This past Sunday, we finished up our mini-series within the Study of Luke on Games People Play.
God confronts us in our sin or calls us into obedience through the Word, a nudging of the Holy Spirit, or through a trusted brother or sister in Christ, and often we are tempted to disobey. The obedience may cost us everything – it may be one of those times when we feel we literally may lose a chunk of ourselves if we were to obey – or, sometimes, it just doesn’t seem that important to obey and the cost of obedience – being inconvenienced or embarrassed – just doesn’t seem worth it to us.
When this happens, our disobedience can be flagrant. On occasion, we wave our hands at the sky and yell back at God. But more often, especially in the Bible Belt, we know enough to know that if we go toe-to-toe with God, it isn’t going to end how we want it to end. In those situations, we engage in subtle, less obvious ways of disobedience. And we’re calling those ways of disobediences Games People Play.
The first game we discussed is the Authority Game. In subtle ways, we tend to minimize God’s authority over our lives by thinking of our disobedience to His will as no big deal. When we are confronted with our tendency to gossip, or a disrespectful attitude, or bitterness we may be harboring, we tend to excuse ourselves. “Well,” we may think, “I may not have been totally polite about that person behind their back, but it’s not like I murdered anyone today.” To be perfectly honest with ourselves, it’s likely we don’t even think through this thought – we just continue to walk through our lives with a flippant attitude towards sin. The problem with treating disobedience as inconsequential is that we are indirectly telling God that His Word is not ultimate – that we think that our judgement of right and wrong is more accurate than His. And, of course, since we are human and He is God, we are wrong.
The second game we have a tendency to play with God is the Change the Subject Game. When God calls us to obedience, and we don’t want to obey, we tend to try to change the subject. So, if God calls me to a mission trip, and I feel it would be far too expensive and anxiety-ridden for me, I am tempted to change the subject. “I’m not going on a mission trip, but I will volunteer in the Children’s area for a month straight instead.” We think somehow that our service to the Lord cancels out our unwilling heart in another area. If we choose not to obey when God asks us to obey, though, we’ve already proven that our hearts are not turned towards Him. So, if I am going to disobey the Lord when He asks me to serve my family better, but I am giving double my time to serve as a prayer warrior, I am not going to benefit from the service I’m giving. My relationship with the Lord is not going to grow deeper and more alive and my life is not going to be ever-increasing in beauty and fullness. I’ve already chosen to walk away from the Lord, so anything I am doing besides obeying, whether honorable or not, is not from a heart of surrender.
The third game we discussed from the book of Luke is the God As A Hobby Game. This game happens any time there is an area in our lives where God is not central. For those of us seeking the Lord, this is an easy one to give ourselves a Free Pass. We think about areas where we are in full pursuit of a love relationship with Him and we think, “I am not treating my relationship with God as a hobby.” And we’re probably right: in some areas of our lives, we’re certainly giving God the central throne He deserves. However, if we are very honest with ourselves, we can probably also all see areas of our lives where God is not central. A big way we can know if we’re playing the God As A Hobby Game is if we find ourselves on a pendulum, swinging from one sin to the next. For example, if I am trying to find balance between self-loathing and pride, then that is a huge red flag that God is not central in this area of life. When God is my center, it takes me off of the pendulum swing completely. So, when I’ve really messed up, I don’t need to feel self-loathing. If God is the center and not just a hobby in this area of my life, I know that even in this moment of my royal mess-up, Jesus found me worthy to die on the cross. His love for me – the me in that moment, who messed up big – kept Him on the cross. And if He feels I am that worthy, then so must I. And, if I am feeling prideful about how important I am or how well I’ve done, then I am not seeing Christ as my center. When He is, I know that everything I’ve done that I can be proud of is like rags compared to His glory. And although He loves me deeply and completely, I can also see that it is not me or my good works that saved me, but the Blood of the Lamb. I no longer have to strive to balance pride and self-loathing, but rather see that I am wholly complete as an individual because of Christ and no other reason, removing me from the pendulum altogether. The same is true for so many parts of life when we tend to pit sin against sin. Rather than trying to find balance on the continuum of control vs. anxiety, lust vs. self-righteousness, or legalism vs. being too lax, we can see that allowing God to be central to that area of our life removes us from the continuum all-together. It is no longer about finding balance between two sins, but rather seeing how Christ has set us free from the pendulum swing completely.
The thing about the Games People Play is that they are subtle. I don’t always cognitively catch myself deciding to treat God as a hobby or doubling my time reading my Bible rather than focus on an act of obedience I’ve been called to. It has happened to me and so many others that wake up, 6 months or 6 years down the road, realizing that the emotional desert or trappings of sin that we find ourselves in are a result of a game we engaged in long ago. At the time, the act of disobedience seemed small and inconsequential, but in truth, all disobedience is sin that leads away from life to the fullest.
When I consider how great God’s love for me is, and that He has always called me to obedience that gives eventual joy, beauty, and life, it makes me all the more serious about walking towards Him no matter what I’m being asked. My prayer regarding these Games People Play is that the Holy Spirit be an ever-present whisper in my ear, showing me the subtle ways I chose a game over life to the fullest. May He give us all the strength to walk towards Him as His love calls us to a better life through obedience.
Jesus spent much of His ministry speaking to the religious scholars of His day. Because of His great love for them, and because He knew that the world was meant to operate in a specific way, He began to engage these men about their sins. The most natural and loving thing the God of the universe could do for the Pharisees (and for us) is to reveal sin and give the opportunity to turn away from the sin and towards ever-increasing joy. When religious people are confronted about sin in their lives, both biblically and in today’s culture, they can choose to do one of two things. They can either choose to turn away from their sin or they can begin to play games with the Lord. Because we tend to be churched people, we don’t want to walk away from God entirely; we just want to do what we want to do while still feeling secure. 
This week we enjoyed an incredible celebration of the resurrection of Christ in both our Deep End Bible Study and in our corporate worship time. In our Luke study, we read through Luke 24 and discussed how to take this story and look at it on several levels. The first level, which is critical for our understanding of the deeper implications, is just to know and understand the story as it is laid out in the Bible for us. The apologetics (meaning, the systematic defense of Christianity using various types of proof) behind the resurrection of Christ are fascinating and overwhelming to opposition. 
This week in our Luke study we covered the wealthy young ruler who asked Jesus how he could have eternal life. Â Jesus’ answer was surprising for those of us who already know how to have eternal life: we know that in order to have eternal life, we accept Jesus’ sinless life as a sacrifice for our own sins and He becomes both our Savior and our Lord. Â In essence, the entire thing is a heart issue. Â In our hearts, we crown Jesus as Lord and accept the truth that our own flawed, sinful nature will never be good enough to earn right standing before God. Â We know this rich young ruler was a religiously devout person and that he had followed the law to the letter. 
In class this week, we looked at three very familiar verses in which Jesus encourages the children to come to Him. Â He then follows with a deeply important statement: “Anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.” (Luke 18:17) Â This verse is critical for our understanding. Â If we must receive the kingdom of God like a child in order to enter it, then how do children receive things?
