When we gather with colleagues and friends, or rendezvous with lovers, we name coordinates, which allow us to all meet up in a “place”   but “places” came with Creation, and this meeting, well, it was pre-creation. This meeting was pre-geographic.  Coordinates, altitude, addresses, neighborhoods, all are post creation experiences.

So if they gathered for a meeting, how did they know and “where” (still not an applicable question, but I can’t think of an alternative…) did they hook up?  Or, how about this, what was it like in their meeting “place”?  Colorful? Hot? Cold?  Just right?  Light? Dark? I think our tendency in thinking about pre-geography is to think “empty” or “void”.  This simply is not possible.  God lived, dwelt there.  No “place” has ever been more inhabited, or filled.  Eternity Himself, the Limitless One was in the house.  Empty would simply not be an option. But what was this locale, realm, area, filled with?

It was filled with God, and God-ness.  His Nature, yet unseen by human eyes (especially since human eyes had not yet been invented…) was no less present.  Our lack of observation or awareness in no way diminished His Fullness.  It just diminishes our capacity to “image” or “imagine” such a place.

Filled with God-ness, this place that He reigned over was a limitless of expanse of all that is still true about Him.

Love.

Life.

Power.

Joy.

Peace.

Imagine a tank filled with the highest intensity of such things.  Love in such a palpable, consuming concentration that nothing un-love, could oppose or withstand it. Life, (not yet living beings, just the Essence, Spirit, which would one day fill living beings…) flowed freely throughout.  Not just the absence of sickness, but the raw power of concentrated aliveness.   Put that in your Starbucks cup and drink it.

Such a “place” seems so foreign to us, such an atmosphere, incomprehensible. Our minds only know places.  Places and limits.  Places, limits and tiny droplets of the things named above.  What if those things were limitless, and we just didn’t know it.

We are so Geographic.

Rev 21:1-8
21:1 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. 2 I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. 4 He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”

5 He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”

6 He said to me: “It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To him who is thirsty I will give to drink without cost from the spring of the water of life. 7 He who overcomes will inherit all this, and I will be his God and he will be my son.

These words come from John the Revelator, as his eyes are given a view to the moment of the redemption of all things.  A day we know lies ahead.  A day none of us can really imagine, because to imagine this moment would require some kind of framework in our minds in which we could categorize this event.  Matter and reality as we know it, being completely consumed and replaced by something none of us can know; this is what John saw.

But I was taken by the thing that stirred in me as I listened to Marcus today.

This world makes me tired.  Don’t read too much into that.  I like my life.  I have and expect to have some amazing adventures.  I get to particpate in supernatural exchanges.  A Lot!!  I love people and I am loved by people.

But this world makes me tired.  In the midst of the richest of experiences, people I love die.  People loved by people I love die.  Sickness, anger, perversion, all seem to have a lot of influence under the old order.  For every life I see radically changed, ten more line up, overwhelmed by their journey through this world, and seeking relief.

I cry.  I grieve.  I strain against the tide of pain. 

I laugh, I celebrate, I dance with those set free and restored.

Then I cry again.  This world makes me tired.

And something inside of me, daily screams that there is more.  There is more than we see.  There is more than we access.  There is more to who we are than we can possibly harness with the limitations of “right now”.  I felt it stir today.  In my chest is a noble, eternal prince, destined to ride the universe with the Creator of all things and see creation in a way we can NOT currently envision. In my spirit is a deep connection to the Source of all Things, filled with love for the broken and the beautiful, and overflowing with Rivers of Living Water.  I know it is there, but most days, I struggle to access it for myself, much less pass it on to others.  Today I felt that man stir in me.  Grieving for the old order, but longing, no, starving for the New.   

I long for no more suffering.  I strain for the day of the wiping away of every tear.  The passing of the old order sounds like relief overwhelming.  Undressing from this world sounds like coming home from a long century of hard labor and peeling off the work clothes covered with sweat, and dirt, preparing to wash off the clinging grime of the day.  What a relief. 

But really…what sounds better than any thing…it is not so much what I will leave behind.  It is what I will pick up.  Shedding the weight of a troubled world, and the healing of my pain, and the pain of others borne in my soul sounds great.  But here is what I really want. 

I want to be a son.  I want to feel like a son.  I want to receive like a son.  I will be His son and He will be my God.  To know that, to drink that in, to feel sonship in every cell of my body.  That sounds like life to me. 

Those words from the book of Revelation stir in me more than I can say.  But I want to try.

Men and women who have spent a lifetime, (or even a day) in church are so bent towards connecting Scripture with behavior control, otherwise known as “The Knowledge of Good and Evil”, that almost all our experience and perception comes through that lens.

Repentance is much more about the blind seeing, than it is about bad people trying to be good.

Jesus never really met a man who was not blind.  At least not in light of His way of seeing.  Jesus could see all things, including the hearts and minds of men, and the swirling activity of the spiritual realm around us.  Because He saw clearly, He could look at every man in every situation and see every aspect of both.  Motives, hidden thoughts, fear, and even the spiritual forces lurking within each exchange, all were as visible to him, as traffic signs are to us.  Such was the vista in the Kingdom to which He was accustomed.

Crippled as we are, we try to perceive reality through a singular set of “senses”. Sight, sound, touch, taste, fragrance.  All these are senses which apprehend a single realm; the physical.  Perhaps within this arena we could perceive clues, signs and symptoms of other arenas, but we could not see them.  Like seeing tree branches move, while not seeing the wind that moved them.

Walking through a dark room, we would trip over furniture and obstacles we could not see.  Turn on the light, the natural result is a different set of responses. Step around the table, stop and turn when solid objects are in our path.

Repentance is about changing the way we see.  The natural result is a different set of responses.  Repentance is about using a set of senses beyond the physical.  Intuition, wisdom, revelation, faith (yeah, you remeber, the assurance of things NOT SEEN!) Operating by these senses, behavior change is a natural result of seeing clearly, as opposed to the application of will power.  When we try to produce behavior change without repentance (Seeing Differently; with different senses) this is called, “The Knowledge of Good and Evil”

Repent for the Kingdom of the Heavens is at arms reach.

If the “Foundations of Freedom” Video’s or Classes have made an impact on you, make a comment here and let people know….

We have already seen that we often focus on our knowledge of Evil as a problem.  Our common response to this awareness is to jump over to the branch called the Knowledge of Good.  The problem is, this is still the same tree, and still draws from the same root system.  On the knowledge of Good branch, one of the most deadly sets of branches is the one that grows from the branch I titled “The Knowledge of God’s good”

The reason that this is so deadly, is that from this branch WE begin to manufcture what WE believe God wants from US.  When WE do this WE can settle into a sort of smugness that WE are the ones who have it right.  Frighteningly often the reason WE believe WE have it right is that it so suits US.

Let me illustrate.

On this branch, if you are particularly bent toward intellectualism you will gravitate toward a branch on this tree that is the MIND responding to the Knowledge of God’s good. People on this branch become convinced that right doctrine and study are the pathway to Life.  Lesser intellectuals, or people with slightly differing doctrine in the non-essentials become heretics and heathen.  The Deadly thing is the strong belief that God likes you better because you have the right Doctrine.

Also growing from this branch is a smaller branch called the branch of the WILL.  Hangers on in this branch focus on the “rights” and “wrongs”, or the “do’s” and “don’ts”.  To them insiders are the ones who hold to the same set of rules and regulations and if anyone has differing boundaries, you guessed it, they are Heretics and Heathen.  The Deadly thing is the belief that God likes YOU better because you are following the right rules better than others.

A third branch off this wicked limb, is the branch of the EMOTIONS.  On this branch our measure of our Godliness is determined by experience.  I should be passionate.  I should feel things when God is around.  I emphasize chills and tears.  Because I experience God, I know that I have it right. If you don’t experience Him the way that I do you must be, well, a heretic or a heathen.  The deadly thing is the belief that God likes YOU better because your experience of God is superior to that of others. 

These branches off the limb of our knowledge of God’s good, can be simply preferences of our soul.  Our soul, is our Mind, Will and Emotions.  When we adhere strongly to OUR particular branch,we may not even realize we have selected that branch because of the leanings of OUR soul, not because of the majesty of God.  The intellectual can hide from his own heart in the dark recesses of his mind.  The will-worshipper can mask his insecurity by performance . The overly emotional one can keep others at bay, with a constant flow of strong and overwhelming feelings.

Jesus said that we should Love the Lord our God with all our heart and with all our soul and with all our mind and with all our strength.  Responding to God from every part of our being is something He wants from us.  The problem is not that we respond out of our soul, the problem is that we initiate from the part of our soul that we are most comfortable with and avoid the parts we are uncomfortable with.

Initiating our response to God’s goodness out of OUR preferences can makes us smug and unbalanced.  The intellectual should break down and weep at the beauty of God.  The emotional one should be still and reverent.  The rule follower should pick wheat or heal someone on the Sabbath. 
I have occasionally heard one of my favorite speakers, Jack Taylor, say, in response to people who criticize a particualr worship style. “It’s OK, it’s not you we are worshipping anyway…” 

Loving God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength, should never be about us camping out in our comfort zone, rather it should be about His Bigness and His Beauty stretching us OUT of our comfort zone. 

Tune in to the Living Voice of the Living God.  Expect to be UNcomfortable, He loves us enough to not leave us where we are today.  Think, Feel, Dance, Live.  And do it in plain sight.

This is a follow up to the last post. So if you are new to Bobhamp.com, start with the previous post, “this tree will kill you”, for this to make any kind of sense to you.

Examine this process.  Life, real aliveness is flowing.  Then the follow up begins. Someone tries to organize it. Someone tries to figure out how to replicate what’s happening, and they jump to the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.  “Here is how we will do this now.”  Last time we sang that song, the Spirit of God moved.  Let’s sing this song every time we gather from now on.  We change the root system  the moment we begin to apply our “knowledge” to the Tree of Life.

Bill Johnson says that every denomination is the corpse of a great revival.  It is the dead or dying remains of what began as a move of God on the earth. 

What about church programming?  Henry Blackaby tells the story in his workbook “Experiencing God” of the man who heard God say to him, “start a bus ministry”.  When the man began the bus ministry, his church exploded with life. 

Now people began to come to him to ask him how he grew his church so large.  His answer?  “You should start a bus ministry!”  He began to consult with other churches about how to do this and eventually wrote a book on, “How to Grow your Church through Bus Ministry”

He missed it.  He connected to the Tree of Life the moment he heard the voice of God.  The bus ministry and the growth were simply the natural fruit that grows on the branches of the tree of life.  He and others began to apply their knowledge of good, when the tried to imitate the fruit.  Like trying to pick up apples off the ground and glue them on another tree, hoping that that tree to would become fruitful. 

This is a bit like Victor Frnakenstein, collecting a bunch of dead parts and believing that the sum of the dead parts might actually equal life.  The Word of God is LIVING and active…Hearing His voice is how we connect to the Tree of Life.

How about a personal application?  Consider this, I sometimes think I was the most free when I first came to know the Lord.  If we are not careful we can write this off as a “Honeymoon Effect”  Everything is so new, and all my sins have been forgiven.  Of course we are free.  But we have so much cleaning up still ahead…is it just an illusion that we were so free then? 

Consider this.  At this time in my life, I had not yet conceived that I could or should do anything to help God out.   Whether in my own personal growth and transformation, or with all the things He has to get done on the Earth, it simply had not entered my thoughts.  All I had done was received His Grace.

It was not until I messed up the first time, or began to realize I might have some things to do for Him, that I began to get weighted down.  I would submit to you that His burden is easy and His yoke is light, but the Knowledge of Good and Evil is HEAVY!! Especially the knowledge of Good that feels impossible.   This was more than just a honeymoon period; I had jumped trees, and it was awhile before I had reasons to try to jump back into the one that had killed me.

Sometimes the worst part of our sin is not what we have done, but what we are driven to do  trying to clean up our own mess.  Isaiah the Prophet tells us that in repentance and rest we will be saved, in quietness and trust is our strength.  We would much rather repent and then fix stuff.  Out of our knowledge of the bad that we have done we fervently apply our knowledge of good, believing that this will restore the intimacy we are missing.

God calls us to come to Him, our Dad, so that He might heal and comfort and strengthen us.  We look at Him in our shame and start gathering dead apples off the ground trying to prove to Him our worth and regain His approval.  “Look Father, I fixed it, I turned it around,”  I, I, I…We gather fruit from a dead tree, hoping that it will produce in us the sense of purity, love and intimacy that comes only from being rooted and grounded in the Roots of Life.

The trap is always this.  We look on the outside.  God looks on the inner man.  We look at the end of the branches.  We seldom look close enough to see if the fruit is growing there or simply glued on to the branches.  God looks at the Root system.  The things we do, are they for God, or from  God.

TheProblem, the Big Curse that struck the whole human race was the shift from one root system to another.  A complete reversal.  From one foundation to another.  From one source to another.  The problem was that Adam, as our forefather consumed the fruit from a tree.  Specifically the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.  Prior to that moment, Adam, his wife, and a whole host of men-to-be were connected to an ever-flowing source of LIFE.   Suddenly they were connected to KNOWLEDGE.  Initally this does not sound like such a bad thing, until we see the insidious root of this new tree, this new source. 

Fundamentally Adam disconnected from a source and a foundation that continually flowed with a river of living water, and connected instead to…himself.  Follow these thoughts.

Knowledge may be the trunk of the tree, but it’s root system was in Adam’s soul.  His knowledge.  His power.  His capabilities.  The roots of this tree were Adams humanity…

Growing from the trunk of knowledge are two primary branches.  An evil branch and a good branch.  Remember the root of both branches is not connected to anything that can produce life.  Both branches grow from a single source.  Let’s follow their growth.

The knowledge of evil is an easy one for us to recognize.  In fact recognizing it can sometimes cause a whole set of problems. 

Growing from the branch of the knowledge of evil, are several branches.  The first, is the knowledge of our own evil.  For Adam, and for us, the fruit on the end of this branch is shame, leading to hiding and covering up.

Next we see a branch that is the knowledge of others evil.  Growing on the end of this branch is judgment.  When we see others faults and failures we instinctively compare.

Another branch here is the branch of SIN. Not sinful behavior, but the sinful condition of our hearts.  The absence of the presence of God. 

When we become aware of this emptiness, again we feel shame and separateness.  Rejection.  Or worse, we begin to ACT in order to do away with this feeling of emptiness.  Busy-ness, drugs, sex, money, religion, you name it we look for ways to not-feel-empty.  And when we act, we try to correct our action.  The fruit of this branch is destructive behavior and self-correction. 

This is the insidious branch of the knowledge of evil.  Surely, we tell ourselves, we know how to do GOOD.  But isn’t the knowledge of good just as destructive as the knowledge of evil?  Let’s look.

Growing from the branch of the knowedge of good, comes several smaller branches.  Here is the first.

We become aware of our good.  We do good, we think good, we feel good.  Follow this branch to the end and you will fins growing there the fruit of PRIDE.  I am good. 

How about this one?  We grow in our knowledge of others good.  Now the fruit on this branch is comparison, or worse, envy.   

Alright, then what if we grow in the knowledge of God’s Goodness.  Surely this cannot have bad fruit.  But remember, the roots are still buried deep in an empty soul.  No live fruit can come from a dead root system. 

When we come to an awareness of God’s good, often the first result is self-effort.  The problem is not what we do, but that we do it separate of God, our Life-Giver.

Next, may be the most deadly branch of all.  From our knowledge of God’s goodness, comes a branch I will call religion. We develop (from a dead root system) strategies and patterns to try to reach God, or please Him.  What was intended as a life-giving system, embedded in dead roots, becomes a death-giving system of rules and traditions.

When we live for a while in our knowledge of evil, we seek to change. The most natural change is simply to jump over to the good branch.  Natural, but still lethal.  God does not ask us to do better, He asks us to come again to the Tree of Life and receive from Him, Living Water.

No wonder He warned us about that other tree.  That thing will KILL you.

“Who do you think you are…you can’t sing…you’ll make a fool of yourself. everybody will wonder why you are trying to do what, clearly, you are incapable of doing….”

The thoughts grew like a rising wave, as my insecurities multiplied.  My fears began to invade my mind, and my emotions.  What was I thinking?  It was in this groundswell of anxiety and insecurity that another Voice surfaced.  This Voice seemed much more kind and wise.  Here is what He said.

“Bob, the opposite of worship is self-consciousness”

In that moment my fear surrendered to Perfect Love and my anxiety to Peace.  I have no idea if “I” was any good that night.  I had become keenly and pervasively aware of Someone else.

Years ago, the religious culture went through this shift about how we worship.  At least that is what we called it.  We debated about the lifting of hands, and the style of music.  We debated about less structured services versus the more traditional hymnal driven service.  Isn’t it funny how so much of that debate was really about self-consciousness?

If you were in the midst of that, you might have had these thoughts. 

“If I raise my hands, will people think I am weird?”  or “I feel more comfortable with being still”, or “I really prefer a more reverent stance.”  or even worse, “what are those people doing…they are just drawing attention to themselves!”

Do you see how everyone of those thoughts is an expression of self-consciousness?  The irony is that we all believed we were discussing worship. 

Most often, when the Bible refers to “worship”, music isn’t even a part of the reference.  The word literally means to bow, or prostrate yourself.  Keep in mind that if you are bowing, or laying down, and thinking the whole time about how others might think, or even about what a good worshipper you are, you are still SELF-conscious.  The bowing may not even refer to your physical body, but to your SELF.  To reduce your focus on yourself, and heighten your focus on God.  Now this is worship.

If this is true, you can worship at any moment in any situation, whether or not your iPod is near.  If your stereo is broken, or you cannot find your favorite worship CD, you can change what it is you are paying attention to.  You can lay down your mind, your emotions, or your will and turn your eyes and heart toward the One who is the Origin and End of your life.

Sunday morning arrived and I was in pain.  Over the years a variety of injuries had left my back and shoulders completely out of alignment.  I saw friends, and gathered my family to our seats, but the whole time, my back was screaming at me for attention.  When I got to my seat the pain  began to dominate my focus.  Sharp, stabbing pain driving into my neck, and under my skull.  This was a bad day, I began to ask God to take my pain away. 

The song service began and we were singing a song, written by a friend.  The lyrics were Psalm 103.

Praise the LORD, O my soul; all my inmost being, praise his holy name.
2 Praise the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits — 
3 who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases…

I was aware that some of the language was about healing, and I began to ask even more fervently, “God please heal my pain…”  My thoughts, my attention all my focus was on my pain.  Then I heard that familiar Voice again.

Here is what I heard,”You are focusing on the wrong part of the Psalm, stop focusing on healing and right now tell your pain to praise me:

I was so surprised.  I did not know until that moment how much I was focused on myself.  Pain will do that you know.  Remember, whatever you seek first, whatever you focus on gains power in your life.  And I had heard people to say “Praise God for your trials, or for your suffering”  but this was different.  God was telling me, to tell my soul, the pain itself to praise Him. 

I shifted.  I immediately told my pain to praise the Source of all that is.  I stopped letting it tell me what to focus on, and I told it Who to focus on.  Immediately the pain subsided.  Or should I say submitted.  In that moment pain ceased to occupy a place of worship in my life.  Before, I had bowed to it.  Now, my pain began to take its rightful place in worship of the Alpha and the Omega.  And pain did what anything and everything does when God is given His rightful place.  It surrendered.  Relief was immediate. 

This is not a post about healing.  It is a post about worship.  The greatest obstacle to our true worship is our concern with ourselves.  The greates obstacle to God’s work in our lives is also our concern for our lives. Whether we are overly pleased with ourselves, or ashamed of ourselves, either way, the posture that will restore the rule of God in your experience is when our posture gives way to His presence.

Look up, instead of around. You will not be able to stop yourself from thinking differently.

Fear is a relationship between us, and the object of our fear,  granting that object control over our minds, our hearts, our physiology and the impulses that move our lives.  Fear is a force that allows the object of our fear to inform us about all other forces.

Fear becomes both navigator and driver. It is engine and gasoline.  Fear grants absolute sway over our entire being to something “not us”.

Fear is hierarchical, meaning that one far can displace another.  Fear of burning will overpower the fear of falling, which can move one to jump from a height previously unimaginable.

What if you granted that power, that sway, that influence, to a singular Source.  And what if that Source loved you and actually had all power.  If the object of your fear was the controlling Force of the universe, that kind of driving impulse would actually align you with the central Truth of Life and Reality.

That kind of control would filter all input into your mind and heart, and would subject all other fear objects to the One Central object of fear.  It seems as if Fear, used rightly could actually be a benevolent force transforming all it touches.

You might even say that if you fear God, you begin a new path and plant a new seed completely   saturated with a new and eternal way of seeing things.  You might even say that…the Bible does.

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and the knowledge of the Holy is understanding.

Proverbs 9:10

Often change comes as a Reaction.  Things are not working well, and the evidence of this is growing.  Dissatisfaction, like a growing wave begins to rise and the atmosphere for change becomes increasingly ripe.  The dissatisfaction becomes visible among the people and the reasons, the issues, become topics of conversation.  “This isn’t working!”;  “Why do they always…”; “no one ever seems to…”…these conversations stir the awareness, and then movement begins.

The movement can be an exodus, a mass shift of people, like we see today.  Mainline denominations are losing people en masse, some are completely splitting over issues.  Some churches are exploding in growth, while others are disappearing and shutting the doors.  The movement can also be change.  Creative thinkers see the atmosphere, recognize the need for change.  They go to their marker-boards and conference rooms.  These movements grow into gatherings and the more distinctive voices gather large conferences.  New thoughts, new ideas, conversations challenging the Status Quo become the medium for this cultural shift.

It is an exciting time.  It is a terrifying time.  The familiar crumbles around us, while the excitement of new and world-changing ideas sends our hearts and collective thoughts soaring.  Embrace change, in fact pursue change.  Living things change, and the church is a living thing.  Part of the change that life propagates is the necessary death of the old, in order to give life to the new.

As the global shift in the church world arises again, many voices are feeding into the stream.  Listen carefully, and listen as if you yourself can actually know the Truth.  In the same way that change often arises as a reaction, change also predictably brings about two types of opposition.  It is these two categories I want to address here.

As the church world shifts, people, particularly established church leaders, tend to fear two different things.  First they fear that we will spin off into a world of unorthodox, or dangerous doctrinal decay.  Second they fear that we will open the door to licentious living, and allow sin and dangerous behavior to enter unchecked into the lives of the flock.

First let me say that we have already done a fine job of allowing both of those dynamics in the last several decades.  Nothing about the current state of things has prevented either dangerous doctrines, or licentious living.  In fact, I find myself regularly frustrated with the inability of our current state to truly help people with “licentious living”.  Again and again I hear the same powerless advice given to those who struggle; advice which boils down to, try harder, and use cognitive strategies.

Let me state the opposition again.  Fear of moving away from right doctrine, and fear of moving into wrong living.  Let me say it one more way.  Fear that we will not maintain our knowledge of good, and fear that we will not resist our knowledge of evil.

Sound familiar?

Real freedom begins with abandoning the Knowledge of Good and Evil as our foundation for life.  We have no other source for real life but the Source Himself.   At first, even the statement, “abandoning the knowledge of good and evil” can sound like a bad thing.  Shouldn’t we guard our doctrines?  Shouldn’t we stand against evil?  We who have lived our lives by the knowledge of good and evil have a difficult time hearing through any other filter.

We should be a conduit for the tangible presence of Goodness, and we should take dominion over creation, thereby banishing all that is dark.  These will be the natural result of maintaining a vital connection to the Tree of Life.  The source, and the power would be God, in and through us.

The difficulty with knowledge as a foundation is that it places the responsibility squarely on humans to both know and empower what only God can accomplish.  The ultimate end of this root looks like this.