“I’m an atheist,” the woman was blunt.
“Really? Tell me more about how you arrived at that kind of place.” I responded. We were chatting in this echoey room filled with other chatting people. We nearly needed to yell to be heard. To say the least, it was difficult to have this kind of conversation, but we powered forward.
She told me of her childhood, her life and her belief that there was a complete lack of evidence for God, therefore, God didn’t exist. So felt that perhaps having faith was something genetic and she didn’t have the gene, she considered herself atheist.
I countered, “Ah, but actually you do believe. You believe that all this: the creation, the cosmos, trees, animals, birds, seas and rivers, everything visible and invisible to the eye, even you and me, all this came about by chance, and I would say that is a belief system much tougher to prove than my own.” She looked stunned momentarily, then excused herself to find someone else due to be at the event.
“A lack of evidence for God.” Imagine that. Visiting baby Sloane Stacey with her tiny hand grabbing onto my thumb was evidence of a mighty Creator enough for me. It’s a matter of perspective, of choice, and also of being blinded to the Real by spiritual forces. Spiritual life is an awakening, and changes everything. I’m still praying for this woman, and for more opportunities to continue our conversation.
This week we are looking with Bucky Buchstaber preaching at the passage at the end of Mark 8, which is the turning point in the gospel. It is the point at which after the disciples, through Peter’s voice, identify Jesus as the Messiah, that Jesus heads resolutely for the cross. This is why after this declaration, Jesus immediately speaks of his death. The Messiah had to die in order for a new humanity to begin with Him, and in order to defeat the power that death had over humanity. It would be man’s way to not take that path. It would be human desire to avoid suffering and self-sacrifice. But Jesus chose it, even embraced it.
And so he says to those hearing to choose the same way -- die that you may live. Choose the way of self sacrifice, “lose your life for Me and for the Gospel, that you might find it.”
To lose our lives for this reason is to die to all our self-saving tendencies. It is to release our tendency to save face, be afraid of man’s opinion, to worry, be fretful over the future or regret the past. It is to release, lay down, harsh judgments, bitterness, accusations and pride. It is to die to our own tendency to have the last word, the best opinion, the most likes on FB. It is to forgive. Laying down this life is to release anger, hate, unforgiveness, and malice. All these must be sacrificed. It is to say no to these. Peter chose “man’s way,” he chose “Satan’s opinion” by standing against the plan of God for Jesus, the Messiah to die for all people. Still the spirits that speak for this false spirit say Jesus never died in the flesh and rose from the dead.
Jesus and the Gospel he lived show us a new way, and we only live into that way by releasing the hold of the old.
The only way to really release our hold on our finances is to release ourselves first into God’s plan and desire for us. We have to die to the hold money can have on our hearts, we might have to die to our mythical thinking about money, and instead sacrifice by giving first, however much, to God in order that we can really be free to follow Him in the rest of life.
“What can anyone give in exchange for their soul?”
The answer is clear.
Let’s choose to follow and live.