘Our lamps are going out; lend us some of your oil.’

They answered, ‘There might not be enough to go around; go buy your own.’

They did, but while they were out buying oil, the bridegroom arrived. When everyone who was there to greet him had gone into the wedding feast, the door was locked.

Much later, the other virgins, the silly ones, showed up and knocked on the door, saying, ‘Master, we’re here. Let us in.’

He answered, ‘Do I know you? I don’t think I know you.
— Matthew 25:1-13

Come, Lord Jesus, come. What a bold, well-worn prayer—one that begs for God to do exactly what He has always done: come. A prayer that, particularly around this time of year, gets muttered and sung half-heartedly as a means to an end instead of the active anticipation it warrants. Perhaps Eugene Peterson says it best in describing it as a gospel verb, an act engrained in the character of God. The Christian message is not just that God is, but that he comes.

The past several months have been spiritually dry for me. I have found myself waiting, much like the “silly virgins” in the passage above. Unprepared, half-hearted, looking to others for tasks I should take responsibility for myself. But as the spiritual season shifts into a publicly recognized time of waiting through Advent, I feel convicted to actively wait—to see anticipation for what it is: a spiritual space to occupy and experience even apart from the longed-for event. A lamp that needs extra oil to provide an adequate light.

I have become more hesitant to share my thoughts the older I’ve gotten, maybe because I feel a growing responsibility for the words I put on paper. Maybe because I’m more hesitant, in general, or less sure of more. Regardless, I have been reminded recently how many others feel that same way—how countless amounts of believers and followers struggle with doubts, questions, and an expansive understanding of our inability to know and understand the most important thoughts and concepts. I hope that me sharing my own journey provides some comfort and encouragement to others who are also searching and waiting.

If you are one of those people, I’m here to remind you there is more community out there than you think. There’s no better time to find it than the season that celebrates the anticipation of God. The anticipation of a bride for her bridegroom. The anticipation for the one that comes. But we must prepare our own hearts to receive his arrival. We must make way for a Way Maker.

Over the next four weeks, I’m going to be looking at the four candles (and themes) of the Advent season. My hope is that we all will bring extra oil for our lamps so that we produce adequate light to see more of the one who comes.

// Out of the Ashes //

As the ashes take away our sins, new growth happens. We start our life anew, just as a forest does, after it, too, has been touched by the fire of sins.
— Anthony T. Hincks

I’m convinced trees have life more-or-less figured out. Seriously, I have come to appreciate what they have to teach us along our own spiritual journeys (thanks, Brian Ford). They are dependent on and patient with what they are given— a tiny seed placed in something so much bigger than itself. Rooted in the present, while all the while aware of a higher-arching call. At the will of their provider, for better or for worse. And, perhaps most importantly, willing to submit to the dangerous process of blooming, despite whatever costs might be associated.

It has always been strangely comforting to me that death is used to breed life. I’m not sure there can be a more powerful beginning than one that comes forth from an ending— like a sunrise that breaks the grip of its darkest night or a plant that must shed itself to truly bloom. There is strength in their submission. There is a prolonged power in their letting go.

Ash Wednesday will forever be one of my favorite events on the spiritual calendar. There is no better teacher of intention than the compelling seasons of spiritual transition. Year over year, I find the most valuable growth to rest in the in-betweens of the big moments, the phases of life that are designed to prepare you for something specific. And for me, to feel a finger of cold ash on my forehead brings me back to the very beginning of myself, to the place where I am only ash of the Earth— a place where I cannot be my own Savior. A place touched by the fire of my sins.

Lent is a rare season, in the sense that it is a publicly observed occasion where intention and submission meet with warm embrace. It is an active submission to the gospel personally enacted. We are called to remember our sin-drenched heritage, while simultaneously remembering the inheritance of freedom alive in Christ’s sacrifice and resurrection. It is truly Christ pulling us out of the ashes, and into a glorious resurrection life like no other.

I don’t pretend this picture and analogy are reserved for the few weeks of the Lenten season. God has been enacting this same story of resurrection not only over the course of my life, but over the course of human history. He didn’t and doesn’t leave us as the dirt from whence we came— he continues His promise to breed life from death over and over again. Day after day, month after month, year after year. And I, along with every other believer, have experienced this redemption narrative personally, more so recently than ever. The story of Lent has permeated every moment of my past 3 years, as my story has embraced transitions that have created new life within me. Even more significantly, new life with a person I am covenanted to as we chase the Heart of God. It is in that covenant I realize the gospel more fully, as I become more aware of what marriage between man and woman has to teach us about the marriage between God and His people. My Cliff’s Notes so far?

Apart from who God is and what He has done for us, we are not worthy of the privilege and call of covenant. Apart from His presence and promise, we cannot breed life out of our own ashes. Every effort to do so will find us in the same place we began— in dust and in ash.

I don’t think it’s any coincidence that Lent and Daylight Savings happen during the same time of year. Days are longer and nights are shorter, almost as if to encourage each of us to do more with the light we have been given. We are gifted with the hope and light of what Christ has accomplished on our behalf, a light that has the ability to breed life out of death. But that life can only be experienced in the face of dying to your own way— a voluntary death and submission to a throne you don’t sit on. An active submission to the gospel personally enacted. It is there, we rise. It is there, we regain our place in the Presence of The King, at the feet and will of The One who breeds life from death.

“There's a garden in the ashes
There is beauty in the mess
If we embrace our imperfections
I know love will do the rest.”

-Steffany Gretzinger, Sing My Way Back

We all know the Story of Eden to be the setting of mankind’s downfall— the place where we chose our own way over God’s way. That story will always be stained with a foundational sin of putting our own desires and interpretations over God’s, which, unfortunately, continues to haunt us in our day-to-day. But, just as the Steffany Gretzinger song describes, There is a Garden in the Ashes. Eden is not our End Game. When we find ourselves at our own end, in our own dust and ash, we also find the garden of God’s provision— Round 2 of Eden. Where, because of Jesus and what He has achieved on your behalf, you have the option to choose God’s way over your own. Get out of the Ashes. Get into the Resurrection.

“Believe me: I am in my Father and my Father is in me. If you can’t believe that, believe what you see—these works. The person who trusts me will not only do what I’m doing but even greater things, because I, on my way to the Father, am giving you the same work to do that I’ve been doing. You can count on it. From now on, whatever you request along the lines of who I am and what I am doing, I’ll do it. That’s how the Father will be seen for who he is in the Son. I mean it. Whatever you request in this way, I’ll do.” -John 14:12-14 (MSG)

We forget the bold claims of Jesus so easily, don’t we? We are the people he’s referring to— the same people He says will do even greater things than Him! BECAUSE of the things He did. The same people who start off as dust and ash end up carrying on Christ’s legacy of resurrection. His death breeds everlasting life, a life that abundantly waits at the end of ourselves. Life that is unlocked through an active submission to the gospel personally enacted.

Do not fear the ends at the expense of the beginnings. In every season of life, God has promised us more. There is strength in submitting to Him and power in letting go of your own grip for His.

Out of the Ashes,

Alex