To He Much Is Given....

Blog entry: 

Dominick Baruffi

When I was a child, my dad made a habit of coming into the room my brother and I shared just before bedtime. He would tuck his two boys in, read to us, and pray over us as Dante and I slowly faded from the land of the living. Almost every time he sat down with us, my dad would repeat the same phrase from Luke’s gospel. Lately I’ve taken to calling it the Baruffi family motto, so frequently was it repeated in our house those days.

 Sitting by our bedside, my dad would remind us: “To he much is given, much is required.”

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The words of my father seemed to be ringing in my ears as Nate preached from the stage on Sunday. I had been given much…but what had I done with it? Haven’t all my resources gone towards making my life as easy as possible? Just like the third man in the parable, I often conclude that, despite whatever “talents” I possess, I am not especially talented, and am therefore exempt from the commands of the Master. For surely, if God wanted to really use me, He would have also given me greater resources, greater abilities, greater opportunities to do great things? I tell myself this in order to justify any action I take that I know doesn’t fall in line with the way God is leading me. If much has not been given, then much is not required.

I don’t have nearly the time nor the space to tell you how hypocritical this line of thinking is.

What is needed, I think, is a new definition of “much.” You and I define it as “whoever has the most.” The Master defines it as “whatever I have given you.”

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Dallas Willard, one of my favorite writers on the spiritual life, once wrote that being a disciple of Jesus means learning from Jesus to live my life as he would live life if he were I. You might want to read that back again. I like Willard here because an important distinction is made; that is, the question is not so much “what would Jesus do?” but rather, “Given these talents, limitations and resources, how would Jesus respond?”

Here’s another way of putting it. You live within a very specific context: you have a job, a family, friends, classmates, etc. You are also equipped with a very particular skill set, regardless of how you may feel about the quality of those skills. The question that demands an answer from you daily is this: if Jesus were me, how would He go about my business? How would He schedule my day? How would he do my job? How would he spend my money? Keep in mind that while Jesus operates without limits, you do not share His ability to do so. You are limited in the time you have, the tasks you can accomplish, and the people you can impact. How would Jesus respond to the particular situations you encounter if He spent a day in your shoes?

I believe that we will come to think differently about the gifts given to us by the Master when we truly come to know the Master. I recently heard John Piper say there is a universe of difference between knowing about God and knowing God. He’s right. Take this word to heart today: know God. He has given us everything we need for life and godliness through the very knowledge of Himself as revealed in Scripture. Pursue the knowledge of God that leads to a transformed life, for that is the life we were designed for in the first place. The one who knows the Master’s heart knows what to do with what he has been given.

Hey...He Was Talking About Me!

I think I would have rather had a tooth pulled than write this post. In fact, I did everything possible to avoid writing this all week, including reorganizing my entire sock drawer (which, though very important, was far from pressing). I did this primarily because I did not want to relive Sunday's sermon. I’ve heard teachings and lectures on the Seven Woes of the Pharisees before, and honestly I was expecting more of the same going into the service. But Nate’s message was not more of the same. It was personal. It wasn’t about the leaders of Jesus’ day. It was about me.

Because I am a Pharisee.

I am guilty of every charge Jesus brought against the religious elite of his time. I am selfish, blind, arrogant and proud. I am full of all manner of lust, greed, slander and envy. And this is not hyperbole, friends. I see this play out in the decisions I make each and every day: decisions to gossip about someone to be part of the crowd; decisions to be showy when being discreet would do the job; decisions to ignore God altogether because why bother when I’ve got me?

I am a Pharisee.

And this is why I wanted no part of reliving Sunday’s sermon. Because I get it. I'm a Pharisee. I'm horrible and selfish and want all the glory for myself. I'm a Pharisee, ok? What do you want from me? I know I'm a sinner and guilty on all accounts. I live with it every day. I don't want to sin, yet I repeatedly choose to do so. And there are days where I have thought that I am never going to change, that I should just give up altogether because what’s the point?

The Judge has spoken. The gavel has dropped. The ruling is clear: “Guilty.”

What do I do now? How do I respond to that, other than “yep?”

It took me until midweek to realize my mistake. While all this is true, it is only half the story.

There’s more.

The beauty of the Gospel is there is always more grace. Just like the prodigal, we have a Father that is forever waiting at the gates for us, ready to run out to meet the poor, disheveled soul who thought life would be better if he did things on his own. I cannot tell you how many times I have been that poor, disheveled soul. It seems like a billion, billion times. And every time I come crawling back to God, embarrassed to even show my face to the Father I so quickly deserted, He does what he has done so many times over: He embraces me. He takes me back. I am unworthy to receive Him, but He does not count my sin against me. That penalty has been paid.

All because of Jesus.

This is the Gospel we claim as ours. Even in our sin, we can confidently approach God because we come as sons and daughters. Most of the time, we’re too distracted by our sin to remember this. That’s exactly what the enemy wants. As long as the focus is your sin, you are of no threat to him. But instead of spending all my time focusing on my sin, I’m learning to spend all my time focusing on Jesus. Sin is my problem, but Jesus made it his problem by dying in my place. And grace covers a multitude of sin.

I am a Pharisee. But by the grace of God, that is not all that I am.

Blog entry by: Dominick Baruffi

A Christmas the Grinch Can't Steal

"Spend less." It's easy to say, isn't it? Rolls off the tongue quickly, almost effortlessly. It's so simple that it's almost trite this time of year. To tell you the truth, if I hadn't heard it from the pulpit on Sunday, I might've been tempted to dismiss it altogether. Sure, I'd tell you, I'd love to spend less. Nobody wants to be wasteful. But I have gifts to buy for so many people, and there's so little time to get all that shopping in, and of course I have to get the perfect gift for everyone, and really how much should I be spending on gifts anyway? And then I walk into church and we start talking about giving to the poor instead, and I just feel guilty about Christmas altogether. It's like I can’t win, no matter what I do.

I imagine you've felt this same hopelessness before. And after Sunday, I'm left pondering a question that continues to bug me year after year: how can we ever hope to practice "Spend Less" in a healthy, responsible way?

Any time Jesus wanted to convey a truth about how to live, he told a story. He could have given us a field manual, or a systematic theology textbook. But he knew that the best way to teach us about life was to speak in terms of things we already knew, like construction or gardening. I like that He did this because it’s easier for me to follow, and stories are way more interesting than textbooks anyway.

 So let me tell you a story.

It's one of my favorite Christmas stories, and one I'm sure you're familiar with: "How the Grinch Stole Christmas," by Dr. Seuss. It's a simple story that asks a simple question: what happens when there aren’t any presents on Christmas? You know the tale: the mean, old Grinch steals all the presents in Whoville on Christmas night, only to find them singing together on Christmas morning, "without any presents at all!" This baffles the Grinch. And at first, it ought to baffle you, too. The Grinch has taken everything even resembling Christmas: "all the ribbons, the wrappings, the trimmings, the trappings." No presents. No food. It's all gone. And yet the Whos wake up singing.

Why? What's left to sing about? “Every Who down in Whoville, the tall and the small” joins hands and sings the one truth of Christmas together. So what are they singing? Well, it didn’t have anything to do with sleigh bells or shopping, I can tell you that. Because if all you have to sing about on Christmas is presents, decorations, and the "Christmas spirit," then you have a Christmas that the Grinch can steal. Christmas has to be about something bigger than presents, bigger even than your loved ones, for it to inspire you to sing all by itself.

Which is why I'm inclined to think the Whos were singing something you and I might know.

O come, all ye faithful,

Joyful and triumphant,

O come ye, o come ye to Bethlehem

Come and behold Him,

Born the King of angels

O come let us adore Him, O come let us adore Him

O come let us adore Him,

Christ the Lord.

That, friends, is a Christmas the Grinch can't steal. It's the truth that keeps the fire of Christmas burning: that hope doesn't come from a department store. That the King has come, in the most unlikely of fashions. And there's a rumor going around that He's going to change everything.

When we stop worrying about things that are less important than Christ, everything falls into place. That's the secret of "Spend Less." Like Jesus' friend Martha, we are worried about many things; "all the ribbons, the wrappings, the trimmings, the trappings." We can't begin to think about slowing down because how will anything get done if we don't work like crazy through the holiday? And I can promise you one thing: until we shift our values to focus on the "Christ" part of Christmas, we will always rest dissatisfied. We can make every excuse in the book, but it comes down to our willingness to follow Jesus into every area of life, even the uncomfortable places like how we spend our money.

So stop for a minute. Quit worrying about your to-do list. Remember to sing. Remind yourself why you’re doing all that cooking and cleaning. Spend time in the presence of God for an hour instead of browsing around endlessly on Amazon. Make room for Jesus every day, and watch Christmas take on a whole new life. Because when Christ comes, everything changes.

Blog entry by: Dominick Baruffi