Actions as Evidence of Faith

(The following is a devotional I wrote for our recent Staff Retreat at the Foundation, and, as is my habit, I share it here with you.)

Those Methodists … they don’t have any real beliefs.  If you are Methodist, you can believe anything you want.

From Ken Carder’s book, “Living our beliefs…”

However, although Wesley and the Methodists “were fully committed to the principles of religious toleration and theological diversity, they were equally confident that there is a ‘marrow’ of Christian truth than can be identified and that must be conserved.” (p25)  What do you believe – those deep, marrow beliefs – that there is a God, that he is alive in the world.  That he cares about us – loves us – all of us -- beyond our imagination. 

The Methodist emphasis upon “practical divinity” or holy living, therefore, recognizes the integral relationship between beliefs and behavior, faith and works.  It is not a diminishing of the importance of beliefs; rather, it is a declaration of the importance of beliefs in shaping who we are and our relationship with God and the world. (p27)  If we really believe what we say we believe, that it has to make a difference in what we do.

Sometimes we want these hard and fast statements of faith, so that we can say, “I am right, and you are wrong.”  That’s too easy.  The United Methodist Faith is more complicated than that.  Wesley’s Methodism doesn’t just say, “I believe…”  It says, “I believe, and my beliefs will change my actions.”

It is easier to say, “I am right and you are wrong” than it is to say, “I love God.  God loves you and me.  In order to love God, I must love you, and that love will change who I am and what I do.”

Wesley wrote, “What then is the mark?  Who is a Methodist, according to you own account?”  I answer: A Methodist is one who has “the love of God shed abroad in his heart by the Holy Ghost given unto him;” one who “loves the Lord his God with all his heart, and with all his soul, and with all his mind, and with all his strength.  God is the joy of his heart, and the desire of his soul; which is constantly crying out, “Whom have I in heaven but thee?  And there is none upon earth that I desire beside thee!  My God and my all!  Thou art the strength of my heart, and my portion forever.”

Believing that our faith is lived out in our lives, Wesley developed a way to live – the General Rules.  The process had two steps – trying to live out the rules, and then, because if we attempt to do it alone, we will fail, living out the rules in a group whose members would help each other.

Our work in the Foundation is ministry.  We’ve known that all along.  We work as a team.  We’ve known that all along, too.  Jeff has asked us to examine what we do in the light of the three simple rules, and I imagine we are all finding that our faith in God has impacted our living of the mission of the Foundation, and that as a team, we are better able to fulfill our calling to this ministry.

And when we do that, we find that God is there, meeting us at the center of what we believe and what we are doing.

Church

I'm still working my way through my notes from Bishop Carder's book, Living our Beliefs. Read this quote from Chapter 9:

The church is treated as another voluntary organization that people join as they do a civic club or a political party. Loyalty is measured by frequency of attendance, payment of pledges, service on committees and participation in activities. The church is considered to be something we belong to rather than someone we are. Membership and participation are viewed as optional, depending upon personal preferences and satisfaction. The church, then is seen as another institution among many institutions competing for our times, energy, and financial resources. Its distinctiveness as a called people of God committed to being a sign, foretaste and instrument of God’s presence and power is lost amid institutional survival and personal satisfaction.

How do we measure the success of a church? Do we use the same criteria that we use to measure the success of a civic club? At Rotary today, we talked about a membership drive. The hope is that we can recruit 25 new members so that the club's vitality continues into the future. Do we have the same goal for the church? Do we recruit new members to maintain our budget? Our roles? Or do we have a higher calling?

Are we a choice among choices for financial giving, for volunteer services?

Or are we something else? Is church something outside of who we are, or is church something that we are?

Feeling Forgiven?

What do you think about this quote from Bishop's Carder's book, Living our Beliefs?

One person said to me, “If you don’t feel forgiven and saved, you haven’t been.”  Or, behavior is often justified with a simple explanation, “It feels right.”  Feeling of certainty, optimism, excitement, serenity or “peace of mind” become of the goals and tests of religious devotion.  While valuing and affirming feelings and emotions, Methodism has never defined Christians discipleship as subjective feeling. 

Have you been forgiven?  Do you doubt the power of God's grace?  Haven't we heard the words of assurance that we have been forgiven?  Do we doubt those words?

And yet, I understand.  In my life, I have often sinned against God, against family, friends, people I don't even know, and people I love dearly.  I know that God forgives me, and I know that other people have forgiven me.  And even so, I still feel guilty; there are times when I do not feel forgiven.

Why would I ever think that my ability to feel forgiven has any bearing on another person (or God's) ability to forgive? 

There are those who have hurt me (or those I love) who I have forgiven, and they don't even know about my forgiveness, or even that I have been hurt.  The forgiveness is real, but it doesn't depend at all on someone else.

Feeling forgiven has nothing to do with being forgiven.  Feeling forgiven has to do with our own sense of guilt, and our relationship with other people and with God.  It's an issue we need to deal with, but it doesn't mitigate how much and how often we have been forgiven.  It certainly doesn't change the power of Christ's death and of God's grace.  We are forgiven

Grace

A few years ago I co-taught a class based on Philip Yancey's book, What's So Amazing About Grace.  I remember as we talked in the class that there seemed to be a perception that grace = forgivness.  I'm not here to argue that; it certainly does mean that.  I think, however, that forgiveness is grace in the same way that a square is a rectangle.  There is so much more to grace.

I read this paragraph from Bishop Carder's book (Living our Beliefs):

According to Randy Maddox, Wesley was deeply concerned to hold together the two traditional emphases on grace.  The Eastern Church has historically placed the accent on grace as God’s healing, while the Western Church has emphasized pardon as the principal work of grace.  John Wesley incorporated both healing and pardon as inseparable expressions of divine grace.

Think about the idea of healing.  I think in this discussion healing is more than the restoration of health.  It's the restoration of the image of God in us.  It's the restoration of our relationship to God. 

Grace is love.  It's forgivness.  It's pardon.  It's healing.  It's restoration. 

It's grace.

God's suffering

Yesterday, I wrote about the image of God, and how our relationship with God moves us closer and closer to reflecting the complete image of God.

Carder, in the next chapter of Living our Beliefs, talks about how sin is the opposite of this.  Sin is the reflection of something other than the image of God.  When we sin, we fall short of our potential -- short of what we were created to be.  If you look at yesterday's list, sin means that we fail in our ability to have understanding and free will, to be good stewards.  It means we fail to discern right from wrong and that we fail to be holy.  When we sin, our actions and thoughts reflect something other than the face of God.  We fail to be what we were created to be.

Now read this quote from the book:

The consequence of persistent denial and betrayal of the divine image is suffering – the suffering of God.  God so closely identifies with the human family that God assumes the suffering and death inflicted upon it.  The cross of Christ, then, represents sin’s tragic consequences upon humanity and upon God.

Have you ever thought of your sin as bringing about the suffering of God?  So often I think we believe that our sin doens't really hurt anyone else -- or at least we fool ourselves into believing that about certain of our sins.  But what about the idea that our sin brings suffering to God?

Of course, obviously, our sin brought about the suffering on the cross, but what about today?  Think about God suffering today because of your sin.  My sin.

Image of God

What do you think it means to be made in the image of God?

• Does it mean we look like God?  I don't think so....
• What do you think of the idea that men are made in the God's image, so obviously, God is male?  Kind of leaves me out in the dark.  I, too, am made in the image of God, so I don't think that image has anything to do with gender.
• Does it somehow reflect in what we can do?  Our abilities?  I hope God has much much greater abilities than I do, so that can't be it?
• What else?

Bishop Carder says in his book, Living our Beliefs:

Our identity lies in the One to whom we belong and in whose image we are made, nor in how we look, what we know, or what we can do.

He also said:

John Wesley saw imago Dei – image of God – in three manifestations:

1. The natural image, in which the human capacity for understanding, freedom of will, and love are expressions of God’s image;
2. The political image, in which human beings exercise stewardship over creation and share in God’s ongoing governance of the earth; and
3. The moral image, in which the human potential for righteousness, true holiness, and happiness are signs of the divine image

So, our capacity for understanding, freedom of will and love are from God. Our ability to be good stewards is from God, and our ability to discern right from wrong, our holiness and happiness are from God.

One other quote from the chapter that I really liked:

In many ways, human identity is formed by relationships.  We take on the values, qualities, dreams and goals of those to whom we relate in significant and ongoing ways.

Because we relate to God, because we have a relationship with him, we move closer and closer to reflecting his image, and to being able to share in the imago Dei.

The Bowl's Purpose

A potter works with a lump of clay. She molds the shapeless form into a form that can be placed strategically in the middle of the bat, and then she begins to turn the wheel. Her hands expertly find the center of the ball of clay -- that point at which the friction of the clay in her hands is reduced. Here, she begins the process of skillfully opening up the clay to her hands, widening the bowl, beginning the formation of the finished product.

Her hands caress the clay, continuing to shape and mold the raw material into the object she dreams it will be. Once the bowl is before her, justified in her mind, she removes it from the bat and takes it through a process to harden the clay into pottery.

Glazes and paints complete the dream.

And then the test. She pours water into the bowl. What if it doesn't function as a bowl should? What if it leaks? What if it disintegrates? What if it doesn't fulfill the purpose for which is was made?

In Carder's book, Living our Faith, he says:

The Methodist emphasis upon “practical divinity” or holy living, therefore, recognizes the integral relationship between beliefs and behavior, faith and works. It is not a diminishing of the importance of beliefs; rather, it is a declaration of the importance of beliefs in shaping who we are and our relationship with God and the world. (p27)

There is a relationship between being shaped by grace and the works to which we are called. Our works do not earn us grace, but grace prepares us for works. If there are no works, then have we allowed grace to do its job?

Conviction

Balance.  Moderation.  They are good words.  Words that are positive.
Read this quote from Living our Beliefs by Kenneth Carder:

“It makes no difference what you believe as long as you are sincere.”  Such a claim is often made in the name of faith and tolerance.  The affirmation, which is itself a belief or tenet of faith, makes sincerity the criteria for religious devotion.  It assumes that all religious beliefs are equal and their validity is judged by the firmness with which they are held and the sincerity with which they are acted upon.  Truth becomes synonymous with strong conviction, and faithfulness if validated by “it feels right.” (p23)

I agree with him that my conviction that something is truth doesn't make it truth.  My conviction should arise from truth; it doesn't work in the opposite direction.

Is there a danger in this, though?  Is there a danger that my own conviction that I am right make me arrogant?  How do I balance the idea that not everyone can be right against the idea that I and only I am right?

Perhaps the best I can do, in most situations, is to say, "This I believe...."

Carder also says this:

However, although Wesley and the Methodists “were fully committed to the principles of religious toleration and theological diversity, they were equally confident that there is a ‘marrow’ of Christian truth than can be identified and that must be conserved.”

(p25)

I like that --  a marrow of Christian truth.

Living our Doctrine

As part of my CLM training, I reading the book Living Our Beliefs by Bishop Kenneth L. Carder.

First of all, let me say that the copy of the book I'm reading belongs to our Annual Conference's Resident Bishop -- I borrowed it from him.  It has the Bishop's highlighting in it.  Cool.

The introduction talks about the idea that some people believe that we United Methodists don't have any real beliefs -- that we are "live and let believe."  Not so. 

But, the United Methodist church did not originate out of a battle over doctrine.  We began as a renewal movement from the Church of England.  Carder states that Wesley's concern was that our beliefs shape our lives.  What we believe should have an impact on how we live our lives.

"In other words, beliefs are to be lived, doctrine is to be practiced."  An authentic belief will bear the fruit of impacting and shaping our lives into the image of Christ.

To me, that says that Wesley would not be as concerned that we state our doctrine as much as he would want our lives to demonstrate our doctrine.

Sound familiar?  To me it is right in line with James -- faith without works is dead.