Postmodernism

Our culture has bought into postmodern thought, which states (simply put) that there is no absolute truth. In postmodernism, our perceptions are reality. Such beliefs as situational ethics and relative truth come out of postmodern thought. We have so agreed with postmodernism, we feel ashamed to suggest there is absolute truth, and we are roundly condemned with some pejorative descriptor if we dare to state a truth as an absolute.

What are the consequences of accepting postmodernism? First, postmodern thought precludes faith. Some might suggest I can have faith in what I perceive, or in what I choose to believe, but I would respond that if it is relative, it is by definition not stable. Hebrews 11:1 describes faith as being sure and certain - in other words, absolute. My perception can change tomorrow. My perception can be altered by circumstances. As Scrooge so eloquently states in response to the question of why he doesn't trust his own senses, "because so many things effect them. You might be a blot of mustard, or a bit of underdone potato." If I rely on my perceptions to tell me where to center my faith, and my perceptions are unstable, my faith becomes groundless and, therefore, not faith at all.

Second, if we accept postmodernism, we are ultimately selfish. ("I me my mine" is our focus - after all, my perception is all there is.) The obvious consequence of selfishness is we can not have relationships. Of course, selfishness has become accepted in our culture as well (no wonder since we have blindly agreed to postmodern thought) and we sometimes forget the horrible consequences of being selfish, but without going into story after story or example after example, no faith means no trust, and no trust means no relationships, all of which are built on trust. Suffice it to say virtually all the pain in the world is due to our fundamental selfishness. Would you agree? Selfishness, again by definition, means there is no love. Without love, we are nothing.

Finally, postmodernism leads to chaos and irresponsibility. Do you see evidence of these responses in our culture? Chaos comes when there are no grounding principles, no absolutes, on which we agree and live by. When the line is a moving one, we can come to a place where anything can be justified, if it meets "my needs" or it is what "I want." We feel no remorse, just defensiveness and a sense of entitlement. Why shouldn't I have what I want? After all, I perceive it that way. Do you see our irresponsibility emerging here? But if everyone is operating on this same nebulous premise, my justified choices are going to naturally run afoul of your justified choices, because what YOU want doesn't always agree with what I want - and chaos ensues. It isn't MY responsibility, it is YOUR fault. From that chaos springs anger, rage and bitterness. We stand against each other instead of for each other, adversaries instead of allies. Relationships become meaningless and crumble. And in our culture, we are there, now.

No love, no relationships, no meaning, no certainty, no faith - that is what we are left with, if we live without truth...without Jesus - for He IS the truth. Even though this culture condemns the certainty of absolute truth, you need not apologize for your belief in Jesus and your assurance in that belief. Instead, feel sorrow for the lost sheep who have no ground on which to stand and no Shepherd to love and lead them.

What is Love?

What is love?

Love is often defined in terms of what we “do” but I believe we need to be careful not to confuse the evidence of love with love itself.  I Corinthians 13 tells us: “¹If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. ²If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. ³If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.

 ⁴Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. ⁵It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. ⁶Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. ⁷It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

 ⁸Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. ⁹For we know in part and we prophesy in part, ¹⁰but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. ¹¹When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. ¹²Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

 ¹³And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love” (NIV).

Verses 1-3 are clear that what we do, if not undergirded with love, is nothing.  Thus, love is not the action, love is the motivation; the heart of the matter.  Paul goes on to describe love based on the evidence of its presence, but again, he does not assume to define love here, just to describe love.

One thing we can know for sure is that love is vitally important.  Verses 8-13 explain that love is everything, the greatest thing, the only thing.

I am going to suggest that love is the presence of Jesus.  Further, I am suggesting that without Jesus, there is no love.   I am saying that love is not an action, it is His presence.  In addition, I am saying that love behaves as that presence behaves.

What does Scripture say about these contentions?  I John 4 states: “⁷Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. ⁸Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. ⁹This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. ¹⁰This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. ¹¹Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. ¹²No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us” (NIV). 

Alright, so we love each other because God’s love lives within us.  What does this love look like?  There may be a temptation, in a spirit of religiosity, to believe that means we accept everything from everyone and never confront anything or be negative about anything; however, I would ask if that is how Jesus acted in love?  In other words, we may know Jesus loved the woman caught in adultery when He showed her the meaning of grace.  But we sometimes forget He ended his conversation with her by saying go and leave your life of sin.  Was that also loving? And now I ask, did Jesus show love to the Pharisees?  He called them hypocrites along with assorted other descriptions (Matthew 23).  Perhaps that is a little tougher for us to see, but it is indeed love.  To allow them to continue in their hypocrisy without bringing it to their attention is not love.  In fact, I would call that choice the easy road, even a selfish road – it protects me and my reputation, but does not help them!

Galatians 6:1 states it clearly: “¹Brothers, if someone is caught in a sin, you who are spiritual should restore him gently. But watch yourself, or you also may be tempted” (NIV).   Similarly, II Timothy 2:24-26 says: “²⁴And the Lord's servant must not quarrel; instead, he must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful. ²⁵Those who oppose him he must gently instruct, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth, ²⁶and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will” (NIV).   II Timothy continues, in chapter 4, “¹In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I give you this charge: ²Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. ³For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear” (NIV). 

Which is the more loving action: to correct, rebuke, encourage, restore and instruct, or to accept, avoid, ignore, allow and excuse?  Is it loving to leave someone in the trap of the devil?

We are living in a time when people do not like correction, and don’t appreciate a rebuke.  This time is predicted in Scripture, again in II Timothy, in chapter 3:  “¹But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. ²People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, ³without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, ⁴treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God— ⁵having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with them.  ⁶They are the kind who worm their way into homes and gain control over weak-willed women, who are loaded down with sins and are swayed by all kinds of evil desires, ⁷always learning but never able to acknowledge the truth” (NIV, italics added for emphasis).  That kind of talk is often called “being judgmental.”  I contend, however, that it is not judgmental to recognize the presence of evil or the enemy’s deception.  What is judgmental is to equate someone’s nature to the presence of the enemy’s lies in them.  In other words, if I decide a person is a “bad” person, I am judging, and acting in the place of Jesus, Who is the judge of the living and the dead.  However, if I recognize that a person’s behavior is “bad” or “sin” and I confront and correct the behavior, and rebuke the enemy, I am using the discernment the Holy Spirit has provided, and I am loving that person enough to partner with God in the hope God will help them get out of the deception.  A diamond covered in coal is still a diamond; you just can’t see it for the blackness around it, and as a result the beauty of the diamond is lost, unless the coal can be chipped away.  It is love to stand with God against the enemy’s schemes, on behalf of the one you love, to help point out the coal.

A question I must ask myself is: do I love that person enough to risk their rejection, or is their acceptance of me more important to me than their best interest, maybe even their soul?  For in correcting a brother, there is always the possibility of rejection, and the rejection of the correction may take the form of a rejection of me, particularly if that person is in the middle of an enemy deception.  Jesus demonstrated selfless love in every area – with the prostitutes and tax collectors, and with the Pharisees and teachers of the law; with Peter and with Paul.  His confrontation and correction was just as much His love as was the cross. 

Proverbs 10:17 He who heeds discipline shows the way to life, but whoever ignores correction leads others astray.

Discipleship

CLF offers discipleship for anyone who seeks a deeper relationship with Jesus.  Primarily, we provide someone to pray with you individually, to guide you into a conversational relationship with Jesus.  We also offer small groups, classes, retreats and educational experiences to help lay the groundwork for experiencing an intimate relationship with Jesus.  These services are offered free of charge. You can contact us at 770-845-8130 to request discipleship or someone to speak to your group.  Be sure you indicate in your message what kind of services you desire.  Topics for presentation are available upon request.

We accept donations to support these ministries. If you would like to help, please send your donation to 1003 Oak Road Suite B, Lilburn, GA 30047.

Welcome!

Welcome to the Cody Lane Foundation blog. To introduce you to our purpose, I want to share Cody's story with you.

Cody went home with Jesus on August 23, 2007, at the age of 17. He had a degenerative neurological disorder, which affected his breathing, coordination, all fine and gross motor skills, balance and stamina. Because of his strong relationship with God, Cody always believed that he could do whatever he set his heart and mind to do...in spite of what the doctors, the world, circumstances and appearances might have said to the contrary. What he did is "impossible," according to everyone else but Jesus and Cody; and he did more in 17 years than many people accomplish in a lifetime.

He had his second dan black belt in Tae Kwon Do, and he went for two consecutive years to the Junior Olympics in Tae Kwon Do (in order to go you must finish in the top three in your state competition) where he received national recognition in the form of multiple medals for his indomitable spirit and perseverance. He played youth soccer, baseball, and football. He was the starting center on his football team, until he could no longer balance well enough to snap the ball, at which point he moved to tackle (!). From the area football program, he received a trophy called the Kyle Maynard award, given for overcoming severe obstacles to make a significant contribution to his team.

The pediatric neuro-opthamologist stated it was impossible with his uncontrolled jerky eye movements for him to read, yet he read extensively, including such works as the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and even the Silmarillion (a Tolkien history of middle earth...sort of like reading Chronicles in the Bible)...not like he was reading simple stuff here. In fact, he loved to read more than anything. The doctor said, flat out, it was a miracle. His academic testing showed him scoring a Masters degree level of comprehension in reading, in spite of being told he would struggle with doing any schoolwork at all. Because he had difficulty with the fine motor skill of writing, he did all of his math in his head. He was also quite a Bible scholar: even our adult Sunday school teacher used to email Cody for his insights into Scripture. At Cody's celebration service, this teacher read some of Cody's email responses to his difficult questions, and I believe even in that forum Cody was reaching people with the truth of Jesus. (If you are interested, you can go to www.restoredchristianity.com and click on “Cody’s Impact” to read some of the comments made at his service and “Lesson from the Bear” to read some of his wisdom. You can also check out the Cody Lane Foundation Facebook page, and watch the video that tells how Cody inspired a song, “Breathe for Me”).

Perhaps his two greatest, most profound accomplishments were the impact he had on others, and his continuing positive spirit and beliefs in the face of the deterioration caused by his disease. Over the last three years of his life, he was in the hospital ICU four times. On his first hospital visit, the doctors said he would not survive; when he survived, they said he would never leave the hospital without being attached to a respirator through a trach tube; when he walked out of the hospital with neither a respirator nor a trach tube, the staff said, "you have made believers out of us." On subsequent visits, the doctors and nurses basically asked Cody what he thought he could do and what he thought he needed from them; they could not continue to be harbingers of gloom and doom in the face of his strong beliefs. (I remember during that first ICU visit, a resident came in and talked about all the negative things Cody had to look forward to, and Cody told us to never let that doctor back into his room. "Get the negative out!" he yelled...and we did.)  In spite of the circumstances, Cody continued to have an unyielding positive spirit, smiling and joking (the nurses told us he was the very first child they had ever had in the hospital PICU who smiled around an intubation tube), still saying he could do anything, never giving up or giving in. He even climbed the stairs himself up to his room on his last night with us here and joked with me as he climbed that I was a golden mushroom - because I was a "fun-gi." Get it?

Once Cody asked me, several years ago quite matter-of-factly, if he was going to die. I told him; sure, we are all going to die. He said, no I mean now or really soon. I suggested he pray and ask Jesus what He had to say about it. So he did. When I asked him what Jesus had said, he responded, "Jesus told me to touch as many lives as I can, and then come on home." This belief governed his attitudes, his actions, and his focus. His last request of us was to establish the Cody Lane Foundation, to provide 1:1 and small group discipling for individuals who want to develop a deep, intimate relationship with Jesus like the one Cody had/has, which we were able to do. The first disciple started her journey just a couple of weeks before Cody went home. Now, many individuals are being discipled, a small group is underway, and three large metro-Atlanta area churches are now working with us toward developing meaningful discipleship in those churches. I know his life may have been short, but it most certainly had an impact.

Cody realized that Jesus' words to him are applicable to every believer. He did not fear or even think about dying, because he was too busy living in the kingdom already. One fun story that reveals his attitude toward physical death started as a quite frightening one: we were attending a football game, watching his older brother play against Ole Miss, and his dad took Cody to the bathroom. While in the bathroom, unbeknownst to his dad, Cody started choking and began to pass out. His dad, as we frequently did, called to him after a brief time, and hearing no answer, opened the door to find Cody almost passed out and turning blue. Once his dad cleared his breathing passage and gave him a little oxygen to recover, he asked Cody if he had been scared. Cody laughed (yes, laughed) and said, “No, I thought it was funny that I might die on the toilet like Elvis here in Mississippi.” He had a unique sense of humor!

We hear Bible verses like "all things are possible with God" and "My strength is made perfect in your weakness," and we think, 'what a nice concept; I agree with that.' Cody lived it. Of all the people I have ever known in my life, Cody was the best, most profound, and most genuine example I have ever seen of someone living Christ's teaching, "the Kingdom of God is within you." Cody did EVERYTHING through Christ who strengthened him. I pray you receive inspiration from his story, and as Jesus spoke to Cody, he will have touched some more lives.