Godly Character

The State of the Miraculous in a World of Unbelief

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One of the hallmarks of the final days, as noted by Scripture, is a horrifying level of unbelief.

Jesus said it Himself:

“Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”
—Luke 18:8b ESV

The end of all things depicted in the Book of Revelation shows that even when all of the earth is afflicted by the outcomes of supernatural wrath, mankind refuses to believe:

The rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands nor give up worshiping demons and idols of gold and silver and bronze and stone and wood, which cannot see or hear or walk, nor did they repent of their murders or their sorceries or their sexual immorality or their thefts.
—Revelation 9:20-21 ESV

There are some today who want to cast aspersions on the Kingdom of God and its many miraculous components, and they want to question how the Holy Spirit works in believers. Oddly, many doing so call themselves Christians. Though they claim to abide by the authority of Scripture and not by personal experience, they regularly challenge the miraculous in the Bible’s pages by asking where all the miracles are today. And they ask why those Christians who still believe in the miracles that are the hallmark of the Kingdom can’t always manufacture those miracles when such is demanded.

These naysayers like to point fingers at the ones who still have faith that supernatural works can occur through the ministrations of simple believers filled with God’s Holy Spirit. When a miracle does not happen, the naysayers often mock those who still believe in the miraculous.

But what the naysayers never take into account is the power of unbelief within a community. They do not ask how it is possible for the Revelation passage above to be true, that despite all the unrepentant have seen and experienced, the recipients of unprecedented levels of supernatural wrath remain in the grips of the powerful delusion that is unbelief.

We turn to the authority of Scripture to explain what happens when an entire community is gripped by unbelief:

[Jesus] went away from there and came to his hometown, and his disciples followed him. And on the Sabbath he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astonished, saying, “Where did this man get these things? What is the wisdom given to him? How are such mighty works done by his hands? Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon? And are not his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him. And Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor, except in his hometown and among his relatives and in his own household.” And he could do no mighty work there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and healed them. —Mark 6:1-5 ESV

Jesus, the Son of Man, who was filled in all His being by the Holy Spirit, who was the sinless Messiah and Alpha and Omega, could do no mighty work in a community filled with unbelief.

When we consider the times we live in and the supposed paucity of miracles we see, do we ever ask if the reason for the lack of the miraculous is because the community around us is mired in unbelief?

Do we ask ourselves what a community of genuine belief can do when all unbelief has been thrown off?Christ and the Community

Do we ever think that the miracle denied the faithful person is because everyone around that faithful person does not believe?

Or do we blame the faithful person?

Or worse, do we blame God?

The question of the miraculous today never takes into account the crippling power of unbelief, especially when multiplied throughout a community. And those who would question the miraculous never ask if their unbelief and the unbelief of those they gather around them is what stands in the way of miracles.

One Empowered, One Not

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Edna had a problem. Her computer’s printer stopped working correctly. The computer followed a day later.

Fortunately for Edna, both devices came with on-site service.

John from the printer company and Chuck from the computer company arrived almost simultaneously at the little house at the end of the lane. John held a thick manual for the printer and was dressed in a spiffy, navy blue uniform with his name embroidered above his heart. Chuck came loaded with tools, drives, and devices and seemed less put together. He also carried a thick manual. He wore a uniform too, but it was faded and had a hole in one elbow, and the headphone/microphone contraption strapped to his head made him look alien.

Both repairmen greeted Edna.

“Just happy you boys are here,” the elderly woman said.

“We’re happy to be here,” the two answered.

But soon, one of the two had less happy news.

John had looked at the printer’s screen and read the code. “I can’t do anything about this,” he said.

Edna frowned. “You looked in your manual and it didn’t tell you what to do?”

“No,” John answered. “Well, actually yes. Yes, it did tell me some of what to do, but protocol requires I call in an engineer who was on the design team. I mean, I know the manual backwards and forwards, but this is how we do it. Only the engineer at HQ is authorized.”

Edna was incredulous and started, “But—”

“—when will it get fixed?” John finished. “Well, the engineer may take his time. He should be back in this area next week.” John stared out a window. “Or the week after that.”

Chuck watched the wind go out of Edna’s sails.

“But I need to print a flyer for the ladies’ auxiliary fund-raiser. It’s next week.” Edna replied.

John offered her a frog-like frown and said, “Sorry. That’s the best I can do. The engineer is really good, though. I’m sure he’ll have you fixed up.”

“Don’t see much of the point of having on-site service if it comes down to this,” Edna said to herself.

But Chuck heard it. Despite the frustration in the words, he smiled.

Edna escorted John to the door.

“A pleasure serving you,” John said. The repairman got in his truck, which was shiny and new, and drove off.

Edna walked back to her little home office. Chuck had out a small notebook computer. He was talking into his microphone. To Edna, it sounded like so much gibberish, but she was sure it was something technical. The repairman stared intently into his computer’s display. “Thanks,” he then said to no one in the room.

“Good news,” Chuck announced. “I was able to discern what your problem is.”

“That’s great!” The woman’s countenance brightened.

“I was talking with the engineer at our company, and he sent a patch that should fix the issue on the computer. Turns out, it was an OS update glitch.”

To Edna, Chuck seemed to rise up an inch taller.

“Yeah, a lot of people got hammered by that one,” he continued. “Those auto-updates sometimes create problems.”

“Yes, they do sometimes,” Edna said.

“Well, I’ll make things better than ever,” the repairman reassured. Edna was surprised to see him move to the printer. Intently, he glowered at the printer’s display.

“I think this is a firmware update glitch,” Chuck said.

“How do you know that, young man?”

“I just know. I think I can fix it.”

Chuck connected his notebook to the malfunctioning computer and ran the patch he had received. With a reboot, the computer was fixed. The repairman then shut off the printer, reached for a button on the back that had escaped Edna’s notice, held it down, and flicked the printer’s switch back on. The printer came on and ran through its startup procedure.

“A miracle!” Edna proclaimed, beaming.

Chuck laughed. “Not quite yet. It won’t run right without that update. I’ll download it and install it.”

Which he did. And soon, both the computer and printer were working right again.

But to Edna’s surprise, Chuck wasn’t done.

“I’m pretty sure your computer was running a bit slow lately.”

Edna was beginning to wonder about this Chuck fellow. He seemed to know things he shouldn’t.

“Yes,” she said. “It hasn’t been itself.”

“‘Hasn’t been itself,'” Chuck repeated to himself with a chuckle. “Yeah, sometimes these things have their own personality, don’t they?”

“My husband could be cantankerous too,” Edna said.

Chuck saw the woman glance at a picture on the wall. “I’m sure he was a great man.”

Edna nodded. “He was.”

The repairman smiled and turned back to the computer. “The hard drive needs defragmenting—badly. The source of the slowness, I’m sure. I’ll take care of that, and you’ll be as good as new.”

And an hour later, for Edna and her little home office upon which the ladies’ auxiliary depended, it was as good as new. Or better. Thanks to Chuck.

On his way out, Chuck handed Edna a business card. As he pulled away in his decade-old truck that had probably seen better days, Edna waved. She examined the white card. Handwritten on the bottom it read, Call anytime—for any reason.

Later that afternoon, Edna phoned the printer company and canceled her service call. She figured if she had a problem with the printer in the future, she had someone better to call.

***

There’s a conference going on this weekend on the West Coast. The equivalence of that conference is to do something about “repairmen” who are out of bounds, especially if they are more like Chuck than like John. That may be well and good, but if folks like Chuck get ground up in the process, that’s not good. Sadly, it does not appear that those running the conference care much about the difference. Maybe they do, but I suspect the Chucks of this world are going to get short shrift anyway.

We need empowered people in the Church. God empowers people by His Spirit because He intends for us to do the work. Wherever we may be, if we are so empowered, we are fulfilling His intent for us, and subsequently, we are helping in the way that He intends. If we reject that empowerment, then we become like John in the story. We can show up, but what good are we?

I want to be like Chuck. Don’t you?

When a Christian Feels Like an Imposter

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When everyone is worshiping on Sunday and seems to be “into” God, you stand with them.

But you’re not feeling the music.

You’re not feeling love for God or for others.

You instead feel alone and disconnected.

You wonder what is wrong with you.

You may even ask yourself, Am I an imposter?

Feeling as if you are faking your way through the Christian life is not unusual. In difficult times, when nothing seems to be going right, that sense can become overwhelming.

But are you really a phony with regard to your faith?

Hiding behind a maskTruth is, most Christians who struggle with feelings of being an imposter need to realize, generally, that people who fake their Christian devotion aren’t self-examining. Real imposters in the faith, those who may go to church and talk the talk but who aren’t truly born again, don’t pose questions of their motives because, for the most part, they simply don’t care. Theirs is not an attitude of wanting to fix their phoniness, so they abide it without worry.

Yes, sometimes God does break through in the life of someone who has been phoning in their faith for years or even decades, but I think that’s not the majority case.

Instead, I think the people who most struggle with feelings of being an imposter are genuine, born-again Christians who have run into some kind of spiritual barrier that has forced self-examination.

What are some causes for feelings of being an imposter?

1. Legalism—Whether imposed by a church or self-imposed, a mandated set of spiritual do’s and don’ts can lead that imposter self-accusation. Everyone else is doing this Christian life thing right, but you’re not making the grade, and you know it.

2. Listening to the Enemy when you should be ignoring him—Satan is real. And more than anything, discouragement is his tool for ruining believers. A discouraged Christian never reaches his or her full potential in Faith, which is what the Enemy wants. In addition, a discouraged Christian is an antiwitness.

3. Disconnection from other Christians—Sometimes, the people in the pews go through turnover. Suddenly, you don’t know who those new folks are, have no relationship with them, and your church just feels different. You find yourself increasingly distanced from the Christian connections you once had. You wonder if there’s something you’re doing wrong, which explains why everyone seems not to care about connecting with you.

4. Change—Your church changed it’s worship music style. The sanctuary was remodeled. You have a new pastor. Your closest friends at the church moved out of the area or switched to a different church. Everything feels different.

5. A new direction in your own life—If bridges are burning through no cause of your own, if everything you were doing feels as if it’s coming to an end, maybe God has a new direction for your life. Maybe it even means changing your church. In short, not all feelings of being an imposter must be negative. Perhaps God is opening a new vista for you or is getting ready to launch you in a new ministry opportunity.

And then there’s that final one:

6. Perhaps you’re not truly born again.

As noted above, that final one is less likely than you might assume when you feel as if you’re an imposter.

Here’s the curious thing, though: Whether you are a genuine imposter or just feeling like one, the solutions are the same:

1. Repent—God desires that all men and women repent of their sins. If you are not a genuine Christian, then you need to repent. If you are a genuine Christian and you’ve just succumbed to ignoring what God says positively about you as His son or daughter, then you need to repent. Even if #5 applies and God is using your feelings of being an imposter to take you in a new direction for His work, repentance is always the place to start. You can’t go wrong with repentance.

2. Humble yourself—Sometimes, feelings of being an imposter can make a person feel superior to others. You alone recognize that you’re a fake and everyone else is too dumb to see that. They’re all imposters too. Or so the self-deception goes. Don’t go there. If you’ve repented, allow yourself to be humbled. You’re dust and so is everyone else. Stop thinking that you’re any better or any worse than anyone else.

3. Accept grace—God offers grace to imposters, whether they are genuine imposters or just mired in the mistaken feelings of being one. Learning to accept God’s grace is key to ridding yourself of feelings of being an imposter. But it has to be learned. Ask God to help you improve in your ability to accept His grace.

4. Draw closer to Jesus—Every answer to every problem is found in Jesus. Really.

I want to expand that fourth solution.

My experience with people who feel as if they are imposters is that the majority are on the cusp of a deeper walk with the Lord. Allow Him to take you there. Deep calls to deep, and that feeling of being an imposter is often God’s way of saying that He has a more fulfilling relationship He wishes to pursue with you. He wants more of you for Himself and for His Kingdom’s purposes.

Because God doesn’t want us to be satisfied with the status quo. He doesn’t want us to be thrilled by mammon, but He wants us to be thrilled by what He values. Feelings of being an imposter are one means by which God can correct the course of your life to look more like His Son’s. In a way, that feeling of being an imposter is real because all of us are imposters if we’re not living in the fulness of life in Christ that He so desires for us.

So while feeling like an imposter IS something of a bad situation, it’s not a hopeless one. In fact, it most often signals the start of a wonderful new direction that God has always desired for you but which you were unable or unwilling to accept because you were not ready.

He has made everything beautiful in its time.
—Ecclesiastes 3:11a ESV