Category: Christian Living

Pursuing a holistic expression of Christian faith that is true to the Bible and applicable for today’s world.

Is Liturgy an Enigma to You?

Post author By Peter DeHaan
Post date September 9, 2012

I grew up attending non-liturgical churches. So when I participate in a liturgical service it is an enigma to me.

While there is something that draws me to it, something mystical, almost magical, I am more so repelled by its distance, a cold aloofness that seems foreign for the God I love.

Even though things are spelled out with unmistakable precision, I feel only vague pretense. The liturgy serves to keep me from connecting with God; I am unable to engage with him and the community that is happening around me.

I could lament, “But, I don’t get anything out of it.” While that might be true, it misses the point. I wonder if simply being there is what’s important; perhaps trying to engage is the goal.

I think God is honored by my presence and with my efforts, so maybe that’s enough—for now.

Perhaps when I grow up I will eventually understand, but until then I will persist because it’s not about me and what I get out of it—it’s about God and what he gets from it.

Peter DeHaan writes about biblical Christianity to confront status quo religion and live a life that matters. He seeks a fresh approach to following Jesus through the lens of Scripture, without the baggage of made-up traditions and meaningless practices.

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Tags liturgy, worship

Christian Living

Do You Appreciate Nature?

Post author By Peter DeHaan
Post date September 2, 2012

Enjoying God’s Creation

In the pre-dawn haze, I perched at the edge of a meadow. From a distance I watched three whitetail deer arise from their slumber, moving with deliberate slowness as though waiting for their circulation to return and their muscles to wake up.

I don’t know if they saw me, smelled me, or heard me, but at once all three looked in my direction, freezing in time and place. For an eternity of seconds, we stared at each other.

They were wary, but not afraid; they were cautious, but not fearful. They did not know to fear man and this man was in complete awe of them.

Sensing it was again safe to proceed, they sauntered towards the woods. The fawn was not keeping up and once he realized this, it took only a couple of graceful leaps to restore contact with his parents.

As a group they continued meandering towards the border between field and forest.

At the fence separating meadow and woods it took one mighty bound, seemingly effortless but extraordinary in power, for the first to clear it. Then the second and finally the third; they were gone.

I thanked God for letting me witness the wonder of his creation and to be in awe of him for his created things.

And then I sensed something extraordinary: God appreciates his creation even more than I.

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Tags creation, God

Christian Living

Are You a Pharisee?

Post author By Peter DeHaan
Post date August 19, 2012

When we think of the word pharisee, we envision a narrow-minded, hypocritical, self-righteous person. To call someone a pharisee is an insult. So, when we read pharisee in the Bible, we automatically think ill of that person.

However, a Pharisee was someone devoted to following a strict moral code aligned with Moses’ instructions, which he received from God.

They were devoted to following the Almighty and did so with zealous dedication. They were the most religiously minded people in the Bible, the spiritually elite.

Paul was a Pharisee before he made a U-turn to follow Jesus. Yet afterwards he persisted in that label and the practices that accompanied it. To him, being a Pharisee was an honorable designation, not a slur of derision.

Yes, Jesus was highly critical of Pharisees, but not because of their zeal for God, rather because they got carried away, making it into something it was never intended to be. Their intentions were noble; their execution was lacking.

In some ways—the right ways—we should be more like a Pharisee: following God’s moral code and zealous for him.

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Tags Jesus, Paul, Pharisee

Christian Living

Can We Really Pray Without Ceasing?

Post author By Peter DeHaan
Post date August 12, 2012

The Bible encourages us to pray without ceasing, to pray continually. This seems to be an impossible task. If we always prayed, we’d be doing nothing but praying.

However, Brother Lawrence did approach this goal, learning over the course of many years to be in a constant attitude of prayer as he went about his daily activities.

But Brother Lawrence lived in a setting that would be ideal for this (a monastery) and during a much slower-paced era (some five centuries ago).

Surely this isn’t feasible today with our busy lives overflowing with activity.

Although I, too, consider this as unattainable, I was at least motivated to be on the lookout for people and situations warranting prayer. I guess I made progress in that area, although it was confirmed in an odd way.

Once while watching TV, the protagonist was in a bad situation and faced a critical decision. I asked God to protect him and that he would choose wisely.

I quickly caught myself, embarrassed for treating fantasy as reality, while at the same time realizing I was developing a subconscious prayer life.

For the next several months this tendency to pray for fictional characters continued, apparently mirroring a growing real-life practice.

I don’t pray for characters in television and movies anymore. I wonder if I don’t pray as much for real-life people either.

I wonder how I can better pray without ceasing.

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Tags pray

Christian Living

What Does it Mean to Follow Jesus?

Post author By Peter DeHaan
Post date July 29, 2012

When people approached Jesus, wanting to connect with him, he would offer a variety of instructions. It seems his response addressed their particular situation and issues. What he said most often was “repent and follow me.”

“Repent” simply means to change our ways, to do a U-turn; “follow” means to go after. Sometimes Jesus was even more concise and just said “follow me”.

I like this idea of following him and often tell people “I’m a follower of Jesus.” The label of Christian may be a quick and easy one, but it means different things to different people, evoking varying responses from respect to invective.

To say, “I follow Jesus” is straightforward and less confusing. Or is it?

With the ubiquitous popularity of Twitter, comes the common request to “Twitter.” To follow someone on Twitter takes little effort and requires no commitment; it is passive and demands nothing.

This is quite the opposite of following Jesus with a passionate desire to be his disciple and know him intimately.

It’s my hope that everyone will follow Jesus, not the meaningless “follow on Twitter” nonsense, but an all in, totally sold out following of Jesus, the Christ who is revealed in the Bible.

Read more in How Big is Your Tent? A Call for Christian Unity, Tolerance, and Love and discover what the Bible says about following Jesus. Available in e-book and paperback.

Read more in his books, blog, and weekly email updates.

Tags follow Jesus, repent

Christian Living

Does the Timing of Prayer Matter?

Post author By Peter DeHaan
Post date July 22, 2012

I believe God lives outside of the space-time he created. Therefore, he isn’t limited by time—as we are—so our prayers need not be bounded by time, either.

This allows me to pray for things after the fact; the timing of when I pray is not as critical as the fact that I did pray, at some time.

For example, if someone asks for prayer at ten o’clock, I can pray at ten (the best option).

Or I can pray in advance, anticipating what they will undergo (this is great if I’ll be busy at ten).

A third option is to pray afterwards but to pray as if the outcome is still undetermined (this is hard and I don’t do it often).

Once I told a friend, I would pray for her—and then forgot. A reminder of my forgetfulness was an email from her, which essentially said, “thanks for praying; things didn’t work out.”

Dismayed over my broken promise, I did my best to set aside my knowledge of the outcome and pray as if it hadn’t occurred. My faith, that my feeble prayer would be answered, was weak at best, but I did pray nonetheless.

About four hours later I received a second email, which negated the first. It basically said, “God is amazing; he has provided for me and answered our prayers.”

I can’t explain the two contradicting emails and don’t know the details. What I do know is that God answers our prayers—regardless of when we pray.

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Tags prayer, space-time

Christian Living

What Does it Mean to be a Prayer Warrior?

Post author By Peter DeHaan
Post date July 15, 2012

How often have you heard the phrase “prayer warrior”? Have you ever attributed it to someone who prays a lot or prays with effectiveness?

Interestingly, those two words are not used together in the Bible.*

I wonder if the warrior metaphor is more a construct of modernity and a colonization mentality and not at all what God has in mind.

What if God doesn’t want us to be a prayer warrior? Perhaps he desires that we not “war” at prayer, but rather that we “love” at prayer—love him.

However, recall that Ephesians 6:12 says, our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against rulers, authorities, powers of this dark world, and spiritual forces of evil. This does indeed evoke an image of war.

Clearly a balance is called for. If we think of prayer as war, our focus is on the enemy, not God. I don’t think that’s what God wants (but the enemy may like the extra attention).

For me a prayer that devotes more words to warring against the enemy than to loving God is a prayer that is out of balance and focused on the wrong thing.

May our prayer focus rightly reside on God.

*The phrase “prayer warrior” is not found in the NIV, NLT, AMP, or NASB. Interestingly, occurs once in The Message, but in a negative context: “The world is full of so-called prayer warriors who are prayer-ignorant,” Matthew 6:7.

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Tags prayer

Christian Living

What’s More Important, to Get Decisions or Make Disciples?

Post author By Peter DeHaan
Post date July 8, 2012

I recently read about someone who is credited with producing over 55 million decisions for Christ. That’s the most impressive number. However, I wonder if it’s the correct focus. He needs to make disciples instead.

Jesus didn’t tell us to go and make decisions—or to get people saved, to make converts, or to have people come forward at an altar call, raise their hands, or say the prayer—but to make disciples.

Making a disciple is much more difficult and takes a lot longer. It requires but minutes for someone to decide to follow Jesus, but a lifetime to become a disciple of Jesus. However, true disciples are what Jesus wanted.

It’s really an issue of quantity versus quality. And frankly, most people today are more impressed with quantity.

Millions of decisions may make headlines and garner attention and adulation, but it was just 12 disciples who changed the world.

Consider how you can make disciples for Jesus.

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Tags disciples, follower of Jesus

Christian Living

Should We Tithe or Not?

Post author By Peter DeHaan
Post date July 1, 2012

Some people who follow Jesus give his church 10 percent of their income. The Bible calls this a tithe and it was a requirement from the Old Testament portion of the Bible.

Other people say 10 percent is more a guideline than a rule. I don’t see much support for this perspective—other than the fact they don’t think they can afford to give away a tenth of their income.

A third group points out that Jesus never asked for 10 percent and whenever the New Testament part of the Bible mentions the practice, it’s always in reference to the Old Testament. They conclude the requirement to tithe no longer holds.

Personally, I see truth in all three. Giving 10 percent is historical, it is a guideline, and it may not hold true any longer.

When many people talk about tithing, the implication is 10 percent is God’s and 90 percent is theirs.

I think Jesus wants us to view 100 percent as belonging to him. Be it directly donated or indirectly spent, we need to disperse it wisely to care for our basic needs and help others.

We are blessed to be a blessing to others, so we should spend carefully and give generously, not just tithe 10 percent.

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Tags tithe

Christian Living

The Spirituality of Giving

Post author By Peter DeHaan
Post date June 24, 2012

When it comes to giving to others there are two schools of thought. One is to give to whoever asks and the other is to be good stewards of the resources God has given us.

The problem is, both of these are taught in the Bible, so which is it?

The answer, as with many spiritual paradoxes, is both. In this case God does not give us an immutable law to obey, but instead guidelines to follow. I think we need to discern which path to take for each individual situation.

Sometimes we need to give generously without hesitation, while other times, the good stewardship rule applies.

This may mean sharing what we have, or withholding resources, or perhaps coming up with a creative response that while not giving what is requested, does provide for what is actually needed.

Giving to others is a spiritual thing; may we do it well.

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Tags biblical Christianity, generosity, give, paradox