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A Theology of Acting

/ Paul Burkhart / Leave a comment

My “final exam” in this acting class I’ve been taking at VCU was on Thursday of this past week. For the class, I had to keep a “journal” to record my experiences through the course. This is one of my “entries.” I hope you all enjoy:

So where is God in acting, anyway? I really do think that all art points to and represents God in some way. So what about acting? I’ve been wrestling through this for a bit now and I’ve come to a couple of ideas:

1 – All parts of the Bible are dramatic representations of the ultimate plan of God – the Gospel. So, Abraham and Isaac, Joseph, Moses, the Exodus, the Exile, the sacraments are all dramas (“shadows” as the Bible calls them) of realities greater than the sum of these parts. SO maybe acting is true art (or more accurately, drama is) because the basic organizational structure of personality, history, and reality itself is a giant dramatic arrow pointing to God and the Gospel.

2 – Acting explores various aspects of the “Imago Dei” – or, Image of God in man. It’s purity, potential, purpose, and perversion. All these aspects of the present reality of that “thing” that makes us human are the substance of good acting. When you touch that part of us, perhaps you touch something divine. The same thing that the incarnation touched in people as Jesus – divinity in humanity – walked among us. The same thing that will be touched for all time when all God’s people adore and behold Jesus for the rest of time. This leads me to my last point.

3 – Acting could be a symbol of the Incarnation. Jesus became that which he was not (human) to such an extent He became that while not leaving the reality of who He was (divine). It is in this process of God taking on the nature of what He was not in order to redeem it, that the greatest “method acting,” if you will, was ever seen. This is a very weak and poorly developed parallel, but hopefully thought provoking nonetheless.

Indeed, these are just possibilities, but they made me think about and love Christ more, so my hope in writing this is that all of you will to.

–paul

Jesus? May I?

/ Paul Burkhart / 1 Comment

Jesus?

I sit here at this laptop, a vision bouncing ‘round my head
to write a prose to you that shows your grace, beauty, and strength.
But I’m tired and I keep typoingt ypos, over and iver again.
And you know what?  I’m not going to correct that above,
because that really was an accident.

I know, I know.  “Nothing’s new” I heard the wise one once said.
No thought, no word, no deed has the sun not shone itself upon.
Looking down, looking down upon my filthy rags, mocking and burning,
mocking and burning.  I just need to get this out!

Oh, Christ! Will thou not enable me to write these words?

He won’t.

Some may say I’m attempting some not so subtle display of irony,
trying to be original, profound, or cute; noting the use of prose to Him
as my medium for my diatribe on not being able to write a prose to Him,
but it’s not.

These words are nothing, they are filth, not fit for the King I serve.
No edits, no plans, no thoughts or “brainstorming” went into this.
Just the feeble cries of a broken man, wallowing, drowning, fighting,
losing.  It seems.

The weight of people not yet known – their souls upon my shoulders.
The sin I bear upon my back, the doubt that grows within.
I’m lost.  I’m depraved.  My futile thinking, my hardened heart,
my ignoble desires, my Glorious King! the One I have! the One I need!

Oh Christ!  Oh Sovereign Lord!  Be the God to me You are!
Oh that my tongue were loosed with the tongues of angels
to say all your Grace could say!

Let my soul take flight! Rise me into Thy Love!
Faster.  Faster!  Make me only Thine!  I need it!
I must! I lust, covet, and gluttonously gorge myself upon
the Grace I so desperately need desperately. . .

desperately.

And even with that, I end this now, not having said
what I wanted to say – what I needed to say.
Your Grace did not come, or at least in the measure I hoped.
This burden thus stays, this wineskin won’t burst,
this angst will continue to grow.

But I know, in the quietest parts of my soul, those deep whispers
and silent voices, echoing within:
my Beloved is mine and i am His, and His Grace is at His whim,
for if it were up to me, I would not need Him,

and it’s in my need I have Him most.

The Sweet Taste of Sovereign Suffering, III (Selah)

/ Paul Burkhart / 1 Comment

“This is not hard to see in the Bible. And it is precious beyond words! I don’t like to get angry at people who call themselves evangelicals; I don’t delight in critiquing people who have major leadership positions [who are] very popular, nice people. This is not fun. It’s heartbreaking! But what can you do when they attack the center with blasphemous cynicism? What can you do?”
— John Piper

John Piper said this concerning N.T. Wright, the British bishop who is now bringing doubt to the orthodox doctrine of Justification. When Piper said this, he was weeping. It has been haunting me these past few days. What you are reading now is my third attempt in writing this post. I keep writing a bit then having to toss it out. Each time my heart still hasn’t been in the right place.

I need to repent. My heart has not been in the right place in these rebuttals. While I feel I’ve done a good job of not letting that effect what I’ve written, sin management is still sin, and it eats you up more than most other sins. My heart has only in the past couple of days been brought to the place that Piper’s quote above comes from. As of a few days ago, I was excited. I, the “great Paul Burkhart,” have been successfully dismantling the argument of a real Pastor. I was defending the faith. I was rebuking lies. I was showing myself better suited for this task than this man. Though I never said these things, I see now this was the state of my heart. Pride. Making my theology an idol, no matter how right it may be, is still sin – and for that I am sorry.

At the end of all these posts, I intend to send them to Pastor Slye and to the person who (with glowing praise) referred me to his sermon. I let unrighteous anger and pride drive me to write, rather than love, and I need to let Slye know that I see this, and I repent. All the Bible says about us young guys is that we are strong, prideful, and foolish. The Bible knows us better than we do, and I thought I could rise above the norm for other twentysomethings. How wrong I was! “O what a wretched man I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!”

Now, I need to do the rest of this tactfully and biblically. The verses right after the verses I just quoted (Romans 7:24-25a) are as follows: “So then, I myself serve the Law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.” I think I relate to Paul here. Though with my flesh I have served the law of sin with my pride and arrogance, I still believe I have been serving the Law of God with my mind. I am still certain in the things I have been writing and writing against, I just need to repent for the heart from which I wrote them.

So, I’m going to finish this series, but I hope the tone is different. I no longer look at Slye in contempt as a heretic who needs to be rebuked and shown proper exegetical and theological integrity by the punk VCU student about to go into seminary. I go through this now as a fellow wounded sojourner, seeing why he thinks how he does. I see him as a man who stands week after week in front of God knows how many people who have been burned and hurt by the church, that come to him with their broken suffering hearts needing to know why. Needing to know God has not abandoned them. Needing to know that God is still good and they are still loved. O how calloused I’ve become because of my theology! After Lazarus dies, and Mary doubts Jesus for not being there earlier. Jesus doesn’t say, “Now now, Mary, your theology is all wrong. How dare you doubt me? O you of little faith.” No. He weeps with her, and then lives out those theological truths before her.

Though I am certain that Slye’s view on suffering is unbiblical and ultimately only leads to more cynicism and pain on behalf of the sufferer, I know that as a man who was reluctant to become Pastor in the first place (as their website says), it must have been hard when faced with the weight and realities of real life that I have yet to experience. But experience aside, the Bible is the greatest commentary and authority on true reality, and as such, I believe I have Biblical warrant to honestly and humbly show where Slye has erred in his theology.

This process now for the first time hurts me and breaks my heart. Please pray for me as I continue in this. I no longer want to do this, but the Gospel of Christ compels me, as I have seen that there is only one true comforting view in the midst of the hardest pains. And that is the view of a loving Father who lets nothing touch you that does not first pass through his loving, ordaining hand such that all things that come our way have been ordained and brought to pass ultimately by a God working for our good – building us into the strong, persevering, hope-filled, Glory-loving, broken clay vessels that we need to be to truly enjoy Him and fully worship Him when He finally takes us home.

“For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be glory forever. Amen.”

Selah

The Purposeful God of Eternity

/ Paul Burkhart / 2 Comments

Tonight on a midnight ride to Williamsburg, God changed my life yet again. How? With this realization: God does all things in us primarily for an eternal purpose before he ever does them for a temporal one.

The “things” God does “in us” refers to pretty much everything: How we feel in a given situation, what we think, what we desire, our temptations, our struggles, our blessings, our joys, our pains, our purification, everything.

I realized tonight that this means that when anyone asks God, “Why?” about anything, there is a possibility of three responses from God; two for the non-Christian and one for the Christian. To the non-Christian he answers either (1) to draw you closer to me, or (2) to further condemn you so your eventual condemnation is just. To the Christian God’s answer is always (3) “to make you holy.”

(1) is pretty obvious. God will put people through a lot of crap sometimes and cause feelings and desires to both come and fall away in order to bring them to him.

(2) is a little harder to swallow, but true nonetheless. God is determined to be just. He will not condemn those not worthy to be condemned, and he has committed himself to showing those not his elect that their condemnation is just (Romans 1:20 , 1: 26-27, 3:5-8). My primary Biblical support for this is in Genesis 15:16. In the context, God is laying out the conditions of his covenant with Abraham. He will punish so-and-so people and give him so-and-so land, and so on and so forth. But at the very end of these covenant promises, God makes a very interesting statement. He says that the final fulfillment of these promises will be delayed. He says, “And they [Abraham’s descendants] shall come back here in the fourth generation, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.” God delayed the destruction of the people occupying the promised land and delayed His people entering it because the Amorite’s iniquity had not reached the level of deserving that wrath, thus he refrained so that their condemnation was just and He was justified in their destruction. So he does with some non-believers in Christ.

Anyway, (3) is what changed my entire perspective on God, me, and sanctification. We are generally presented with a certain situation that has pain and we begin to do what? Worry about the future and how it will resolve itself. God told me tonight that the resolution in the temporal to that situation is not the point. He gives (or allows us to feel [but if he’s all powerful, then “allowing” is just the same as “willing]) emotions both good and bad to us, and their effect in the temporal is not the point. God is preparing all of us for Eternity! No matter where we will end up in eternity, His every act toward us is to prepare us further for that end. I’ll repeat that:

No matter where we will end up in eternity, His every act toward us is to prepare us further for that end, both Christians and non-Christians.

So what does this process look like? I ask God “why do I feel this way?” He says, “to make you holy.” I say, “well, how will it end up?” He says, “It doesn’t matter. This all has eternal ramifications to it before it ever has temporal ones – THAT’S the primary point; don’t worry about the temporal – worry about how this is preparing you and those around you for eternity after these temporal things fall away.”

I don’t know about anyone else, but this gives me the key to entering into God’s rest in this life, no matter what comes your way. Being able to step back and see things from an eternal perspective rather than zooming in a focusing on the temporal creates a peace and a rest from faith that can only come from God.

No more worrying necessary, for the things I go through now are to prepare me and make me worthy for His Coming; to make sure He fulfills His commitment to me to make me His spotless Bride. Whatever temporal things that come about are merely part of the ride.

in Him,

–paul

p.s. – I’m still processing all this and have yet to actually spend a day with this perspective and see how this practically works out. I don’t really know what will happen outwardly if anything. We’ll see. I’ll keep you up to date. Now I’m off to slumber into my said first day with new perspective.

What’s Your Isaac?

/ Paul Burkhart / 1 Comment

I’ll give the thesis to all this first:
When God asks us if we are willing to give something up, it does not NECESSARILY follow that God wants you to actually give that thing up. I know, I know. Let me explain . . .

As is typical of most truths God lays on my heart, this truth in the hand of immature or false believers can be very very dangerous. So I encourage anyone as they pray through this to be very critical of their own applications of this principle as it could be very self-serving. Anyway, we turn to where all things started and must start, the Word of God:

“After these things God tested Abraham and said to him, ‘Abraham!’ And he said, ‘Here am I.’ He said, ‘Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.’ . . . When they came to the place of which God had told him, Abraham built the altar there and laid the wood in order and bound Isaac his son and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. Then Abraham reached out his hand and took the knife to slaughter his son. But the angel of the LORD called to him from heaven and said, ‘Abraham, Abraham!’ And he said, ‘Here am I.’ He said, ‘Do not lay your hand on the boy or do anything to him, for now I know that you fear God, seeing you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me. . . By myself I have sworn, declares the LORD, because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely bless you, and I will surely multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven and as the sand that is on the seashore. And your offspring shall possess the gate of his enemies, and in your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice.’”
— Genesis 22:1-2, 9-12, 16-18 (emphasis added)

I really want to make this short and sweet, so here goes. Two interesting things to point out in the story: (1) though God asks Abraham to give up Isaac, he doesn’t ever have to actually “give up” Isaac in the complete temporal sense we think. (2) Though Abraham, in the natural, doesn’t actually complete the “offering” of Isaac, notice that God tells him that he didn’t withhold his son, and that Abraham has done this (in the Hebrew a completed action referring to the original command of God in v. 2). God tells Abraham he fully accomplished what God ordered him to do in the very beginning. God didn’t “change plans” or lie to Abraham. Abe did exactly as God ordered him to do and completed “offered his son there as a burnt offering.” This means in God’s eyes, “giving up” something may mean something much more meaningful than just giving up on it. Just because God asks of you’re willing to give something up, does not mean, it is his desire that we do that in the typical temporal way we usually think.

In American Christianity we suffer so much from Platonic Dualism and Gnosticism. Our first response to things is to cast off the material for the sake of some spiritual ideal. Especially charismatics, who desire so much for the spiritual realm to “break through” into the material world with great signs and wonders, who build this dichotomy between spiritual and material and put such a distance between the two. So when God asks, “will you give this up?” The first inclination people jump to is that God must be telling them to give this thing up for the sake of the spiritual ideal hidden within the question. Perhaps this may not be the case.

Oh Saint. Oh Christian. Oh Beloved. We serve not a God that commands us to not love things in this world. He most certainly calls us to not love things of this world, but those are two very different things. He does not call us to remove ourselves from all things in this world we enjoy that bring us fulfillment, joy, and pleasure; rather he calls us to redeem those things in the world to reflect the spiritual Reality He is and find our joy fully in those things as they reflect Him. This how it can be completely acceptable and worshipful to God for a pastor to enjoy, love, and cherish his people, for a parent to do the same for their child, and for a husband to do that for his wife. It is because those things are designed to reflect the spiritual in their very nature.

My point is this: If God were to ask a husband, “are you willing to give up your wife?” It would not mean in any way, shape, or form, that He were insisting that man actually do so. Many times the point of the question is merely to test where your heart is in the matter, whether you are loving this thing for its own sake, or for how it reflects God. If you have been loving it for its own sake, or have been treating it in some other inappropriate way, God’s answer in this (from what I can see Biblically) is not even most of the time to give that thing up. Rather, His answer is to call you to redeem it so he can be reflected.

So, reader, what is your Isaac? Many of us have relationships, jobs, projects, callings, plans, and dreams God may have whispered in our ear “are you willing to give this up?” Know now that God many times has instilled all these things in your heart not to take them away, but to be glorified in them. What is your thing you have been called to “offer up” but maybe not necessarily give up? If I may encourage anyone out there, let it be in this: What I see in this story with Abraham and Isaac is God’s dedication to purify our love for things he has put in our heart, not necessarily to take them away (key word: necessarily).

So, Beloved, open your eyes and realize that many of the things that God asks if you are willing to give up are the very things that he plans and intends to use to fulfill promises and blessings made since eternity past for your own life and for the blessing and joy of all those around you, after you have responded appropriately to his question, not by taking the easy route of casting off that which God has called forth now for redemption, but by fighting for the reflection of Christ in your Isaac, who was “offered up” not by being “given up”, but by being lifted up for God to show his Son in for your joy and the joy of all peoples.

–paul<

p.s. – also, though God may not be calling you to actually give up in the temporal your “Isaac”, keep your eyes open for any “Rams in the thicket” God may be intending for you to sacrifice in your “Isaac’s” stead. These are things that must be sacrificed so that your “offering” of your “Isaac” can be complete and God’s blessing of it can follow. These “Rams” may be anything from insecurities, desires, lack of desires, current projects, jobs that have nothing to do with the desire God has placed in your heart, classes and majors that have nothing to do with the calling God has for you, certain ministry involvements that prevent the growth God wants in you, certain positions of leadership (or fears of being in those positions), or anything else that may be intended for the temporal altar other than your “Isaac,” which may belong purely on your spiritual altar so it can stay living and active in the temporal to bless you and those around you.

I hope you followed the metaphor enough to make sense of all that.

A Confession

/ Paul Burkhart / Leave a comment

” But you, O my love, for whom I faint with longing that I may be strong, you are not those material objects we can see, in heaven though they are, nor are you the beings which we do not see there, for you have created them and do not even count them as your highest works. How much more distant are you, then, from mere figments of my imagination, fantasy-bodies that have no reality at all! More real are the memory-pictures we form of objects which at least do exist, and more real again than these are the physical beings themselves; yet none of these are you. Better and more certain than the bodies of material creatures if the soul that gives life to their bodies, yet you are not the soul either. You are the life of souls, the life of all lives, the life who are yourself living and unchanging, the life of my own soul.”

— St. Augustine

Damascus

/ Paul Burkhart / 1 Comment

A troubled heart troubled still as I walk in the valley of the shadow of death but Im the shadow of that valley as I strike them with one rod while another comforts them why wont they die as I strike them with My Left as your right upholds them all Ill kill them inhale Ill kill them exhale Ill kill them inhale so on and so forth I walk as the dust of My sandals covers their face while Mine is clean Mine is pristine following none but MySelf on this dusty Damascus road and
then—

a Light . . .
i’m Yours . . .

an Emanating Illumination
eliminating all i thought i knew.
a Light i’ll see no more until
i see Your Face again.

There-

in that Place where every taste
is satisfied;
every desire fully known,

and consummation here,
but until such appointed time
i wait . . .

and endure . . .

a darkness, a pain, a thorn:
a longing for the Light
that keeps me running-
keeps me racing.

a longing for the Light . . .
a longing for the Sight

that took mine,

but left me not in darkness
then, now, and nevermore.

The Sweet Taste of Sovereign Suffering, Pt. II

/ Paul Burkhart / 2 Comments

I’m in the process of writing why Christians take joy in suffering. In this post I hope to explain the second reason why suffering, tribulation, and even evil are the joy and delight of the Christian. The first reason was that all evil, suffering and calamity reveal the Glory of God, which is the delight of the Christian; and must be, for a Christian to be a Christian (See my last post, Part I)

This second reason is a little more difficult to explain. In my life, God revealed these truths to me in a very peculiar way that led to these truths becoming some of the most precious that my mind has ever grasped. It was a night of confusion and not comprehending the words of a great sister, only to finally understand it all the next morning as the Holy Spirit fell in my shower. This post is the fruits of that night I am so indebted to. I pray the Holy Spirit communicates through me these truths, and that they may lead you to a deeper joy for God.

After the aforementioned shower, I went to Starbucks to do my Bible study for the morning and ran across John 9:39, which reads: “Jesus said, ‘For judgment I came into this world, that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind.'” If you click the link, you can get more context from Scripture, but Jesus goes on to tell the Pharisees that sight is metaphorical for salvation, obviously. Why is this verse, so profound?

Jesus is pretty much saying that his “judgment” is the greatest benefit of all to some, because it brings them nearer to God; for others, it is to cast them as far from his presence as can be done. His judgment is the greatest gift to those who believe in Him, but is the greatest curse for those who don’t. It’s a foreign concept in the church to worship God for his judgment. Who wants to rejoice in the sending of sinners to Hell? Romans 9:22-24 tells us that God’s Glory is revealed to those saved by the sending of sinners to Hell. His judgment reveals the Glory of God and opens our eyes to see it. Praise God!

[DISCLAIMERS: We can take comfort in the knowledge that this condemnation of sinners is just and righteous. Also, we can have no absolute knowledge as to who those people are that are condemned eternally, thus our preaching is not in vain, it brings about the expansion of the kingdom of God. So, PREACH, but take comfort that it is not based on you, your words, or even your motives whether someone is converted or not, and, remember that even if they are not, you can still praise God.]

In Romans 8:28-39, this principle is carried further. For sake of space, I won’t provide the text, just the exegesis, but please click the link and read it all. The main points are this: v.28 is the most precious and famous of all Bible promises. “We know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” That’s great, but what is the foundation of this? Why and how can we possibly believe this when we live in this world of suffering and pain? Verse 29 says that our assurance of this promise comes from our assurance of our election and salvation, but Paul doesn’t stop there. He knows this simple trust in God’s choosing and keeping of us doesn’t fully explain the foundation of v.28. I think that’s why he says next: “What, then, shall we say in response to this?” He answers with some of the most glorious truths in the Bible.

He tells us, because God is on our side, the usual system of fear and worry in suffering is destroyed in Christ. He says in verse 32 (this is the key verse for our purposes): “He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?” His grace will also give us all things. What did this grace first give us? It gave us a death, a suffering, a tribulation. The first and foundational gift of God’s Grace was a pain. Paul continues speaking of the foundation of this great promise by appealing to (of all things) the judgment of Christ – He is the one who condemns, which secures the power by which he can bring about that promise in our lives. The application of Romans 8:28 which is foremost in Paul’s mind as he is writing is then found in vv.35-39, and it is persecution, death, and tribulation! When Paul says that God will “give us all things,” he means all things – including suffering, tribulation, persecution, and even death. Not only that, that is what He gives “graciously.”

You see, just like we saw in John, all things that normally cause fear and heartache for all, for the Christian, are actually their greatest joy. This is because, just as in Christ’s judgment, all things good and bad are now merely our servants to bring us closer to God – even death. Whereas death is the greatest fear of man, after conversion, it is the things that propels him the deepest into the bosom of God he will ever be. Praise God!

So, in summary, all suffering, tribulation, pain, heartache, loss, judgment, and death we go through in this life is for the purposes of (1) revealing God’s Glory in this world, which believers so delight in, it is their joy, no matter the earthly cost; and (2) bringing us closer to Him, now that He has destroyed the system of fear and heartache in tribulation by making those “fearful” things our servants now to bring us to our Father.

I’ll end with this Psalm of Praise I found. I’ll just put selections up (the link has the whole thing), but pay attention to why it is all of Creation is rejoicing so much. I think you’ll find it “glorious.”

Psalm 96
Sing to the LORD a new song;
sing to the LORD, all the earth.
Sing to the LORD, praise his name;
proclaim his salvation day after day.
Declare his glory among the nations,
his marvelous deeds among all peoples.
Ascribe to the LORD the glory due his name;
bring an offering and come into his courts.
Worship the LORD in the splendor of his holiness;
tremble before him, all the earth.
Let the heavens rejoice, let the earth be glad;
let the sea resound, and all that is in it;
let the fields be jubilant, and everything in them.
Then all the trees of the forest will sing for joy;
they will sing before the LORD, for he comes,
he comes to judge the earth.
He will judge the world in righteousness
and the peoples in his truth.

ahh, Selah

–paul<

The Portrait of the Artist as a Never Ending Series of Talks and Inside Jokes

/ Paul Burkhart / Leave a comment

I
She stands alone,
lost in a process she only knows;
the reflection staring back in silent contemplation
of a piece going God knows where.

The streets lie lifeless in her eyes;
those eyes
never hidden,
speaking more than lips ever could –
or will.

Imitation sincerest form:
The arm-enveloped laugh wins again.

It wins the hearts of those around her,
a victory bitter in her mouth as unintentioned
as the persual of a lover
far less worthy than she.

II
A treasure to behold,
lost in the circles that bind her.
Unaware of the weary travelers,
knocking at her door.

What reason? What allure?
Presumption guiding every step,
obsession ceasing pleasant passion
as strangers ask for more

and more.

Find the part, feel the skin.
The skin of scalp under fingers raw
from scratching doors leading to air?
Maybe this time?

To freedom.

Freedom from pain, freedom from drama;
just twist the lone lock of so many colors once more
between the fingers and

sleep well this night and rest your head,
let not the demons haunt thy muse
as musings cascade down rivers gold
in dreams,
of a love:
due praise, and
worth honor.

A love Love’s loathing has kept you from knowing
this, these nineteen years gone past.
“A hope deferred makes the heart sick;”
indeed it ever has, but
“a hope that is seen is not hope at all,
for who hopes for what she sees?”

“A desire fulfilled is a tree of life.”

I hope beside you this still dark night
that you find
that which you’ve been made to have
but have had not ever still.

That you settle not for swine
as you are the pearl that is cast.
The pearl unknowing and unawares, of that which
thrusts one’s own out of the sea and into the arms

of He.

your Love.

[NOTE: Part II of the previous post will come very shortly.]

The Sweet Taste of Sovereign Suffering

/ Paul Burkhart / 2 Comments

devil-jesus-arm-wrestle

I absolutely REFUSE to believe the following:

  1. I worship and believe in a God that spends half his time saying “Oh crap, did that just happen?” (Romans 8:28)
  2. Satan is just the evil version of God that pretty much has the same power and authority as Him. (Job 1:7-12; Zechariah 3:2; Matthew 16:23)
  3. God merely REACTS to the suffering Satan causes, thus making Satan pre-eminent and initiator of all bad things. (Isaiah 45:7)
  4. Every creature and being in all of the universe has a free will of self-determination EXCEPT God. (Isaiah 55:8-11)

Something that has been on my mind a lot lately, is this topic of God’s presence in a world full of suffering. Let’s face it: life is pain. You’re either coming out it, going through it, or about to enter into it. So . . . where is God in all of this?

We don’t worship a God that looks at the suffering of the world and says “Wow, that’s bad, someone should do something about that.” Rather, we worship a God that enters into this suffering and undergoes it Himself in order that His Will may be accomplished of saving His people and ushering them into His Glory.

My decision to finally get these thoughts down on the blog was because of an interesting message I read in my personal study of Micah. You can find some more context in Micah 2:1-5, here I give the verses of significance.

they oppress a man and his house,
a man and his inheritance.
Therefore thus says the LORD:
behold, against this family I am devising disaster,
from which you cannot remove your necks,
and you shall not walk haughtily,
for it will be a time of disaster.

The Hebrew word for “devising” can also mean “create,” “weave,” “fabricate.” The Hebrew word for “disaster” used here can also mean “evil.” So, this verse can reasonably read:

“Therefore thus says the LORD:
behold, against this family I am weaving together evil.”

If you want a more direct verse, look at Isaiah 45:6-7:

that people may know, from the rising of the sun
and from the west, that there is none besides me;
I am the LORD, and there is no other.
I form light and create darkness,
I make well-being and create calamity,
I am the LORD, who does all these things.

In both these passages, why is God directly weaving together and creating calamity and disaster? In the first passage we see that the intended result of this time of “disaster” is that the Israelites would no longer “walk haughtily” – or in other words: Discipline and Sanctification of God’s people. In the second passage, we see that the LORD is doing these things so that everyone may know that there is no other God but Him, and that He is in control – or in other words: Revelation and Communication of God’s eternal Attributes and Being. How does it do that? Suffering and evil cause something deep inside of us to want to cry out “No!” because something inside of us just knows that it isn’t the way it is supposed to be. Suffering shows us how fallen the world is and how unlike it was originally created to be. So, from these passages we can conclude three primary reasons for suffering, as it is caused by God Himself:

  1. God’s Glory
  2. Our Holiness (God’s Glory in us)
  3. Further His Redemptive Plan (God’s Glory in History)

Where did I get that last one? The context of Isaiah 45 is that this is the passage where Isaiah is prophesying about (and to) the ruler that would free the Israelites from the Babylonian captivity 500 years (I think) later! He calls him by name and country: Cyrus, king of Persia. The opening lines of Chapter 45 are “Thus says the LORD to his anointed, to Cyrus.” He refers to a pagan king who never believed in God (as far as we know) and calls him “his anointed”! Cyrus is anointed because he was chosen by God to free the people and so God says in this passage that he is opening every door and using everything to bring Cyrus to this point to display His Glory in the world, because God will use whatever it takes to bring about the redemption of His Creation, a pagan unbelieving King, light, darkness, or calamity.

Also take note that in all those purposes, God’s Glory is the key to it all. God’s Glory is at the center through every pain, every atrocity, and every evil perpetrated in the world. How does this help us? Well, it can’t – naturally. It really only helps some of us. Those whose very nature has been changed so that it delights in the Glory of God more than the glory of themselves. The natural man cares more about himself than the Glory of God. That is what conversion is. Heaven is an eternal revelation of the infinite Glory of God, being poured into the finite beings. Heaven is not eternal just because that’s how long it is – no, Heaven is eternal because it will take that long to exhaust the storehouses of God’s Glory for us to experience. The problem is thus: when people are born, they care about and enjoy every OTHER thing but the Glory of God. So, conversion is (and must be) the process of changing someone’s very nature so that they now delight in the Glory of God! It is to prepare us for Heaven. What does this have to do with suffering?

Well, two things:

First and foremost, the complete canon of Scripture testifies to the fact that (a) God does ALL things with His Glory foremost in His mind (even love us), (b) He is the one who actively causes suffering, tribulation, and pain in the world, therefore (c) He does it all for His Glory, which the converted soul now delights in, thus the Christian can delight in suffering, trusting that it is revealing God’s Glory in Him/Herself, the World, and History.

[UPDATE TO THIS POST: I should probably give an operational definition to the phrase “Glory of God.” It’s a nice concept, but what does it mean? The best way I have found to define it is thus: The “Glory of God” is the external manifestations of the manifold perfections of God. If that is your passion in this world, then you are converted.]

The second reason this helps the Christian I will discuss at length in my next post, but I assure you, it is Glorious (no pun intended).

I know this is very rough and hard to follow and my case isn’t made very fully. I just knew this was going to be long enough, so I had to try and compact somethings. Really, if anyone wants more Scripture on this, just ask. There is PLENTY to go around. Also feel free to leave a question if you see some philosophical, logical, or exegetical holes in my thinking. I’m sure there is a lot. Please let me know.

I appreciate everyone that reads this blog, and love you so dearly. Until next time.

A Prose of Praise to the One who Saved Me.

/ Paul Burkhart / Leave a comment

Actually, this title is misleading. I know not what will come of this late night inspiration of necessitated typing. A prose? An essay? A treatise, perhaps? Ah, the leading of a Spirit whose word made the world! I sit here at my desk, 1:30am, and I just got home from work – a long 8 1/2 hour closing shift at a casual dining restaurant. I smell like smoke, I feel like grease, and all I can think about is getting all this out into the world for all to read.

God has been so amazing. Ushering me into a time of effectual Grace, intimacy, and stilling, I know not what He’s doing and why. I have to wake Him often from the cabin of the boat of my soul to step out and calm the storms – those torrid uprisings of emotions, pains, doubts, fears – the sea foam blocks my view, the winds push me about, but still, still my God rescues me. He has been drawing me to an intimacy I’ve never known. The intimacy of one alone on a wooded path that curves so sharply at every bend, you never know what’s coming – though you know where it’s going the whole time. I recall the first theological dilemma my developing mind ever tried to grasp and couldn’t. Not the usual trinity, eternity, or who created God, but the verses in 1 John that talk of God being in us, and we in Him at the same time. What? I walk down this path alone but never by myself as an Incarnation walks before me, a Father pushes behind me, and a Comforter stills me.

Ah, stills me.

That stilling of my soul that still stirs me now. Be still, my soul; be still. Ah, to feel the waves and storms turn to crystal waters reflecting the Glory of a God reflected in the sunset reflected in the water reflected in my soul. I love Him so little. I must have more. Daddy, give me more! Give me more! Be still, my soul; be still. Ah. . . to find one’s face upon the cold linoleum of a darkened night pillowed by tears flowing from a familiar hymn that carries with it more weight than it probably should but breaks you nonetheless because of recent reminisces of 2 1/2 months one is trying to forget. To see the God of the universe speak through the shuffle an Apple-gizmo-i-whatever to that damn song once more! to call God to Be Now My Vision and to Give Me Clean Hands as I try not to think of You and Me as My Soul Sings forevermore How Great You Are O God! Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God Almighty; who was and is and is to come!

As every facade by the hands of men comes crashing down about me, I’m quieted by the one support left still standing. A support that stands in silent adoration of the unfaltering faith of a broken woman who laid the foundation right. I stand on the shoulders of a Giant named Mama. Her faithfulness and prayers- the prayers she taught me- like the one when I was as young as five to always pray for my future wife. O my Beloved, how I long for you. So much more than I should. or should I? I don’t quite know. All I do know is that the faith of one woman is what will bring me to you in the glory of a Solomon, strong and worthy of trusting with your heart. Why did this typing turn to this topic? Am I meant to write these words? O God, if not, lead me to stop. Please stop me! Be still, my soul; be still. Daddy, speak through me as you will, as you want, as you must. Do this work. Oh Beloved, this is all for you – wherever, whoever, whenever if ever, you are. I’m meditating in the field. Draw your veil as I approach your beast of burden, led by One who works on my behalf to bring me to you. Why am I writing this? For whom? Me, or another? I don’t know.

Be still, my soul; be still.

The end is here as I prepare to fall more in love with the one whose Bride I am, for my next night of 60 minutes of time I give to His love letter, His praise, to Him. The time He has called me to only in the past few days, to give him 1/24th of my day devoted entirely to Him, everyday, to draw close to Him, or for Him to draw close to me – whichever. I am in Him, and He is in me.

I’m off to have couch time.

Daddy: still my soul; still my soul . . .

Until another restless night of meandering thoughts,

–paul<

Sorry for the L Word

/ Paul Burkhart / Leave a comment

[I wrote this a while ago, so no one get any ideas as to “certain interpretations”]

Is a hidden love a love at all?
For the sake or right, to fake not wrong,
are feelings feeling present pain
not aright, though actions wane?

For the sake of the past
shall the future lie in want-
lie in wait, for the past to become thus?
Become that?

That which aching hearts cry
and lie and die to, for the sake of a
grace yet to be revealed
though seen everyday:

in a glance, a look, a lasting lingering
lasting just too long. Or does it?

A grace found within a face whose frame
changes daily,
whose heart grows only deeper still as

his deep, and His deep, cry out for hers.

A Portrait of the Artist as God

/ Paul Burkhart / Leave a comment

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Summer is over. The autumn rains
Have descended like tears from an invisible god.
I lie on this rock, the ringing of the isle’s name
                                                                    drips off my ear
along with the stampede of water rushing
                                                             rushing through the silence

Clothed with beauty,
                              I began to understand,
The source of Jupiter-Zeus
And begin to form my own mythology
Within the realm of reality

I see the personality of the wind
The fright of the trees
                                the whispers of the water
The art of the sky the song of nature
My altar erected
                        I now understand

The quiver of twigs
                            the movement of fingers
through the hair of some autumn goddess
Golden; beloved and adored above all the others.

Birds in silent homage,
                                  while sabbatical flowers fall.
I smell the smell of my sacrifice
                                               burning at the altar
of my gods and goddesses as I long to merge.
Be made a tree,
                        the breeze
                                        the ground.

To know and experience all that I love
As lovers
              in one embrace
One flesh of flesh
                          Dust of dust.

My heart in one accord, in that which I was made for
Worship of somethings someone anything
                                                             never nothing
In hopes of finding joy.
                                   But,
As I lie in the midst of beauty’s nature’s beauty
I grow sad because:
For although they knew him,
                                          they did not honor him as such
or give thanks to him,
                                but they became futile in their thinking,
and their foolish hearts were darkened.

Claiming to be wise,
                              they became fools,
and exchanged the glory of the immortal for images
resembling mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.

Because they exchanged the truth about him for a lie
and worshiped and served the creation rather than
                                                                          the Creator.

And I am no different.