Twenty Easy Ways to Raise a Pharisee — Number 5

Represent holiness and happiness as opposing (or even alternating) experiences.

"Let it be the principal part of your care and labour in all their education, to make holiness appear to them the most necessary, honourable, gainful, pleasant, delightful, amiable state of life; and to keep them from apprehending it either as needless, dishonourable, hurtful, or uncomfortable. Especially draw them to the love of it, by representing it as lovely."

Richard Baxter, 1615-1691, Baxter’s Practical Works,

The 2001 film, Chocolat, is a fable—almost a parable—of contrasting life perspectives. Set in an old-world, European village, the physical context is as much a participant in the story as the human characters.

A face-off unfolds across the cobblestones of the town square. The towering, grey-stone face of an ancient cathedral forebodingly occupies one side of the courtyard—guarded by the stern-faced, stone visage of a revered, deceased spiritual dignitary.

Opposite this edifice, the neglected shop space of a former pharmacy is pleasantly renovated, by a journey-woman and her young daughter, into a welcoming chocolaterie—a cafe of tantalizing, finely-crafted sweets.

On this stage, a heavy-handed, living spiritual dignitary and a kindly, beautiful, irreligious shopkeeper do battle for the heart of the village. Pleasure, friendship, and tender care—at the chocolaterie—compete with power, guilt, and Lenten-sacrifice—at the church—each seeking to claim the loyalties of and offer hope to needy souls.

The chocolaterie wins.

This tale effectively captures the common perception of countless people—often well-earned and reinforced by the church itself—that the conflict between religious life and "real" life is a contrast between accusation and acceptance, law and love, hypocrisy and honesty, hell and happiness.

To be clear, the gift of saving faith in Jesus is not an earthly path of unmixed spiritual, emotional and physical ease and pleasure. The deceitful prosperity gospel and hollow "happy, happy, happy, all the time" Sunday school ditties have done no service to the credibility of the Gospel and are not the life promised by grace.

Actually, life—after the fall and under the sun—according to Solomon, in the book of Ecclesiastes—can, from one angle, be summed up, in the words of Wesley (from Princess Bride, not the Methodist preacher): "Life is pain your Highness, and anyone who tells you otherwise is selling something."

But that is just half of the message of Ecclesiastes—the Ernest Hemingway, Albert Camus, "life is meaningless" half.

Even in the Old Covenant, waiting-for-the-promise world of Solomon, the often-neglected full message of Ecclesiastes (after his long experimentation and reflection) is: remember God, fear God, obey God, and enjoy life!

Since we are living in the hope of life over the sun, the forceful command of the wisest of the wise is to stop grasping and clinging to things that pass away like a vapor, so that you can finally feel free to enjoy them as gifts from our Lord.

Clinging to earthly pleasures, it turns out, is idolatry—offering as much satisfaction as "chasing the wind." On the flip-side, enjoying your labor, your food, your wine, your strength, and the intoxicating wife of your youth—is the natural fruit of God-centeredness and it is the uninhibited freedom of the one who starts worshipping the Giver instead of the gifts.

Joy—present and future—is the rightful and reasonable possession of the holy and the heaven-bound. Satisfying or sustained joy is not the reward of shortsighted hoarders or impatient hedonists.

The hope and holiness that come from grace provide two extraordinary freedoms:

1.) Freedom from slavery and addiction to the things God made to be gifts not gods, and...

2.) Freedom to enjoy those same things with Godly gratitude and hearty delight. According to the Scriptures and the Gospel, not only can true holiness and lasting happiness coexist—they cannot exist separately!

Pharisees manipulate and mangle God's gifts - either gorging on them in hypocritical self-indulgence or gagging on them in hypercritical self-righteousness. Those who love grace, enjoy good things, because they love their extravagantly-generous Lord more than anything else.

The eternal happiness of God and the stunning discovery that God's passion is to be known for boundless grace and generosity are a perfect recipe for our stalwart joy.

Freed prisoners dance. Redeemed slaves sing. Pardoned felons clap and shout. Cured terminals laugh and cry and get downright giddy with the breathless recovery of a hope that had been staggered. We are all of these! And—next—a permanent, brilliantly perfect tomorrow awaits us.

Children of God, loved by Christ, we are the only ones with countless reasons to live and laugh and love and learn, to play and eat and tease and cheer, and to pour out our resources with abandon, so that others might be invited and welcomed to the celebration.

In the parable of the rich fool, in Luke 12, the man with extra large crops designs a plan to hide, hoard, and hold on to this unexpected windfall—to secure a hope of his own making. I doubt that his sin was, as many seem to think—his plan to eat, drink and be merry (that’s the actual command of Deuteronomy 14)—but, rather, that his plan was to carry out this celebration by himself, on his own terms, and on the basis of his self-sufficient security—without the nasty uncertainties of faith or the rich-heartedness of gratitude.

Redeemed fools, with extra large crops, don't build bigger barns. They build bigger banquet halls, so that they can eat, drink and be merry with thanksgiving, with announcements of God's goodness, and in fellowship with any friend, foe, fatherless or friendless fellow-fool they can get in the door.

Children who are raised by these kind of redeemed fools learn what it is like, passionately to love God, expectantly to trust His provision, constantly to long for more and more of His flowing generosity, and uninhibitedly to share the windfall with everyone in sight.

And they might just stop by the chocolaterie on the way home from church.

* * *

We would love for you to listen to this week’s companion podcast episode: “The Holiness of Happy Lovers” at the link below! (Due to be posted early this week.)

This series of blogposts is being posted in conjunction with Season 2 of the “No Mere Mortals” podcast (this link is to the Apple podcast app, but NMM is also available at Spotify and in other podcast apps). Jump on over to the podcast to listen to Lisa and my conversations on grace-rooted, joy-shaped, self-righteousness-suffocating home life and relationships!

Track along with all that we are doing here at Enjoying Grace Story Co. at Don’s Instagram

Twenty Easy Ways to Raise a Pharisee — Number 4

Display a Passionless Marriage

Nothing will have a greater human impact on the heart-attraction of our children toward God, His goodness, and His grace than the degree to which our lives as couples in Christian homes reflect (as designed) the beauty of God and the bountiful kindness of His grace in Jesus.

Husbands and wives in union, are described as nothing less than 1. His self-portrait—His image displayed, and 2. the picture (on purpose from the beginning of time) to illustrate the grace of Christ and His all-giving love for His people

If we are a married, it is not just okay to be happy, faithful, romantic lovers—it is the highest calling of our lives as God’s children. 

If in this intimate companionship—played out before the eyes of our next generation—there is evident joy, bonded-love, attentive care, enduring satisfaction and contentment (or at least the whole-hearted, single-minded pursuit of these, through thick and thin—even when there is rebuilding or repair to be done); then the likelihood of our son or our daughter anticipating joy in the Lord and holding the course on the journey of grace is richly magnified.

Let me ask a common question, from a fresh angle.

What moral short-coming or offense most distresses the heart of God—most jams a wrench in the gears of His splendid design for intimate relationship? Nominations are offered quickly and frequently in the Worst-Immorality category, and the most identifiable pattern in theses nominations is that they are the offenses common in the surrounding population. They are the sins that others do.

Ranking sins has long been a popular hobby in religious communities. Far beyond the Roman Catholic doctrines of cardinal and venial sins, there flows a wide and popular tradition (in an unbroken succession from the Pharisees to the modern Evangelical) of classifying and demonizing particularly heinous transgressions…that others do.

Let me be clear: sin can (I believe, in a sense) be “ranked” and some offenses against God's design and desire are of greater grief or consequence to His heart. The surprise lies in what makes some sins more troubling than others—and who is most at risk.

The Scriptures offer at least two guidelines for understanding the character and consequence of sin.

First, sins are equal.

Every sin breaks the whole law of God (James 2:10-11), and requires the full benefit of God’s forgiveness and grace to be accounted for and vanquished. In other words, the essential character of every sin is the same; and the general effect of every sin is separation and broken relationship with our good and glorious Maker.

A homosexual swinger (no matter how human religion likes to label what is extra-offensive) is not more morally bankrupt or in greater spiritual peril than a haughty salesman or an attention-grabbing preacher. 

All need to be arrested by the abundant mercy of God and to embrace the Savior in repentance and faith. 

We must not rank the character of sins (or the depth of needed grace) as long as it is true that rejoicing in the harm of someone who has hurt us equally alienates us from the glad fellowship of God…as murder.  This is the helpful message of the Sermon on the Mount. We all need the same grace and that grace is abundantly offered.

Second, sins are different.

The judgment and consequence of sin, on the other hand, is in proportion to the knowledge of the Savior's truth and grace that is disregarded in running after ruinous things.

Call it the Capernaum-principle. Jesus warned that city—where He had spent so much time, offered such caring and personal instruction, and performed so many stunning miracles—that they in their rejection would bear a harsher judgment on the final day than Tyre and Sidon. Their heightened peril arose because—although their outward conduct appeared less deplorable than that of these scandalous Old Testament cities—they were rejecting God in the face of an outpouring of gracious opportunity and such generous knowledge of Christ and His words and ways (Luke 10:13-16).

The difference between sins is not between different sins but between the same sins in the context of different degrees of knowledge and grace.

With those thoughts in view: what is the most heartbreaking and troubling form of immorality common in the world today? What moral failure, above all others, dismays God's heart? I believe, with full conviction, that the grieving answer is this:

Passionless Christian marriage.

We who love Jesus and have experienced His grace have such a breath-taking opportunity and honor. Our lives and our words are God’s reputation in the world. Especially at home.

And He leans toward us in this, with boundless eagerness and abundant grace.

Our children and the watching world will interpret the authenticity and attractiveness of our faith, according to how we live and love and laugh at home, more than by any other measure or test.

And that is just how God intended.

The bond of love and pleasure between a husband and a wife—experienced through the genius of equally-significant, perfectly-fitted, deeply-distinctive roles—has been crafted by our happy God to exhibit nothing less than the exuberant intimacy of the Trinity and the glorious reality of the love of Jesus for the Church—His treasured bride.

The splendors of God's eternal fellowship are nowhere more vitally and vividly intended to be on display than in Christian marriage.

The wonders of the Savior's redeeming grace, dying love, and sheer delight in pursuing and perfecting His bride is what marriage was intended to illustrate from the beginning. This was always true but Paul unveiled this history-long mystery in Ephesians 5:22-33.

The person of God and the beauty and the bounty of Christ are to be portrayed in every facet of both the public devotion and the private delights of a husband and wife.

With difficulty will a son or a daughter of Christian parents come to treasure the Savior's matchless devotion, where there is small evidence of Dad and Mom's mutual affection.

If we want to raise Pharisees—going through the form and function of Christian habit, without a hunger for Christ's heart—then we need do little more than this: go through the motions of marriage with a mild delight and a moderate devotion. Or less.

Remember what makes some sin more serious than other sin (even when it is the same sin): the measure of truth and grace available.

This is why I am far less troubled by the absence of prayer in public schools than I am by the absence of spiritual fervor in Christian homes. The corruption of political leadership in our culture will ultimately damage far fewer souls than the collapse of principled leadership in the church. Homosexual marriages in the world are less troubling to God than half-hearted marriages within His family.

Selah.

You see, God's most sober judgments—and most serious joys—begin in the house of God and in the homes of His people. (1 Peter 4:17)

Our son desires and desperately needs our radiant affection—toward each other, that is—before, and even more than, toward him!

A daughter is impoverished, who is doted on by a father and mother who are remote from each other. Her conception of God and her wonder at the saving mercy of Jesus is devastatingly diminished.

Children’s desire for our Savior's grace will always be enlarged by growing delight on parents' faces. 

* * *

We would love for you to listen to this week’s companion podcast episode: “Intoxicating Romance” at the link below! (Due to be posted early this week.)

This series of blogposts are being posted in conjunction with Season 2 of the “No Mere Mortals” podcast (this link is to the Apple podcast app, but NMM is also available at Spotify and in other podcast apps). Jump on over to the podcast to listen to Lisa and my conversations on grace-rooted, joy-shaped, self-righteousness-suffocating home life and relationships!

Track along with all that we are doing here at Enjoying Grace Story Co. at Don’s Instagram

Elasticity

Where Hearty Thinking, Honesty & Humility Meet

The Truth is Out There (and it's one scrappy son-of-a-gun).

So the buildings that survive an earthquake are not the ones that are immovable, but the ones that flex on a firm foundation.

Glass is harder than rubber, but not stronger.

Christian belief seems to me to have become brittle—increasingly hard and unbending, but subject to cracking or even shattering when pressure is applied.

Recent centuries have delivered an unmistakeable pummeling to a Biblical and Christian worldview. I am an amateur historian, at best, but I don't believe that there has ever previously been a one-two punch to the jaw of the Faith quite like the left hook of Darwinian and the right uppercut of Freudian redefinitions of what it is to be human.

Naturalism declares that we are in a closed system that excludes the existence - or at least the engagement - of the supernatural. The Naturalistic thinking that both produced and proceeded from Darwinian theories on where we came from and Freudian theories on who (or what) we are spawned a broad and brazen frontal assault on Biblical authority, gospel propositions about sin and salvation, and any real experience of the eternal, the transcendent, the miraculous, or anything that did not fit in the quickly constricting and pronouncedly narrow-minded box of "enlightenment" rationalism.

Others could survey these historic, philosophical, and theological dynamics better than I am able; but I do have a thought about the inclination of Christian thought and theology that emerged from the spiritual blitzkrieg of those times.

In large part, through the assault, Christian dogmatism increased and Christian thought diminished. I do not doubt the heart passion and sincere piety of the believers who fought through that storm; but when the winds subsided and the downed trees were cleaned up the Faith appeared to be standing - but on a whole new playing field (to keep mixing metaphors).

Darwin and Freud remained identified enemies, but Kant and Hegel (a more subtle and insidious pair) had been unwittingly absorbed as friends and applied to redefine the categories of life and thought.

There was much honor and faithfulness among the fundamentalists of the early 20th century (a substantially different title, crowd, and mindset than "fundamentalists" of recent times) and there were remarkable exceptions to my overly-simplistic evaluation of them (men like J. Gresham Machen come to mind).

But what seems a fair and apparent observation is that Christian thought emerged from the Great Storm of naturalism, higher-criticism, and rationalism having accepted submission to a new set of rules.

The supernatural and the natural, the phenomenal and the noumenal, faith and reason - these all had been pried apart and relegated to separate spheres of life and reality. The tragic essence of much 20th century, conservative theology was, as a result, "Let the rationalists and the naturalists have reason - we are claiming faith." These two, God-crafted partners—faith and reason—were declared alien to one another, and a Babel-like redefinition of language made it nonsensical for them to try to be on speaking terms.

Faith and reason would be forced to part ways as perplexed strangers, and it would take quite some time to reintroduce them to one another.

Reacquainting these two is a project still in process. Progress has been made in recent decades. Thoughtful men and women of both belief and brain have arisen to offer theological faithfulness, careful thought, apologetic skill, and philosophical and even scientific counterpoint to "enlightenment" dogmatics - but there remain concerning remnants of concessions made in earlier days.

For example (rather randomly and quickly assembled):

1. We believe more things, more dogmatically, with less thought and less ability to explain or defend them.

2. Generation after generation we appear to be re-experiencing a mass exodus of "the next generation" from the community of faith, as most Christian-trained young people are left to perceive a need to choose between faith and reason/scholarship/science—left also to choose between legalism (rules without reasons) and apparent liberty (rationalism without rules). A great many churched young people, understandably, barely flinch before stepping over that threshold.

3. Our Christian witness has become more combative and less conversational. We assume that the Babel-like confusion of languages between faith and reason was irreversible and that we must run over the questions and concerns of a non-believer with emphatic, inflexible declarations on nearly every point of discussion. We assume that saying "I don't know" reveals weakness, so we always "know." We insist that it will all make sense if they would just believe it, rather than urging them to consider if previously unfamiliar beliefs might make considerably more sense than the ones they have been working with up until now.

4. Christian unity seems unattainable. When faith and reason got divorced, all beliefs became equal. Confining ourselves to the faith domain not only alienated us from reason, it erased reasonable distinctions in dogmatism. Believing in justification by faith, scriptural authority, a particular method of baptism, a certain structure for church life, a specific millennial theory, proper dress, music style, or biblical translation for a church service, etc. etc. - are all equals in the eyes of subjective, self-authenticated faith. They are all authorized by the same internal intuition and (too often) defended with the same unbending fervor. When faith and reason are fittingly wedded, we can grow toward a sense of proportion, without shame over honest questions, measured dogmatism, and a humble orthodoxy. This also adds to our credibility when we stand firm on the big stuff.

5. Christians have largely become, in the analogy of Dr. Michael Bauman, Fortress Theologians instead of Pilgrim Theologians. We often communicate and function as though we possess the Truth, rather than pursue it. And since we often have a latent distrust of reason - left over from when it was declared our enemy - we seem to believe that the Truth is vulnerable and needs our protection. We put the Truth in a locked vault somewhere deep inside a fortress that we have erected, in layers, around the Truth. We then (immovably and, therefore, immaturely)—stridently fight for a treasure that we have treated as though it is fragile.

We think the Truth vulnerable because we acquired it by weak and self-sufficient means. Let it out into the light of day! The truth is quite resilient. It smiles at the storms and arrows and bombings that come its way. It is trustworthy enough to talk about and test, and it is tough enough to take on the assaults of error, enemies, or even the sincere wrong-thinking of others or ourselves. Pilgrim theologians love the truth they have and eagerly journey toward the treasure of gaining more. It's a messier way of life than life in the fortress, but it allows our ideas to increasingly align with the Truth and our faith to effectively mean something.

By the way, Naturalism and modernism have taken their own bruises as well through the decades. Modernists discovered that they couldn't comfortably live without a soul - so they became what we have labeled (for a while at least) post-modernists. Having "rediscovered their spirits," most still linger in the schizophrenic existence of living in a tension of the spiritual and the sensible, that were never meant to be at odds in the first place.

Anyway - just some nagging, quickly-assembled, over-simplified thoughts as I remember that the buildings that don't fall down in earthquakes are built on a firm foundation and designed to flex.

* * *

This is a bonus post, woven in with the “Twenty Easy Ways to Raise a Pharisee” series of blogposts that are being posted here in conjunction with Season 2 of the “No Mere Mortals” podcast (this link is to the Apple podcast app, but NMM is also available at Spotify and in other podcast apps).

We would invite you to jump over and listen in on the weekly podcast, but we would also suggest (related to this post) that you go back to Season 1 of the podcast and listen to Episode 11—”On Thinking.”

Track along with all that we are doing here at Enjoying Grace Story Co. at Don’s Instagram.

Twenty Easy Ways to Raise a Pharisee — Number 3

Discipline them before you delight in them.

“Don't give me money, Mr. Boffin, I won't have money. Keep it away from me, and only let me speak to good little Pa, and lay my head upon his shoulder, and tell him all my griefs. Nobody else can understand me, nobody else can comfort me, nobody else knows how unworthy I am, and yet can love me like a little child. I am better with Pa than any one--more innocent, more sorry, more glad!"

Charles Dickens, Our Mutual Friend

The less we laugh with our children, the less they will benefit from any of our instruction, correction, or discipline.

The usefulness of our correction in their lives will never exceed the depth, comfort, and constancy of our whole-hearted connection with them…and them with us.

Do not misunderstand me. Loving correction and gracious discipline is a priceless gift to a child. No greater unkindness is done to any young one than to "protect" him or her from caring, consistent correction. 

So I will say, again - the less we laugh with our children, the less they will benefit from our training.

Here's my earnest proposition for your consideration:

Our correction or discipline of our children is only as effective as the environment of joy it interrupts.

Too many parents are laboring to discipline their children into children they can (eventually) enjoy. They rightly assume—affirmed by the wise proverbs of Solomon and the general observation of life—that an untrained child will bring little pleasure to a father and mother - or anyone else in the general vicinity. 

They are right.

Misapplied, this wise observation can hazardously reverse the right order of pleasure and punishment. Deep joy in our children must be plainly evident before judicious discipline of our children can produce any happy results. 

We must delight in our children before we discipline them and, again, our discipline will—plainly and simply—be effective in direct proportion to the delight it interrupts!

Disciplinary failures, both of abuse and avoidance, are rooted in the exact same misconception about what correction is. 

Here is the logic of the issue.

Most parents training their kids understand that there is a conduct/consequence connection that they are seeking to weave into their daughter’s or son’s discernment. Therefore, they rightly (in one sense) assume that the greater the discomfort of the correction, the greater the effect will be on the child's conduct. 

The great trouble (and potential, enormous harm) comes in misunderstanding what is the true source of loving, effective discomfort.

If we assume that physical, verbal, or emotional punishment is the primary, effective “discomfort" of discipline, then we are certain to be driven to one of two dangerous, heartbreaking, and fully unfruitful patterns of correction—even if they seem like opposites.

On the one hand, some—wrongly believing that the punishment (of whatever type) is the discomfort reinforcing the correction—will inflict serious wounds, of many kinds, upon their—seeking to make their discipline more effective through intensity. 

This is horrifying and so many have experienced it.

On the other hand, others—with a right and healthy loathing for severity—will neglect consistent discipline of any kind. The errors and harms of both abuse and avoidance arise from the same false assumption.

Listen—any specific application of correction is intended to awaken and alert a child to the heart-breaking, harmful, impoverishing consequences of destructive or hurtful behavior; but the correction itself is not supposed to be the consequence of misbehavior.

Stay with me here.

If my son does not know, without question, that I both permanently love him and immeasurably enjoy him and want his joy, then effective discipline is simply impossible. Only in the context of my ordinary, predictable, growing, and fully-felt delight in him, will the sting of any correction get to the heart of the good we want for him and the danger of foolish behavior.

Lovingly applied, correction does not primarily draw my daughter's attention to the brief discomfort—it draws her attention to an interrupted delight. The pain of that brief loss, and, therefore, the effectiveness of the correction, is measured by the extent of normal pleasure that my kids enjoy in the days of life spent with me.

How much more true, even, is this whole principle, as we move on to guide, challenge, gracefully correct, and urge maturity and vision into our older children? 

If the harder conversations, even corrections, are not interrupting eager-conversation, honest-about-ourselves-conversation, knowing-them conversation, exploring-everything conversation, curious- and questioning-conversation, silly-conversation, intimate-conversation, always-conversation—then the fruitful effect of the good (but challenging) corrective conversations will lay cold on the heart—more likely to stir up distance and resistance and withdrawal, than responsive, appreciative growth.

If the experience of discipline for our children is more an addition of emotional or physical discomfort than it is a brief loss of familiar delight, then our training is unlikely plant in them a hopeful, expectant vision of their future or stir them to love the happy kindness of God’s grace. 

It’s far more likely that the painful intrusion will incline them toward resentment and rejection or perhaps toward habits of approval-seeking through legalism and external obedience. 

Pharisees live to avoid God's punishment more than they long for the embrace of His wholehearted pleasure. 

The child who is trained to earn his parents joy through obedience is well equipped for skilled religion (or rebellion) and is likely to be suspicious (at best) about the offer of God's free, affectionate, and extravagant grace.

From my first amazed tears in the delivery room, alongside each accomplishment or heartbreak or even stumble—until this very hour—am I living and laughing and lingering and looking and learning—with my son or daughter—in a way that shouts to them that it is too good to be true that I get to have each one of them be part of my life? 

For life!

Do I linger at the door, so disappointed to leave the delightful commotion of home; or do I linger at the office, more than content to limit my participation in the treasures and tangles that may await me when I return? 

Do we anticipate with more pleasure the last day of the school year when our kids will start spending their days at home with us or the last day of summer break when the kids will head back to school? 

Our honest answers to these questions have more impact on the effectiveness of our training and nurturing of our children than we would ever imagine.

The more we laugh with our children, the more they will benefit from our correction. The more we enjoy our children, the less severe—and more effective—our discipline will be. 

Because, again, the effect of our correction is measured directly by the experience of joy that it interrupts.

Every dad and mom should go out on dates, and, at the same time, we should nearly have to be told to do so. And when we do enjoy a night out, the kids should see our eagerness to return to them, more than they sensed our relief on the way out the door.

* * *

We would love for you to listen to this week’s companion podcast episode: “Delight-based Parenting” at the link below!

This series of blogposts are being posted in conjunction with Season 2 of the “No Mere Mortals” podcast (this link is to the Apple podcast app, but NMM is also available at Spotify and in other podcast apps). Jump on over to the podcast to listen to Lisa and my conversations on grace-rooted, joy-shaped, self-righteousness-suffocating home life and relationships!

Track along with all that we are doing here at Enjoying Grace Story Co. at Don’s Instagram

Twenty Easy Ways to Raise a Pharisee — Number 2

Teach them that desires are their spiritual enemies.

“I know a planet where there is a certain red-faced gentleman. He has never smelled a flower. He has never looked at a star. He has never loved anyone. He has never done anything in his life but add up figures. And all day he says over and over, just like you: ‘I am busy with matters of consequence!’ And that makes him swell up with pride. But he is not a man -- he is a mushroom!”

“As for me,” said the little prince to himself, “if I had fifty-three minutes to spend as I liked, I should walk at my leisure toward a spring of fresh water.”

Antoine de Saint-Exupery, The Little Prince

One day Jacob was cooking a stew.

Esau came in from the field starved and said to Jacob,

"Give me some of that red stew—I’m starved!"

Jacob said, "Make me a trade: my stew for your rights as the firstborn."

Esau said, "I'm starving! What good is a birthright if I'm dead?"

That's how Esau shrugged off his rights and privileges as the firstborn.

(Genesis 25:29-34)

A number of times in the Gospels, in various ways, the Savior simply asked:

"What do you want?"

And when folks told Him their desires, He never (never.) told them to want less.

"Do not lay up for yourselves treasure on earth,” any disciplined monk or Pharisee might have agreed, "where moth and rust corrupt and thieves break in and steal."

"But," Jesus added, "lay up for yourselves treasure in heaven, where neither moth nor rust corrupt and thieves don't break in and steal."

Hunger intensely for the best things and refuse to let the brief gratification of lesser things rob you of the great stuff.

And if breathtaking treasure is available, abandon your trash—with light-hearted and giddy ease—to get your hands on potent, permanent wealth.

Jesus said:

"The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and hid; and for joy over it he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field." — Matthew 13:44

All Gospel changes in our lives are treasure transactions—glad, easy decisions that make us chuckle and say, "My Ford Focus for your Lamborghini—I don't know...I'll have to think long and hard about sacrificing my Focus!"

There are no exceptions—not one time—where our Lord says, "I want you do such and such, even though in the long run you will lose something good or be less happy.

Never. Not once. No exceptions to this extravagant rule.

We've really messed this one up. I'm tempted to use stronger language.

For centuries the world has assumed that following our faith is a fool's errand designed for masochists and self-abasing hermit-monks. Why wouldn't they, given the wonderful mix of martyrdom and moral superiority that marks so much of the "Christian" message and method before a watching world?

C.S. Lewis offers a strong antidote to this wretched thinking (he made a habit of this):

"Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because we cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased."

We are far too easily pleased?

This violently shakes the etch-a-sketch of what nearly everybody assumes is the Christian message and requirement. 

Not having strong enough desires is thwarting faithfulness and diminishing spiritual progress in our lives.

Stifle desire or tolerate small, easily-satisfied desires and you will find yourself (and your son or daughter) easy targets for wasted lives of sinful indulgence or indifference.

Enlarge your desires and demand that your joys be both sustained and satisfying and you will find no alternative but to run hard after the King of grace and His gifts.

If you want to groom your heart or your children into self-satisfied, tragically-impoverished Pharisees:

1. Warn them of the danger of wanting too much pleasure.

2. Teach them to sacrifice for God

These are fertile soil for both self-destructive rebellion and self-sufficient religion - both of which are deadly.

Pharisees, legalists, and religious people of all sorts are preoccupied with what God requires and expects of us instead of what God longs to give us. They assume that God needs something from us, rather than that we desperately and hungrily need everything from Him. They think that God is more honored by our hard work than by our hunger for Him. They function on the assumption that God is a kill-joy and that He wants us to avoid punishment by learning to abandon pleasure.

Rebels smell these same slanders against God's extravagant grace and simply say, "Not interested."

And why should they be?

Even our everyday parental instructions toward wisdom and righteousness will crush and crumble if they are rooted more in sin-management and behavior modification than they are in vision-casting and pleasure-preservation.

Does your daughter crave popularity and get easily drawn into vanity (or self-pity)? Don't tell her that acceptance and beauty don't matter. Share with her the treasure of being loved and embraced by God and point her to the beauty that the Savior is crafting in her for a future unveiling. Stir in her a desire for deep-connection-marriage and home, with those who treasure her every look and thought. Compare cheap gawking to eternal admiration and life-long love.

Is your son struggling with lust? Don't tell him to stop longing. Give him something worth longing for! Magnify the wonders of sexual intimacy and the delights of God's gift of marriage. Envision in him a future worth wanting and guarding and investing in—then enjoy your wife or husband deeply in his view (or your words won't ring true).

If we portray faith and faithfulness more like monastic vows of self-flagellation than magnificently rewarding investment, our children will choose alternatives. 

Which of these propels the soul toward grace? And which of these magnify the gladness and generosity and the glory of God?

Teach your sons and daughters the insanity of Esau.

Don't start by getting all spiritual-sounding and telling them how sinful and ungodly he was. (Though true.) Get right to the point and tell them that he was an idiot, a moron, a joy-crushing fool. He gave up the wealth, honor, privileges, and future of an ancient first-born son, so that he wouldn't have to be briefly hungry and wait a few minutes for dinner. His short-sightedness destroyed him quicker than his appetite.

Eager, hearty desires drive us to the grace and good promises of God. Plead for the Lord to plant enormous, irrepressible desires in you and your children that can't easily be satisfied!

A hunger for joy and vigorous desires propel growth—healthy and holy change—in our lives. (More on this in these coming Twenty Ways posts.)

This is why Moses could follow God and fulfill his calling, “choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin, esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than all the treasures in Egypt; for he looked to the reward.”

Jesus Himself “endured the cross, disregarding the shame, for the joy that was set before Him.”

With this paradigm-shift out on the table, how do we experience a thriving life?.

Please tag along for the coming posts and No Mere Mortals podcasts, as we unpack grace-rooted, treasure-motivated life-training and transformation for our lives and the lives of our children.

Next week: 

If you want to raise a Pharisee: 

Number 3 — Discipline them before you delight in them

With a NMM podcast episode exploring the Celebration, Connection, Correction, Conversation Sequence.

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This series of blogposts are being posted in conjunction with Season 2 of the “No Mere Mortals” podcast (this link is to the Apple podcast app, but NMM is also available at Spotify and in other podcast apps). Jump on over to the podcast to listen to Lisa and my conversations on grace-rooted, joy-shaped, self-righteousness-suffocating home life and relationships!

Track along with all that we are doing here at Enjoying Grace Story Co. at Don’s Instagram.

Twenty Easy Ways to Raise a Pharisee — A Clarifying Interlude

Graceless religion and fearless rebellion are two fruits of the same Pharisaical root.

Let me back up for a minute.

I would completely understand if our introduction to our No Mere Mortals, Season 2 and this Twenty Easy Ways to Raise a Pharisee blog series seems irrelevant to your personal situation—in a couple of possible ways:

1. At a glance, it could appear to be primarily for parents. This is not so. We are using the topic of “raising” or nurturing young people because it is an ideal illustration of how all of us will best see and experience the grace, goodness, and hope of God. These podcast and blog series are visions of grace-for-all-of-life, not just for grace-based parenting.

2. I also imagine some of you, on first impression, concluding that these resources are not relevant to you, because you, your children, or others you know are in no danger of becoming Pharisees at all. High-performance self-righteousness, you may be saying, is nowhere in sight—but talk to me about indifference, rebellion, abandonment of faith! 

I get it.

I am plainly on the record here that Pharisaism and self-sufficient (spiritual or secular) religion are lethal poisons to be feared with a life-or-death desperation and (if they are in our system already) immediately lanced and sucked out of our flesh, like a classic-movie rattlesnake bite. 

This unmixed-grace proposition will continue—relentlessly and emphatically—to be our accent.

But…

I fully see how both my ironic 20 Ways title and individual points could lead folks to believe that this message of radical, unmixed grace is primarily useful for guarding against self-righteousness and Pharisaical over-confidence.

We highlight this application of the truth because there is a far greater need to offer true grace to Christianized young people than most seem to realize.

But (I don’t deny)…

Simple, self-centered unbelief and rebellion remains as great a threat (even if a more helpfully obvious threat) to lives and souls.

Here's the thing.

I am passionately accenting the danger of “religion” because it is both deadly and frequently not talked about; but the antidote to both lifeless religion and faithless rebellion is identical!

The warm opportunities of these Twenty Ways are what will help unmask a Pharisee.

But…  

They are also exactly what will guard our children’s hearts (and our own) against rebellion. Only the free gift of grace and a magnified view of true treasure will prevent minds and hearts from rejecting permanent goodness for temporary trash. 

Pharisaism, legalism, false expectations, hypocrisy, performance-based affection or acceptance—if they mark our lives (or parenting) will irresistibly (but for the Lord’s kind intervention) nurture either Pharisaical religion or fleshly rebellion. 

The one child (or inquiring soul) under our care will respond to Pharisaical expectations with fearful compliance, while another responds to the same with frustrated abandonment.

When the pure, radical generosity and affection of the Gospel of grace is lost (or even mixed with fleshly duty and human expectations) it will actively populate two crowds: 

1.) Honorably intended and/or nervous and fearful performers, and 

2.) Bold and/or brow-beaten indulgers. 

The exasperating (and unachievable) demands of performance, appearances, law-keeping, and sacrifice—as a way of salvation—leave no other rational options:

Try desperately to earn your way and impresss or “give up” and fall back on the temporary and far easier “enjoyment” of the world and its ways.   

So here is my personal request.

Please track along with the grace-loving passion of the “Twenty Easy Ways to Raise a Pharisee” posts, no matter which natural danger appears to tempt your soul or the souls of those around you. 

The breathtaking, scandalous, extravagantly-generous good news of Jesus Christ is the single, unstoppable cure to every type of spiritual sickness!

The principles and pleasures celebrated in this series can inject hope and happy expectation into your life and the lives of those around you—whether you are just setting out on the journey or are far down the path, walking with weary and wounded feet.

* * *

Now back to our regularly scheduled programming. :) 

We invite you to listen to Episode 1 of Season 2 of our No Mere Mortals podcast (available now). Lisa and I talk about the goodness of God and the comforts of His love and grace for our lives and our homes..

Our first, monthly 2021 Maker’s Hollow Conversation with Kristen Morris at “Good Things Run Wild” will land in your podcast app or Spotify early this coming week. We will be talking about Rest in Restless Times, when so many circumstances, expectations, and misunderstandings can rob us of our peace and make it hard to breathe.

Twenty Easy Ways to Raise a Pharisee — Number 1

Tell them that God wants them to be good instead of that God wants to be good to them.

"Inconceivable!”

[pause]

"You keep using that word. 

I do not think it means what you think it means."

Inigo Montoya, The Princess Bride 

The young man ran to Jesus, knelt before Him, and pleaded, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

A better beginning would be hard to conceive.

Jesus replied, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.” (Mark 10:17+18)

Whoa.

The man runs to Jesus, bows before Him, and declares the “goodness” of the Master—and the Savior rebuffs him—challenging him for saying the truest thing he could ever have said.

That this exchange exists in the Gospels explains why we stumble over, bumble through, and—if God is extra-kind—are humbled by our use of the vague, vital word: good.

We tell our children, “Be good.” We tell them that they can be good if they try hard enough. We then tell them that Jesus died because we cannot be good, and His plan worked because He is the only one who is good. Then they hear us cheering “Good boy!” when the puppy goes potty on the Sunday Classifieds instead of the study carpet. There are “good guys” and “bad guys,” even though it is obvious that the good guys are sometimes bad and the bad guys can come through in a pinch and do something unexpectedly “good.” 

Good grief!

Could we blame our daughters or sons (should we not, in fact, admire them) if one day they look up in perplexity and—like Inigo Montoya—say, “You keep using that word. I don’t think it means what you think it means.”

That this encounter between Jesus and the rich, young ruler is recorded in the Gospels also demands that we get a relentless grip on the eternal peril of muddying the nature of true goodness—if we wish not to be adversaries of the Gospel and of God.

Widespread, familiar Christian teaching and practice (It has often been true…times change less than we think) is frequently an amalgamation of ideas, perceptions, and influences—a virtual gumbo of notions. 

We are products—many of us—more of western civilization, gnostic mysticism, and loosely gathered traditional habits than we are of well-thought, historic Christianity. 

The highly unsettling good news of the grace of God through Jesus was a radical disruption to all of the familiar threads of social, philosophical, and religious thought—a scandal, Paul says, to the Jews and cockamamie nonsense to the orderly-thinking Greeks.

And, in general, it is an insult to us all. Horrible for our self-esteem and disrespectful to the upwardly-mobile, go-getter type.

The flesh craves karma: 

Do better, gain reward.

The desperate, observant soul (and anyone with a smidgen of self-knowledge) pleads for grace: 

Be given everything, do better.

The Pharisee, outside the temple in Luke 18, flamboyantly complimented God that he was blessed to be better than other people.

The ne’er-do-well scoundrel beside him cried out, “God be merciful to me!”

Jesus is not ambiguous about which one went away redeemed.

In our age of moral relativism and logical chaos, it is understandable that even Christians speak with a renewed admiration of civility, natural law, ethics, virtues, etc.. These are concepts well-grounded in western civilization—rooted significantly in Plato, Aristotle, and their buddies. 

That whole crowd could have happily hung out at the pub with folks from every works- or merit-based religion, whether sacred or secular (and believe me, the secular is as religious, performance-based, and self-righteous as any fundamentalist). 

In God’s creational order and by His common grace, these virtue-principles offer a measure of truth and wisdom; but as a path to hope and freedom, they are not your friends.

Aristotle and the rich, young ruler would have been soul-mates. The elder prodigal son, Pharisees of every age, and adherents to the entire pantheon of world religions could all join comfortably in their good-deeds club, as well.

Aristotle explained, “virtues we acquire by first exercising them, as in the case of other arts. . . .men come to be builders, for instance, by building, and harp players, by playing the harp. In the same way, by doing just acts we come to be just; by doing self-controlled acts, we come to be self controlled.”

The anti-gospel of Jesus.

Virtue and pragmatic ethics outwardly manage life better than lawlessness and self-indulgence. It’s true. They don’t get us any closer to new life and hope.

I understand why the attempted revival in recent decades of “Judeo-Christian” values is cheered by Christians and championed by well-meaning men like Bill Bennett; but note his description of the governing principle of his Book of Virtues:

“As Aristotle pointed out. . . We learn to order our souls the same way we learn to do math problems or play baseball well – through practice.”

Pharisees would concur.

Exertive human effort to discipline stronger virtues into our children or to under-gird our families with time-tested, “traditional values”—much like gospel-neutral prayers in the public schools or Ten Commandments carved on public buildings—are (swallow hard) no friend of the grace.

On the contrary, if we learn any thing from the Great Physician, the Pharisees, and eager seekers like the young man of Mark 10:17-18, it is this: the more virtuous a person or a people appear to be, apart from Christ, the more virtuously and violently resistant they will be to the Gospel of Christ.

The young ruler struck the right physical pose, asked for the right thing, and spoke rightly about the Lord—but the Savior perceived that his main goal was to certify his own goodness, not to cry out for the goodness and mercy of the King of Grace.

God doesn’t want us to be good for Him. He wants to be good to us. He wants us to do anything we want and to want beautiful and lovely things. The one who tastes, embraces, and then incurably craves more of the goodness and generosity of God will grow to flourish in every good thing. It is treasure that trains us, not restriction or fear or noble thoughts. We run after—without needing to be told—what we most believe to be of greatest value and delight.

So, the virtue, the wisdom, the behavior will come; but never safely if we begin with them.

Begin with the One Who never stops doing good to His people with all of His heart and with all of His soul (Jeremiah 32:38-41) and does not dwell in temples made with hands, as though He needs anything from us. (Acts 7:48).

God does not need us. He wants us.

He does not need us to do anything. We need Him to do everything…and then He does even more.

Jesus wants to be good to our children. He wants, in a flood of generosity, to give them an alien goodness, to which they contribute nothing, but by which they obtain spectacular, unfading life and the kind of treasure on God’s eternal New Earth, that never rots or rusts and no thief can steal.

If we are kind to our kids and our neighbors, we will help them learn that they are not good—and that catching on to this is very good.

We will point them—like Christ did—to God’s matchless goodness; and we will topple—like Christ did—their dangerous charades of personal virtue. 

Yes, the Lord also wants our children (and us) to be and do good; but—like the new birth—the new behavior of a Christian is a gift. . . from God to us—not us to God! 

Just as no good works, no self-worth—no cash, check or money-order—even contributes to our salvation; so also nothing but His extravagant generosity—drawing us into a Father’s embrace and flourishing us in His grace—will gradually (and then gloriously) reveal us to be the splendid and—yes—good sons and daughters of the King, that He has happily redeemed us all to be!

* * *

This series of blogposts are being posted in conjunction with Season 2 of the “No Mere Mortals” podcast (this link is to the Apple podcast app, but NMM is also available at Spotify and in other podcast apps). Jump on over to the podcast to listen to Lisa and my conversations on grace-rooted, joy-shaped, self-righteousness-suffocating home life and relationships!

Track along with all that we are doing here at Enjoying Grace Story Co. at Don Shorey’s Instagram.

Twenty Easy Ways to Raise a Pharisee: An Introduction

Twenty Easy Ways to Raise a Pharisee: Tilting Our (and Our Kids’) Hearts Toward Grace, Joy & Freedom

We need the Pharisees. 

This is not primarily a “parenting” series (despite understandable appearances), but:

Our kids need the Pharisees. 

The Pharisees are a cautionary tale of the highest order. They shout to us that we can be (and raise) attractive, orthodox, respectful, religious, high-performance citizens, with hands raised high in worship—who are very comfortable in our own perceived standing with God, while we stand outside the Father's house, knowing nothing of the joy, rest, feast, and calm humility of lingering in the Father's true love and grace.

They also remind us that a religious culture not captivated by grace, not honest and humble in its questions, and not deeply committed to the freedom of the Gospel of Christ is fertile ground not just for dangerous religion but also for disillusioned rebellion. These two are different fruits of the same Pharisaical root.

More on that later this week, here at the blog.

***

According to some research a majority of American teens and young adults on social media still list their religion as "Christian." Not a few include the Bible in their list of favorite books.

It is safe to say that the Jerusalem network of Facebook—circa: 1st century—would have been full of youngsters listing “Judaism” as their religion and the Torah as one of their favorite books.

What's more, those raised in the tradition of the Pharisees were the descendants of an honorable and rich heritage. 

Their Pharisee fore-fathers had taken an extraordinary stand for truth and led the way through a "protestant reformation”of sorts—recovering sound, Biblical theology, a passion for God's Word, and the hope of eternal life. 

These were the folks who called people to a personal relationship with God, promoted spiritual disciplines, sounded off on "traditional family values," and were more active in community care and mercy than any other group of their day. 

First century historians suggest that the Pharisees received the broad support and goodwill of most of the common people, apparently in contrast to the more elite Sadducees, who were the religious upper class. In general, the Sadducees were aristocratic monarchists and the Pharisees were more diverse, popular, and democratic.

The label "Pharisee" (meaning “separated”) was originally a mocking title (like "Puritan") applied by their opponents to highlight their fearless passion for what they believed was good and right.

Through the decades—leading up to the times of Jesus—the Pharisees undeniably experienced spiritual stagnation, became institutionalized and in-grown, and then (always perilous) achieved power and influence. Their theology (even in fine details) was increasingly inflexible and their instructions for living (to defend against worldliness) were expanded to cover all areas of life and carry the weight of Scripture itself. Any of this sound familiar?

They were (truly…not just in their own minds) the defenders of "righteousness," the stewards of God's revelation, devoted worshippers, and the diligent citizens of their communities.

Like the Elder Son in the Savior's Parable of the Prodigal Sons, a young Pharisee would have made a very appealing husband for your young daughter—disciplined, hardworking, church-going, spiritually studious, up-standing and (according to Jesus) alienated from from the hope and joy of the Father of grace.

The Pharisees are a gift to 21st century Christian families. When we scowl and frown and roll our eyes at the Pharisees of the Gospels, we scowl and frown and roll our eyes at people very much like us. The Pharisees’ sandals are the ones that we should pull on our own feet, if we wish listen to the message of Jesus as it would have come to us—the current religious, institutional stewards of sound doctrine, righteous behavior, biblical authority, and family values.

Forget the Sunday School coloring page, sinister caricature. These folks were “good” people and they are priceless to us because they are a generational tale—a chronicle of handing off a deeply held faith from generation to generation, while its faithful roots and grateful heart toward God can drift further and further into the past.

This Introduction begins an (obviously) ironically-angled blog series, entitled "Twenty Easy Ways to Raise a Pharisee." The ironic twist highlights effectively some of the piercing discoveries that this topic can offer to our vision for faith and life.

If you do not have children, please stay here with us. The tragedy of misrepresenting the grace and heart of God, has obvious, huge implications for how we instruct and envision the next generation, but this is not a parenting series. It is a series on grace-rooted, joy-shaped, self-righteousness suffocating life and relationships. 

To this end, the Pharisees and the Parable of the Prodigal Sons are gifts of immeasurable value.

To help make the best sense of the posts to follow, I will be weaving in additional posts and resources to help us all understand the remarkable identity, relevance, and helpfulness of the Pharisees and the Prodigal Sons parable (that was to the Pharisees).

I also would eagerly invite you to subscribe to Season Two of our No Mere Mortals Podcast. Lisa and I are sharing conversations there in the coming months—starting this week!—that will explore the hope and vision of relationships and home-life that are rooted in grace and shaped by joy. 

The podcast season and this blog series are intentional companions, and we would be very happy if you enjoyed them together and tracked along with us!

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/no-mere-mortals/id1507890671

I trust you will enjoy these coming posts with me. It is my hope that they will stimulate thought, grow eager faith, animate your love for Christ, and sometimes make you smile and take a deep, restful breath (essential ingredients in a redeeming experience of the grace and goodness of God).

Stay updated on all these happenings on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/donshorey/

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[Read “Easy Way” Number 1 tomorrow, in anticipation of Monday’s opening episode of Season 2 at the No Mere Mortals Podcast!]