Receive - 2022’s Word (Bot9 #315)
There are all kinds of things that we believe are in the Bible that really aren’t. For example, an apple in the Garden of Eden. It’s never called by a certain name, it’s just fruit. We absorb things in the culture as believing people, but we always need to know the scriptures well enough to attribute it appropriately.
Around the holidays and the practice of gift giving, we will utter the phrase, “it is better to give than to receive.” Where does this come from and is it in the Bible? In this case it is, but the location might be surprising. The phrase comes from Paul quoting something he believes Jesus to have said. I say it that way because I’m assuming Paul learned this from the disciples who walked with Jesus for three years, something Paul himself did not do. While speaking to the Ephesian elders in Acts 20:35, Paul says, ”In all things I have shown you that by working hard in this way we must help the weak and remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’”
It’s interesting how we have taken so many of the things that Paul said through his ministry and epistles to the early church and warped them to fit our American culture. Please understand, I’m not blaming Paul. The guy was beaten up enough in his day. But in our American Christian culture, we have warped this idea of giving being more blessed than receiving. We work so much to give of ourselves. We’re always on the go. Even when we’re sitting, our minds are on the go in front of one device or another absorbing content. We’re constantly giving of ourselves. So many of the things that get screwed up in the world and in our lives are a result of a desire to give out of warped understandings and not from pure inspiration.
Specific to athletics and the Christian walk, which is where I live and operate every day, I see people who are constantly trying to do, to grow, and to be active. It’s a part of the ethos of the athletic culture. Ethos is well defined as “the characteristic spirit of a culture, era, or community as manifested in its beliefs and aspirations.” We are constantly giving in sports in hopes of receiving something on the other end - a win, a championship, a scholarship. We don’t stop and think about how it’s in the giving of the effort that we are blessed. We seem to believe that it’s in the receiving of the thing down the road that we will be blessed. It’s the age-old idea of loving and embracing the journey (giving), and being less concerned with the final destination (receiving).
But what if there’s more to receiving as well? In praying, reflecting, and thinking about my word for 2022, it’s become obvious to me that I’m far more inclined to give a lot of myself than I am to receive what the Father has for me. His hints to me around this idea came throughout this past month. It started as a pastor told his story in a book I’m reading on spiritual formation. He went on a sabbatical and he recounted how long it took him to get his heart into a posture of receiving the love Jesus had for him. He wanted to do, do, do, to give more of himself. All Jesus wanted him to do in the moment was receive. As he did, he was overwhelmed to the point of tears. He continued in the process and continued to deepen his time with the Lord. Another instance when this idea came blaring at me was during our Christmas Eve church service, we sang “Joy to the World,” as so many of us did this past season. This lyric stood out to me: “Joy to the world! The Lord is come, Let earth receive her King!” Receive her King. Not do something to earn it, receive it. Receive the love that has been lavished upon us by the Father through the infant born to us.
This is the change I’m after in 2022. My word for 2022 is going to be ‘receive’ and I want that to be my heart posture for the whole year. I want to receive the love Jesus has for me. I want to receive His inspiration and work from there. I’m starting to believe it’s the only way to stay in step with the Spirit. It’s not by giving more, it’s by receiving more. I contend that by focusing a year on receiving more, the fruits of the Spirit will come to life and against the things of the Spirit there is no law.
“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.” - Galatians 5:22-25 NIV
There was a Spanish nun in the 1500s named Teresa of Avila who helped us understand the shift that occurs between our effort and God’s grace as we grow closer to Him. She uses the analogy of a garden, the garden of our souls.
Teresa describes four conditions, called the “Four Waters,” four ways in which the garden of our soul is “watered” by the Holy Spirit:
The garden of the soul, she says, can be watered in several manners.
The first, drawing the water up from a well by use of a bucket, entails a great deal of human effort.
The second way, cranking a water wheel and having the water run through an aqueduct, involves less exertion and yields more water.
The third entails far less effort, for in it the water enters the garden as by an effluence from river or stream.
The fourth and final way is the best of all: as by a gentle but abundant rainfall the Lord himself waters the garden and the soul does not work at all.
My hope for 2022 is to receive the rainfall, and absorb God’s goodness and beauty in the process. As a doer and a giver, I’ll fail often. But this is the power of having a single word to remind us of our focus for a year. I hope you’ll join in and choose a word to focus your year as well.