God Our Home

October 9, 1994

Psalm 90:1 Lord, Thou hast been our dwelling place through all generations.

Hebrews 3:6 [Christ Jesus] whose house are we.. if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end ...

Ephesians 3: 14 - 21 That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith...

There is a recurring theme here of "home" or "dwelling" or "abiding." The Psalmist says, "Lord YOU have been our dwelling place." Then in Hebrews and again in Paul's prayer in Ephesians 3 God is spoken of as dwelling or living in us. Hebrews seems to say that together, as a body, Christ is building us into a house where he can dwell. Paul prays "that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith." And do you remember Jesus saying to us (John 15) "If you abide in ME, and my words abide in you . . . ask what you will!" We do not dare overlook this theme of abiding, dwelling, being "at home."

There is a deep longing built into your heart and mine for "home." What makes "home" is more than place (although that can be very important.) People— PERSONS - are really what "home" is all about.

God has made us for community. It is great when families love each other and trust each other. It is great when communities are more than just isolated individuals. Friends I made while in college are still as close to me or closer than some blood relatives. God has made us for lasting fellowship with Himself. Beyond human love (and what escapes us sometimes) is the lesson that God has also made us to be more and more at home with HIM.

He does not demand that we be hermits and give up human friendship to draw near to Him. He has made it clear that He certainly intends that we love one another. But God does desire that we learn that He is the reason for that deep longing for "home." That ache in our hearts for God is the most important desire we will ever have.

We hesitate to call this God-hunger the most important quality of our faith. We think the most important thing is success, or productivity, or ministry. (The elder brother in the story of the Prodigal— was faithful in his chores— but the father wanted his affection, and wanted him to love his brother.) The most important thing in all the world is being "at home" with God. God our dwelling place; Christ "at home" in us.

Henri J. M. Nouwen, as reported in the most recent Christianity Today, once told a gathering of Baptist ministers these shocking words:

"Ministry is the least important thing. You cannot NOT minister if you are in communion with God and live in a community. A lot of people are always concerned about: 'How can I help people? Or help the youth come to Christ? Or preach well?' But these are all basically non-issues. If you are burning with the love of Jesus, don't worry: everyone will know. They will say,'I want to get close to this person who is so full of God.'" CT, Oct 3, '94, 28

This strikes home to me as I read it, because drawing close to God, being filled with Him is demanding work. It begins when we decide that God's will is worth anything, that God's way is best even when we don't understand it. It begins in earnest with the "BREAKING" part of sacramental living. It seems sometimes that we are willing to do almost anything to avoid "being broken"!

"Who is Henri Nouwen?" "Does he do any ministering?" " Has he ever accomplished anything?" Many of you are "old friends" with Henri Nouwen, but others have yet to meet him. He is one of my favorite devotional authors, a Hollander who began studying to be a simple parish priest, but had such a brilliant mind he was almost pushed into academia. After years of what might only be termed "brilliant" successes, as a tenured professor at Yale, as the author of a score or more good books, and working in Latin America and spending time in a monastery in Genesee, New York, and teaching at Harvard University, for the last eight years Henri Nouwen has been pastor of a community of mentally and physically handicapped persons, located just north of Toronto, Ontario.

As gifted and productive as Nouwen has been, he has always been restless, and to a certain extent rootless, but now he has found a sense of being at home in his ministry to the people who do not know him as "that famous holy man," but just Henri, who cares about them.

Nouwen wrote that the more "important" he became, the more empty he felt; until when he got to Harvard it was very difficult for him to maintain the simple contact of being at home with God (MY words of interpretation.) One big reason Nouwen feels at home is because he experiences God's love through people who love him for himself, and not because he is a celebrity. He says,

"If (handicapped people) express love for you, then it comes from God. It's not because you have accomplished anything. These broken, wounded, and completely unpretentious people forced me to let go of my relevant self— the self that can do things— and forced me to reclaim that unadorned self in which I am completely vulnerable, open to receive and give love regardless of my accomplishments."

So Henri spends much of his routine days caring for people who cannot take care of themselves, and would be outcasts in the world at large. Just a few more words of wisdom from this modern day holy man:

"The evangelical movement has become just a bit victimized by a success-oriented culture, wanting the church— like the corporation— to be successful. On that level the mystical tradition of communion with Christ is important. 'I am the vine, you are the branches. If you remain connected with me, then you will bear fruit.' The fruit is not success." CT, Oct 3,'94,29

But strangely enough, to be "at home" or seeking to be at home in God, or to make God at home in us— does not lessen real spiritual accomplishment. Nouwen's spiritual journey is not over, and he continues to be a blessing through all the evangelical Christian world.

One other person who rejected "success" in favor of spending a life-time seeking to be "at home" with God was a man who once was a student at a sister holiness college. As a young man this young man, Stanley Jones, sought to be sanctified entirely, set apart for whatever God wanted in his life. I suppose there have been others who did what he did, but I never saw one in our own denomination: Stanley was offered- - elected— to the highest post in the United Methodist Church— elected a bishop. It is like being elected a General Superintendent. Certainly God's will! But Stanley Jones turned it down and instead went back to India where he was serving as a missionary. He was one of the great Christians of modern day times. Truly a holy man, Jones was at times controversial, outspoken. Let me tell you a little of the story of a man who was learning to be "at home" in God:

As a seventeen-year-old, he was converted under the hell-fire ministry of Evangelist Robert J. Bateman (who went down on the Titanic.) Stanley went on to seek and claim the experience of entire sanctification. He began to read Hanna Smith's book The Christian's Secret of a Happy Life, and on page 42 the Holy Spirit said: "Now!" Stanley obeyed, and without any emotional surge he claimed the fullness. He testifies that it saved him from the extremes of emotionalism and of rationalism. Stanley was from that moment "all out" for God— with no holds barred.

He professed to be called to preach— but forgot his outline in his first sermon and left the pulpit, dumbfounded. But before he got to his seat, he felt he should give his testimony; and a young man came forward and was converted [— and later entered the ministry.]

Stanley did not take his crisis of being sanctified wholly to be a static, milestone in the past sort of thing. He wanted to be being filled with the Spirit! He told of how as a student at Asbury, in a dorm-room prayer meeting, the Holy Spirit moved in in a way that Stanley had never known before— and never knew quite the same way again.

He was "spirit (Spirit) intoxicated!" for three or four days. After a day or so the emotion almost totally wore off; but there was a sense of God's Presence that swept the entire community. Every student in that Christian college professed to a right relationship with the Lord, along with scores of people from the community.

And for Stanley, that filling became the touchstone for a life of living in the fullness— depending on the fullness— again and again breaking into the fullness of the Presence of the Lord. Whatever it took for Christ to be "at home" Stanley wanted that more than anything. He declares he did not live on "mountaintops" or speak in tongues— did not know extremes of emotions. He simply lived in the fullness of the Presence.

As we said at the beginning, he was elected a Bishop of his church— the highest honor that could be offered— and graciously declined so that he could continue a missionary in the poorest country of the world that he knew. He touched thousands of lives. He spoke here in 1949— and I still remember his text!

He was controversial. He was wrong many times. He said himself that there were times when he went on his own judgment and failed.

Stanley Jones learned to live in the dynamic of being filled with the Spirit. He knew his crisis of being sanctified. He had his mountaintop experience(s) of full assurance. And then he simply lived in the expectancy and the dependency and the obedience of the Spirit-filled, Spirit-dominated, Spirit-saturated life! When you looked at E. Stanley Jones you saw an ordinary man. When Stanley Jones spoke and acted, somehow Jesus was exalted! There is a deep longing built into your heart and mine for "home." HOW CAN YOU AND I FOLLOW THAT SPIRITUAL HOME-SICKNESS AND FIND OUR HOME IN GOD, AND MAKE GOD AT HOME IN US? I really believe that God wants to make his home in your heart; he wants to share every part of your life. (Revelation 3:21)

1. God has CHOSEN you— called you to himself. Have you responded to God's choice? Are you His child? You are already loved! But when God calls, we need to respond!
2. God has BLESSED you. If you have asked Him to save you, He has already give you his Spirit and increasingly wants you to have the full fruit of the Spirit. There are gifts and graces waiting for you. All the resources of God's storehouses of grace are available to make you all God wants you to become.
3. God needs to BREAK you! HERE IS WHERE THE RUBBER MEETS THE ROAD! God does not have servants who serve Him because of fear, or because they are trying to save themselves, or any other selfish reason! God asks that we make our lives available to Him simply because we love Him and trust Him!

We cannot plumb the depths of being at home in God until we are willing to empty out the things that hinder, and set aside our own will and "die out!" (Holiness people may have said some pretty extravagant things here. The fact remains there needs to be a sacrifice made:) Romans 12: 1,2. We must renounce the sovereignty of self forever in favor of God's good will.

And then God will see to it that we are GIVEN where He says we are needed! There is where the JOY is! Wherever God's will and our loving obedience coincide there finally is the greatest joy we can know!

I want to minister well; I want to be a good preacher, or a good "do-er." But far, far more— I really want to be the kind of person Henri Nouwen was talking about— remember what he said:

If you are burning with the love of Jesus, don't worry: everyone will know. They will say,'I want to get close to this person who is so full of God.'"

THAT puts me under conviction! The world is waiting for people who are really at home with God, and in whom God is at home. The world will seek out a church where God is pleased to be "at home."

Prayer

Hymn #462 Sweet Will of God