Daniel Darling's Blog, page 41

The Way Home featuring Candi Cushman

What rights do Christian public school students have? What is the best way to be a witness to unbelieving friends? Candi Cushman, from Focus on the Family, joins me with some practical wisdom for parents, pastors, and students.

Show Notes

Recent writing: Religious freedom on campus: What students can and can’t do
Website: focusonthefamily.com/about/media/candi-cushman

Be inspired and equipped to stand up for human dignity at Evangelicals for Life. Join us and Focus on the Family in Washington D.C. before the March for Life next January.

Teach Us To Pray: “Thy Will Be Done, On Earth As It Is In Heaven”

This is part of an occasional series of posts on the Lord’s Prayer. You can read the previous entries in this series , , here, here, here, and here.

In this post we will discuss the third request found in the Lord’s Prayer, “Thy will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven.” This request is a natural response to the previous request that God’s name be worshipped and proclaimed through the earth and the coming of the kingdom.

We often look at prayer as the opportunity for us to get stuff from God, right? And as desperate people, God is the only one to whom we can pray and seek help. But in another sense, Jesus is saying that prayer is less about getting our will done by God, but seeing God’s will done on earth.

Today, as in every generation, the priorities of Heaven are at odds with the priorities of a fallen world.. Prayer, then is not a matter of making God conform to our expectations, but aligning our expectations to God’s kingdom purposes.

So what does it mean to pray, “They Will Be Done On Earth As It is In Heaven? Here are three implications.

1)   A Prayer for the World

To pray for God’s will to be done on earth as it is in Heaven acknowledges two things: it acknowledges that there is a better way for this world to run than the way that it does, and that God cares about this earth.

This is the prayer of someone who believes the world is not as it should be, that there is a better world coming. This prayer means we should be brokenhearted for what breaks the heart of God (to quote the late, great Bob Pierce): the evil that prevails, the racism, the poverty, the violence, the sin, the death, the corruption, the injustice. It means we can’t just shut our eyes to the world’s deep suffering and pretend it isn’t happening.

Ultimately this is a prayer for the consummation of Christ’s kingdom. We pray Christ will return as King and for Heaven to finally come down to earth as promised. We pray to see the Kingdom arrive in its fullest. But it also means that right now while we await that day, we pray for God’s will to reign in this sinful world.

This is not just a nice phrase to affix to calendars and coffee mugs. This is a revolutionary prayer. It is the act of praying against the prevailing, sinful, world system. It’s a longing for the curse to be reversed, for Heaven’s healing and hope to prevail upon the brokenness of our families, our communities, and our world.  

Here’s the thing about this kind of radical prayer. You cannot pray this prayer without being drafted into action to see God’s will done on earth. It is a dependence on the Spirit of God, who alone, working through His people, can see his will done on earth as it is in Heaven.

To pray “Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven” is to not be satisfied with the way things are, to be part of the renewal God is bringing to bear on the world. It an earnest, broken, heart-rending plea to God to align Heaven and earth. This is a prayer that says, “Lord, keep me from being an indifferent bystander to evil. I want to join your mission of healing and hope and renewal.”

2) A Prayer for Myself

As much as this is a prayer for the world, it’s also a prayer for myself. For to pray, “Your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven” is to say, “Lord, do your will in me.” Essentially this is a risky prayer for us personally. It’s saying to the Lord: I have my will. You have your will. Sometimes those two line up, but when they don’t, overrule my will.

There are three things this prayer implies: Submission, Study, and Satisfaction.

First, to pray this prayer, and really mean it, means we are willing to submit our wills to His will. It’s acknowledging that the One who best knows how to run my life is God. And this is a prayer that we must pray, not one time, while walking an aisle, but daily because we have hearts prone to wander. This prayer becomes a pledge of obedience to God’s will.

Which brings us to the second aspect of this as a personal prayer. In order to submit to God’s will, we must study to know God’s will. How can we do God’s will if we are ignorant of what he asks of us? If we are to pray this prayer, that means we’re committing not only to obeying it, but knowing God’s will so we can obey it.

As we walk with God, He works on our hearts, our affections, our desires. We begin to think like He thinks and love what He loves and hate what he hates.

Lastly, there is a trust aspect of surrendering to God’s will. It’s the satisfaction of knowing that God’s will is best. Despite our doubts concerning God’s will, in the end, we can trust Him. We were made to do His will. To trust God’s will, to rest in him, is to accept his sanctifying hand, to let him mold you and make you, to respond to the needs of the world and be part of bringing Heaven to earth.

And here’s what we have to understand. This is where we find our deepest joy. To follow God often means deep pain and sacrifice. But, it also means intimacy, dependence on your Father for provision and protection. It means that in your life and in the life of the Church, you are showing a glimpse of the world to come, of another king and another kingdom.

3)   The Prayer of Jesus

Lastly, we cannot read “Your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven” without thinking of Jesus’ own example of this submission. In the Garden, Jesus prayed, pleaded with God, “Take this cup from me, not my will but yours be done.” He accepted the cup of God’s wrath for sin, accepted the darkness and death of the cross, the curse of sin. And he said, “Not my will, but yours.”

In this we can read Jesus’ words to the disciples to pray this way—not as words from the mountain, but words Jesus himself lived out. These words called the disciples to yield their own wills for the sake of the gospel.

And yet, Jesus’ accepting of God’s will over his will enables us to do God’s will. Jesus is the bridge between heaven and earth. He is the answer to the prayer, “On earth as it is in Heaven.” So in some ways, this prayer has partially been fulfilled. In our own lives, Jesus bridged the gap between heaven and earth. By his death, we now have access to God. By his resurrection, we now have life, here and in eternity.

But in an even deeper sense, we can only pray this prayer—“your will be done in me” because Jesus prayed that prayer. He was the only one to fully fulfill God’s will. Because Jesus fulfilled it for us, now we do God’s will, not to earn God’s favor, but as part of God’s mission to spread the fame of his name to the ends of the earth. We obey God’s will, not to make God happy, but because it is our joy. It is what we were created to do.

photo credit: Kevin Gill

The Way Home featuring Renne Rizzo

What does it mean to be pro-life? Renee Rizzo joins me to talk about being pro-life in more than name only. Renee is the president and CEO of Hope Clinic for Women in Nashville, Tenn.

Hope Clinic for Women is faith-based. It is a safe and confidential place for anyone dealing with unplanned pregnancies, prevention, pregnancy loss (miscarriage, stillbirth, infant death, or abortion), and postpartum depression.

Show Notes

Twitter: @hopeclinic
Website: hopeclinicforwomen.org

Be inspired and equipped to stand up for human dignity at Evangelicals for Life. Join us and Focus on the Family in Washington D.C. before the March for Life next January.

The Way Home featuring Gary Thomas

What do relationships have to do with our sanctification? Today on the podcast, I’m joined by my friend Gary Thomas. Gary is a bestselling author, international speaker, and prolific writer. I have thoroughly enjoyed Gary’s writing and teaching throughout the years. He is the author of fourteen books, including the bestselling, Sacred Marriage, Sacred Parenting and his latest book, Cherish, releasing in January. Gary is an avid runner who has completed eleven marathons, including Boston three times. He lives in Houston, Texas, with his wife and three children where he is a Writer in Residence at Second Baptist Church.

Show Notes

Twitter: @garylthomas
Website: garythomas.com

Join us for Evangelicals for Life in Washington, D.C., January 26-28, 2017.

The Way Home: Episode 86 featuring Bruce Ashford

How can pastors recover the sense of the Lordship of Christ? Bruce Ashford joins me today to discuss Christianity, cultural engagement and his new book Every Square Inch: An Introduction to Cultural Engagement for Christians.

Bruce is Provost and Professor of Theology & Culture at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary.  One Nation Under God: A Christian Hope for American Politics.

Show Notes

Twitter: @BruceAshford
Website: bruceashford.net

Join us for Evangelicals for Life in Washington, D.C., January 26-28, 2017.

Teach Us To Pray: Your Kingdom Come

This is the sixth article in a series of blogs posts on the Lord’s Prayer. You can read the previous entries in this series , , here, here, and here. In this post, we will discuss the second request Jesus encourages us to present in the Lord’s Prayer: “Your Kingdom Come.” So what does it mean to pray “Your Kingdom Come?”

1) This kind of prayer involves   

First we acknowledge that we are not God. To pray “Your Kingdom Come” is an acknowledgement that there is another King than the kings of the world. It also acknowledges our dependence on God. We cannot usher in the kingdom of God. We cannot, on our own, make a better world. We are at the mercy of God. This prayer is a desperate plea: Lord, please send your kingdom!

Second, we acknowledge that this world is not as it should be. This is a prayer for a better world. It doesn’t take much effort to look around and realize that this world is not as it should be. Jesus reminds us that God’s people have the promise of a better world. We long for the day our righteous king finally consummates His kingdom.

Jesus’ new Kingdom is inhabited by those who put their faith in him. And His people are citizens of this new Kingdom. Today, the church is a signpost to that world to come. We apply the good news of the gospel by working for justice in our communities, but do this knowing that no human movement can perfectly fix all the problems of the world. We will never achieve utopia. Only our triumphant King, Jesus, will perfectly make all things new when he returns.

2) This kind of prayer affects your perspective

Consider how revolutionary and radical Jesus’ words were. For the Jewish people, to ruled by the Romans in their own land was humiliating. Every day, as they walked in the marketplace, as they passed by the temple, as they went about their daily business the symbols of Roman rule reminded them of how much they had lost as a people. So Jesus words, proclaiming the sovereignty of another kingdom, were a balm to the soul. Caesar is not God, Caesar is not the ultimate king.

Jesus words are a powerful word to every single monarch who has ever lived and who will live. You may rule a certain group of people. You may be a President or Prime Minister or dictator. But you are not the ultimate king. You are subject to the Creator.

As citizens of God’s kingdom, we need not fear history. We need not fear tyrants. We need not fear current events.

The Bible surveys all of human history, it’s wreckage, it’s sin, it’s evil and it’s bloodshed. It makes a radical claim that a man from Nazareth who walked this earth 2,000 years ago is the ultimate King who will come back and restore what is right in the world. The curse of this earth, the curse on creation, the trouble in my own heart, and the evil I see in the world—this has all been defeated and through Christ I can see glimpses of a better world to come.

History didn’t happen by accident. My life didn’t happen by accident. God holds both in his sovereign hand and one day will gather history to its conclusion in Christ’s kingdom.

3) This kind of prayer affects your . . . prayer

To pray, “Your kingdom come” teaches us how to pray, not only for the future, but for the present. It teaches us to pray big prayers. As much as this is a vision of a world to come, it’s also a willingness to yield ourselves to the kingdom way of life Jesus wants us to live while here on this earth.

It’s a prayer that is not only praying for God’s kingdom to come in it’s fullness but that it also breaks in today, in this earth, in my community, in my family, in my church, in my own heart. It’s a prayer for the Church to become a window into the kingdom, to reflect the values and the ethics of the kingdom, to become ambassadors for the kingdom.

4) This kind of prayer affects our practice 

Praying, “Your Kingdom Comes” implies an allegiance to another King and another Kingdom. Jesus didn’t just give us a promise of the consummated kingdom, but he gave us the kingdom now—in that it exists in the hearts of God’s own people.

Jesus said kingdom living involves abandoning building our own little kingdoms and committing to building His, whatever that looks like, however He leads us. Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about what it means to live this way. And for one thing, it means it reorders our priorities. Jesus said to us in Matthew 6:33, “Seek first the Kingdom of God and all of these things will be added unto you.” What are “those things”? These are the necessities of life, your house, your food, your clothing. Things, Jesus said, that your father knows you need.

In a sense, this prayer is a prayer of humility. It’s a prayer admitting that your desires, your will, your efforts are not always kingdom-centered. The problem with most of the world is not anything less than the fact that we want to be kings of our own kingdoms. We want to be our own Lords. But the most joyful, the most freeing thing we can do is to recognize that we were not made to be kings or lords. We need a King and Lord. And submitting to His kingdom frees us to be who we were created to be.

When we pray this prayer, we are saying, “Lord, send your Kingdom, but first begin with me.”

The Way Home: Episode 85 featuring Joel Smallbone

Why is the band, For King and Country speaking out against human trafficking? My guest today is Joel Smallbone. Joel and his brother Luke form the Christian pop band, For King and Country. Since their debut in 2007, these two brothers have won numerous music awards, including two Dove Awards and three Grammy’s. Their music has appeared atop the Billboard charts and they’ve been labeled by some as the Australian version of Coldplay. Joel and his brother have appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live and The Tonight Show.

Today Joel joins me to talk about his music career, about growing up in a famous family (his sister is singer, Rebecca St. James), and about a new book and movie project, Priceless, that addresses the tragedy of human trafficking.

Show Notes

Twitter: @4kingandcountry
Website: forkingandcountry.com

Join us for Evangelicals for Life in Washington, D.C., January 26-28, 2017.

Some tips on getting published

I often have young writers ask me how to get published. I’ve written some of my advice already here and here and here. But I thought I’d offer a few more practical tips on getting editors to appreciate your work and give you a byline:

1) Research publications you intend to write for. It’s important to read widely and read deeply at the publications you’d like to see publish your work. That way when you pitch ideas, you will know what is a good fit for a specific publication. Over time, this will develop into an instinct, so when you get an idea you will instinctively know the best market. It also makes editors happy when you pitch them pieces that actually fit their publication.

2) Be flexible, within your abilities. Sometimes you will have burning ideas you just need to see in print. But as you develop relationships with editors (and you should be developing relationships with editors) and as you develop a good reputation for delivering clean, fast, creative copy (and you should be developing a reputation for delivering clean, fast, creative copy — see below), often editors will come to you and ask if you can turn around an idea on a tight deadline. If the topic is remotely in your wheelhouse, you should say yes and then figure out a way to get it done. Not only is this an opportunity to stretch yourself, it endears you to editors who will be more open to your nest, fresh, burning idea.

3) Develop a reputation for delivering clean, fast, creative copy. This only comes with time and with lots of writing experience. I worked, for nearly a decade in a role that required me to churn out lots of works in short pieces, on a deadline. This helped me develop writing muscles that allow me to write quick and fast. This is why the best way to become a good writer is to actually write, even if you are writing stuff nobody reads. Write well and write with excellence, but don’t noodle over every blog post as if its your magnum opus. News flash: it’s not. Learn how to write short pieces quickly and editors will love you.

4) Develop a reputation as someone who is willingly edited. Don’t be a diva. Seriously. Give every piece your absolute best effort and then encourage editors to hack away and make it better. Learn to welcome the red pen on your copy. There are times when an editor might edit so much that it removes the spirit of your piece. If so, make good arguments and fight for your perspective. Those times are few and far between. Most of the time you are fighting for a phrase that you think is unadorned brilliance when, in reality, it is pedestrian. Give it up. Let yourself be edited and editors will love to publish you.

5) Carry around a journal or something to jot down ideas. I’m not much for regular journaling. I figured out, a few years ago, that Jesus will still love me and I can still walk with him without having sunlight pages of reflective prose. However, I do keep a small notebook for those times when I’m struck by ideas. I get struck by ideas at odd times. During sermons, during a movie, or other random moments. When an idea strikes, I write it down and I try to sketch out a working outline. Then I revisit it later when I have time to write. Sometimes when I come back to the idea I realize it wasn’t that great. But there are many moments when I find gold in my sudden ideas.

The Way Home: Episode 84 featuring Andrew Walker

How should we read the news? What sources can we trust? Andrew Walker and Dan Darling discuss their favorite magazines, websites, and podcasts and give some instruction on how best to read the news.

Show Notes

Twitter: @andrewtwalk and @dandarling
Website: andrewtwalker.com
Article: Advice to Young Christian Politicos

The Courage to Not Overreact

One of my favorite podcasts is the Washington Posts’ Presidential Podcast. It’s a unique idea: cover one president a week for like 45-50 minutes. They began on January 10th of this year with George Washington. The plan is to continue until Election Day.

I love presidential history. This podcast doesn’t give you a deep dive that a biography or mini-series would, of course, but has been helpful, especially for some of the more obscure presidents in our history.

As the coverage moves into the modern era, there is so much more to cover because there is so much more we know. So the host, Lillian Cunningham, has been forced to cover basics and then choose what issues to dwell on. Listeners will, obviously, disagree at times with what she chooses to cover. I’ll admit some episodes have left me a bit more disappointed that certain things were not discussed. But then again, this is not my podcast.

Today I listened to the most recent one, covering President Dwight Eisenhower. I’ve read quite a bit about Eisenhower, so I was looking forward to it. Presidential chose to cover some of Ike’s leadership traits. One of the guest experts said something that made me think: Eisenhower had the courage to wait before acting. An experienced general, who led the Allies to victory in World War II, Ike was no stranger to leadership in crisis. This well-prepared him for the Presidency, perhaps better than most of our other presidents. Because Eisenhower was confident in his own leadership, he didn’t overreact in key situations. He didn’t listen to the many voices who wanted him to move swiftly when it was more prudent to wait for the right timing and for things to play out.

This is a key leadership principle, I think, not only for Presidents, but for any kind of leader. Too often we are pressured to do something. We live in a fast-paced, social-media driven world. Inaction, at times, seems like we don’t care. To be sure, this isn’t an excuse for laziness, but there is a wise middle course between panicking and passivity.

Leadership often requires quick action, but it requires the right kind of action and the right timing. I’m reminded of James wise words:

Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God. (James 1:19). 

We live in an impatient, instant age. The fast pace of the modern world, the pressure to perform and look decisive can injure our ability to lead people well. This affects our ability to listen, to learn, to get all the facts about a situation.

I’ve also noticed how this affects parenting. Sometimes its important to step in and act quickly when our kids act up or something bad is happening. But we should also be wary of the tendency to overreact to situations, to jump in and rescue our kids when, at times, we should let them work things out on their own.

Good leadership knows when to be emotional and when to keep a cool head, when to jump on a situation and when to sit back and allow things to play out. We get this wisdom best when we lean in on the Spirit of God, when we read the Scriptures, and when we are surrounded by good voices who can help us think through critical decisions.

Sometimes courage looks like decisive action. But sometimes courage looks like simply waiting.

photo credit: Eisenhower Presidential Library