Psalm 37:11 “But the meek will inherit the land and enjoy great peace.” Psalm 37:34 “Wait for the LORD and keep his way. He will exalt you to inherit the land.” Inheritance from God is a privilege, not something we get because we demand it, nor can we manipulate favor out of God’s hand. Some seem to think more highly of themselves than they are in that they can declare blessing out of God’s hands, or prophecy prosperity out of His pockets making sure to get the words right like they’re speaking some magical incantation. i’ve heard people pray out loud and then insist everyone say “In Jesus Name” together while making a circular motion with their hands like their sealing a pact of some sort. i think that’s just crazy presumptuous, pretentiously assumptive, and arrogantly taking advantage of the privilege the Lord affords us to come to His throne. We can’t name it out of His hand, nor can we claim it from Him in order that we would “make” God give us what we want.

One of the laws of sound doctrine is we must take the entire Bible into account, cover to cover, not just select scriptures which make us look and sound good. Jesus said in John 8:44 “You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desire.” John makes the same distinction in 1 John 3:10, saying “This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are”. Sounds harsh maybe to some, but there is a difference that is important to point out the distinctions. i’m not creating the difference, God is. Those scriptures are being quoted because, within ourselves, we must draw a distinction of who belongs to God and who does not in order to see privilege as God extends it to us, and pretense as we have extended privilege to ourselves. Let me say that again, that is “privilege as God extends it to us, and pretense as we have extended privilege to ourselves.”

To those who have entered in to a relationship with God, there are amazing and wonderful privileges that come to us, and for those who have NOT entered into a relationship with God and have refused His gift, the only privilege hell will grant is the right to suffer…and that’s a privilege i, personally, do not want. Even at that, let it be known God gives wisdom and mercy, even to those who are not His. Matt5:45, “…for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.”

i’m Social Porter  and this is Outposts.

The topic is “Of Privilege And Pretense”. Inheritance is a privilege, not something we get because we demand from God, or practice to manipulate favor out of God’s hand. i’d like to briefly discuss privilege as God extends it to us, and pretense as we have extended privilege to ourselves.

Pretense. People seem to love, i say, love personal titles. We love qualifiers and titles which, hopefully, cause the world around us to highly esteem us and think we are worthy of being listened to – maybe even so we will believe we are worthy to be heard in our own ears. We need to hear God more than men. What if God asked you to lose your title and quit telling people your name? Would you still be willing to do what He called you to? Or would the need for the dirty water of men’s praise and being validated in the eyes of other people prevent you from continuing? Let us weigh that one well within our own hearts.

A minimum of 5 times, John simply refers to himself as the “one whom Jesus loved.” John never named his title, someone else did that. i figure he must have been really irritating for some religious people to talk to. i also think it would be safe to assume that he was the premiere apostle on earth and was the last man alive who knew and walked with Jesus, but yet you probably couldn’t get the guy to tell you his name much less his title. i can hear it now, “What’s your name?” “Doesn’t matter.” “Where are you from?” “Doesn’t matter.” “You’re the last apostle, how do you feel about that?” “It’s irrelevant.” “Well, what is relevant and what does matter?” (1John5:20) “That you know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true. And that you are in Him who is true– his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life.” 1 John 5:20 was what was important to him, not his entitlements or privilege among the brethren.

The titles we get for ourselves make us larger than we are. i figure only the world and religious people need a title.

i am amazed at the people who demand to be called “pastor”, “apostle”, or “bishop”, “teacher”, or “prophet”. They gladly name themselves. It’s almost as if the Lord did not say over them, “This is my beloved Son, hear Him”, so they say it over themselves. Is it not enough for those people that God has called them? Is it not enough for them to simply be who they are? Proverbs 27:2, “Let another praise you, and not your own mouth; someone else, and not your own lips.”

i recently heard of people giving themselves titles like, “panoramic prophet”, “all encompassing prophet”, “comprehensive teacher”, “master prophet”, “super-prophet”, “dread apostle”, or “super mystic”, and then there comes a guy trumping all those by naming himself, “Pastor to the prophets”. When will it end? This is absurd. Jesus, even Jesus the Son of God said of Himself in John 5:31, “If I testify about myself, my testimony is not valid.” Isn’t it enough that God has given us the privilege of exercising His gifts, which are supposed to be used to glorify Him and bring forth the Kingdom of God? His spiritual gifts are a privilege, not used in pretension to create a facade of greatness for ourselves.

When privilege becomes entitlement, when we assume we are more than we are because we “deserve” glory, then pretense is revealed and our God-given-privilege becomes an aberration. Do we think God owes us something and we deserve favor because we have “the right kind of history”?

 Pretentious people are folks who portray themselves as those with unwarranted, or exaggerated importance, worth, or stature. Pretense is when we extend privilege to ourselves, by ourselves and for ourselves, being in our own eyes more than we are. With pretention comes large egos, seeming narcissism, and a compulsion to be “right”, there is a need to be seen.

i believe we often operate in pretentious faith when we feel small, invalidated, and we need to be larger in our own eyes than we are. Romans 12:3, “Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you.”

i’m not talking about entitlements like Social Security, which most of us have paid into and are entitled to the pensions of the plan; or Medicare and Medicaid which our taxes have supported and we are entitled to the benefit. Those type of entitlements were meant as a safety net for the needy, not as a prop.

To quote Ezra Bayda, “Perhaps the most basic belief underlying all of our feelings of entitlement, our ‘if onlies,’ and even our illusions, is the belief that life should please us, that life should be comfortable. All of our resistance to life is rooted in our wanting life to be pleasing, comfortable, and safe. When life doesn’t give us what we want — you know, the job that isn’t satisfying, the relationship that isn’t quite working, the body that ages and breaks down — we resist. Our resistance can manifest as anger, fear, or self-pity, and even depression … but whatever forms it takes, it blocks our ability to experience true contentment. We see our discomfort as the problem: yet it’s the belief that we can’t be happy if we’re uncomfortable that is much more of a problem than the discomfort itself.” Wow. Did you catch that? The belief that we can’t be happy if we’re uncomfortable, which is much more of a problem than the discomfort itself.

Often, in our nation, it seems only conquering heroes and title holders count, and it’s okay to do whatever it takes to advance our position. The church says, “Oh, that is the worldly way of living”, but i see the same pretentious behavior going on in my own people who are more than willing to get themselves a position and a title when God doesn’t move fast enough for them.

We tell ourselves that we deserve happiness and to always have things go our way. We often act like a bunch of spoiled little kids when we don’t get what we want. Many of us, when we were kids, expected our parents to chauffeur us around from one place to another. Were we thankful? No; we expected adults to meet our needs; were we were convinced they owed us special treatment? Absolutely, maybe not consciously, but the attitude was still there. And when they didn’t do what we wanted, we cried out demanding: “It’s not fair!”

My friends, God’s appointment will come around to us, but in His time, not ours. He will give us a position and a title if we’ll wait, but it will be on His time schedule and His terms, not ours. And finally, a quote from John Wimbur, founding member of the Vineyard Church, he once said, “Let me see first how the Holy Spirit is using you before we give you a badge defining your place in the Body of Christ.”

Many in Christianity act as if they deserve preferential treatment, like spoiled children demanding their rights of their parents. It isn’t that we have the privilege of preferential treatment by God as His people, but more that we demand our rights from God. For us, as the Body of Christ, to be so involved with ourselves and our agenda and entitlements that we let honesty, truth, and justice ebb away from us really does not speak well of us.

More than a few seem to operate under the pretense that they, themselves, have earned everything and success is entirely of their own making. Really? i believe we take God’s blessing of privilege and twist it into the pretense that we did it all by ourselves.

For me, i’m old enough to surely know one thing about entitlement and that is it doesn’t give up without a fight. On a side note, pretentious privilege and expectations seem to go hand in hand, and you know what is said about exaggerated expectations, that most of the time they are premeditated resentments. Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with expectations. We live with it, and it’s part of having hope, but when we got twisted thinking which feeds our twisted expectations, we’re absolutely bound to be disappointed.

So fight we must. Where do we get the idea that we deserve benefits and favor because we have the “right kind of history”, as if God somehow owes us power, blessing, honor, wealth, or life with a lack of conflict? Don’t you know, we’ve all been at war, in some form or another, all our lives, so much, so long, we’ve never known anything but war, and for us to have a life without conflict would be a life in “perfect peace”, which even with the best of us, is an astounding rarity most of us have never known. As long as there’s a devil and we wear skin, it’s going to be a fight.

Shalom does mean peace but it does not mean a lack of conflict or violence. In John 16:33, Jesus said, “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”

Privilege. God gives us life through His Son Jesus. Life, real life, not life according to the world. It is an exclusive privilege afforded us by God.

Peace is a privilege from God, and we can’t get it because we have declared ourselves or set ourselves up on a podium. Galatians 1:3, “Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.”

Wisdom is a privilege God gives to all who ask. James 1:5, “If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him.”

Faith is a privilege. It’s a something that is real and without it we can’t please God. Hebrews 11:6, “but without faith it is impossible to please God.” Is the faith in me something i drummed up? No. We can’t go to the store and buy faith. In order to drum it up i would have to have some ability to drum with, and i have no such thing in me. Faith is an exclusive privilege afforded us by the blood of Jesus.

Justification is a privilege. Romans 5:1, “Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Being holy because He is holy is a privilege not to be taken lightly.

Grace is a privilege – it isn’t something we demand from God or manipulate Him into giving. We can’t fast it out of His hand, demand it or declare it from His wealth, nor can we tithe enough or do good works do get some. The privilege of grace was not available under the law, but by Jesus Christ as it is written in John 1:17, “For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.”

Those are just a few things which are a privilege extended us exclusively by God.

One definition of privilege is “to be exempted”, and in our case and all who call on the Name of Jesus, we are exempted from the penalty and verdict of death, delivered from the law and corruption.

Salvation, Redemption and mercy are a privilege; We are afforded the privilege of reconciliation – which means God balanced our books; and probably the highest privilege is the Love of God which abides with us forever. Here’s one: being given a seat at the marriage supper of the Lamb, talking, eating, and laughing with God is an amazing privilege! God did not HAVE to give us those things, but because He loves us, He grants us the privilege of sharing in His Kingdom. i don’t ever want to take God’s extension of privilege for granted. Now this may seem odd to say but according to Heb12:5-8, part of the privilege of being part of God’s family is … being tested. i have read somewhere that, unlike the Egyptian’s perspective which said that the heart was weighed after death, the Lord continually evaluates and improves our hearts that in the end we may come forth as gold. It is a privilege to be tried in the refiner’s fire.

It is a privilege to live our lives in the loving kindness and favor of God. The Lord is the center and source of creativity in the universe, and it is a privilege and honor that He shares His resources with us, and shares His inheritance with us. It is an honor that i can’t hardly get my head around. i mean, can you imagine that, the King of the Universe, upon repentance He honors us who were dishonored by sin by making a way for us to come clean, be forgiven, and to come home with honor? He even shares His name with us! Friends, it is a privilege to be placed in leadership in the body of Christ, not so we can get wealthy, not so we can lord it over the sheep, but for the purpose of advancing the Kingdom of God. Not your denomination, not the number of titles you demand others recognize about you, but to advance the Kingdom of God.

Ultimately it is a privilege and eternal honor to know the unknowable. He was known to Martin Luther as “deus absconditus” (ˌdāy-oos-ˌäp-ˈskȯn’-di-ˌtoos\), deus revelatus” (ray-vay-lah’-toos) … Literally meaning, “the hidden God” and “the revealed God,” respectively. The phrases, originally used together by Martin Luther, speak of the paradoxical situation of a hidden God revealing himself and a revealed God hiding himself. For Luther, the unknowable God is revealed in Christ; yet in the cross of Christ, God’s true glory is hidden to human wisdom.

The Lord did not HAVE to reveal Himself to us, it was His good pleasure to grant us the privilege of meeting Him, and it should never, ever be taken that He owes us a ministry, a title, or a position with power and authority.

It isn’t that we have taken, but more that He has given. Psalm 116:12 “What shall I render to the LORD For all His benefits toward me?” Let us be glad and thankful we get the privilege of all His benefits and not stretch our privilege into presumption and pretense. Amen, and think about it.

 Privilege: When God gives us a place and a title, it is given with authority and with His endorsement. Know this – with God’s endorsement, we have the power and authority to do whatsoever He has given us to do. His calling and gifts are a privilege.

Pretense: When we make our own place and give ourselves titles … it is thin, self-exalting, self-important, self–authenticating, and self-validating … ultimately, it’s all about, me, me, me – where I go, what I see, how I feel, what I do, what I say, what I want … me, me, me, always controlling the narrative. Whether we are dictating what others are allowed to talk about, or depreciating ourselves in our conversations where we are the focus, it is still all about ourselves. That is pretentious. Is that really who we want to be as the people of God, or does it just sound like a continuation of pretentious worldly thinking?

i’m Social Porter and this has been Outposts,

The idea is to go with God, not get what we want. It is a privilege to serve in the court of the Great King Jesus before all the host of Heaven. Be strong and courageous, take your dreams seriously, listen carefully for the Lord, it is life and peace for those who have ears to hear. Amen!

After four years of a man pursuing the Lord for a vision of what He, the Lord wanted to do, it finally happened and God gave him a vision and multiple confirmation as to the new direction. So the man gets rid of all his stuff, packs up his little remaining possessions, and moves across the country. Suddenly, the man finds himself in a place he does not know, with people he does not recognize, to do something he has no idea about. He wonders about employment and how to pay the bills; the culture is very different than where he came from, they talk different, use different words to reference similar things, even food products are different…it’s still food, but very little of it is anything he’s familiar with; the air is different, dust is different, the water is different, food is different, the bacteria is different, the land and soil are different, tax structure is different. But yet he is sure that this is what God has asked him to do. Uprooted and obscure, a seemingly inconsequential outsider, this fellow is so very uncomfortable. And now that he is at the destination the Lord has given him, he finds himself with one huge, over-arching, ever present question: Now what? And all is silent.

Do you find yourself in similar discomfort? The circumstances may be different, but the discomfort is the same.

It would seem our nation is a country of uncomfortable people…frustrated and disquieted in our hearts. Some for good reasons, some for not.

Maybe God is gently getting our attention and we, as a nation, are simply, and quite probably, hard of hearing. What do you think? …. and i’ll be right back.

In all the Bible, one of the most uncomfortable people, in my opinion, was Naomi, who’s story is revealed in the book of Ruth. Sure, Job was uncomfortable, but it was for a short while, whereas Naomi had a life of being uncomfortable. It seemed for the longest time nothing was working out. When situation after situation arose, i’d bet, at some point, she stared off into the distance, sighed, and thought, “Great! What’s next? Locusts?”

She, her husband and two sons lived in Bethlehem, Judah during a famine, times were tough. They decided to move to Moab, evidently things seemed better there. During the next 10 years in Moab, her husband died; her two sons marry two Moabite girls, then the sons die. She is left with no means of getting by, and everything about the big plans to prosper in Moab have just fallen flat. Her husband and two sons have died and she is left with only herself and two daughters in law. Now what?

They heard God was giving food to her home people in Judah, so she and the two daughters in law set out for home. On the way back to Judah, evidently things were so difficult, and she was so uncomfortable, she told the two daughters-in-law to go home. Life was very bitter. They were all so very uncomfortable. One daughter-in-law agreed and went home, but the other, Ahhh….Ruth was the other, and she said, “Where you go I go, your people will be my people, and your God will be my God.” Ruth 1:20-21, Naomi’s heart was, “….Don’t call me Naomi; call me Bitter or Mara. The Strong One has dealt me a bitter blow. I left here full of life, and GOD has brought me back with nothing but the clothes on my back.” Can you relate in some way to this? Maybe you left a home or job, full of life, convinced you were following God’s lead off on a great adventure, and came back with nothing,  just nothing but the ashes of your dreams and the continued discomfort of your circumstances. Yea, i did that. i moved us all to a far away place, and came back 9 months later with my tail between my legs.

What do we do when we’re in the long night of our discomfort? It feels like our ship is sinking, the wind and ocean are howling and raging, and God is silent silent silent. Tough question…honestly, i don’t even like to think about it….it’s just a very uncomfortable question.

Jonah is another person who had a time in his life of being extremely uncomfortable. i think Jonah was a real grouch, never the less, God gave Jonah a job, go preach to Ninevah. Now you may think this is a great thing, and it was, but it was also something which terrified Jews of the time. Ninevah was well known for it’s hatred and abuse of Jews, even torturing them just for entertainment, and i think Jonah wanted God to simply kill them all, without giving them of any sort of hope. i mean, what if Ninevah repented and God saved that horrible nation of horrible people? So, Jonah ran away from God. Yea right, like anyone can actually escape God.

Jonah found a ship going far away. He was so uncomfortable with God’s request and his personal circumstances that he left everything behind, got on a ship and headed out to anywhere but where God was, or so he thought.

Well, everything about Jonah’s life got worse and even more uncomfortable. The more uncomfortable he became, the more uncomfortable things got. A storm of storms blew up, the ship and it’s crew were in danger of dying at sea, and i guess in an effort to escape God all together, Jonah resigned himself to die. He told the sailors it was all his fault. In Jonah 1:15 “Then they took Jonah and threw him overboard, and the raging sea grew calm.”

It seems Jonah figured dying was better than being as uncomfortable as he was….a sort of suicide in a way, only he was getting the sailors to do it for him. It was a permanent fix to a temporary problem, when quite probably, all Jonah had to do was STOP his running and face God.

When we are uncomfortable, so often, i think we attribute that discomfort to our doing something wrong, or God is pressuring us to repent or something like that. On the other hand, it is entirely possible our discomfort has nothing to do with doing something wrong and everything to do with simply being in the Lord’s transition. Regardless, if you can’t out run the difficulty you’re in, stop running, turn and embrace it. We’re going to live with it until we deal with it, and pretending an unfortunate situation isn’t really there, doesn’t solve anything. Actually, if anything, that pretending thing we do only increases our discomfort.

Is that, as a nation, what’s going on with us? We need to stop, STOP what we’re doing and face God. You know, i heard a man say once that God will get our attention, one way or another. He’ll work to get our attention in our spirit, and if that doesn’t work, he’ll work to get our attention in our minds, and if that doesn’t work, he’ll get our attention in our flesh even to the shedding of blood, but one way or another, He WILL get our attention.

So many people are looking for work, and these days there’s a lot of work available, so they can no longer say they aren’t working because there isn’t any, but now must be honest to tell the truth, which is “i want to get what i want and i don’t want to work for it.” A very uncomfortable place to be i’d say.

Many are uncomfortable at church, and uncomfortable even in their best chair. They are uncomfortable in their beds, in their kitchens, sitting outside, with friends, without friends…it’s almost as if all of life feels like wading through mud. We plant 100 and reap 10, we extend ourselves to 10,000, and only 50 respond. We leave a difficult situation and shortly find ourselves, in yet another difficult situation. We get into a conflict with a friend or at work, and we don’t resolve the conflict, we just leave it to stand hoping it will simply go away, and of course, it doesn’t really go away. It just changes shape to morph into yet another conflict, which we’ll have to live with until we deal with. Many sail from storm to storm, so often, the storms seem to be normal operating conditions.

Imagine each life situation as a brick. One brick of one unresolved situation maybe inconsequential, but when it is many bricks of many unresolved situations, what was once just a brick is now a wall, walling the world out, but also walling ourselves in. There are two sides to every wall. God calls to us and we’re not listening…. The phone is ringing but we pretend to not hear.

We have become a nation of uncomfortable people who tend to want to move away from or avoid what we don’t understand…. many times rather than ask an uncomfortable question, we simply smile, keep quiet, and move away. In our avoiding the Lord we have become increasingly uncomfortable. We eat but we’re not satisfied; we store up and conserve but in the end nothing is saved; it’s almost like we plant but don’t get to harvest; we do the work of crushing grapes but don’t get to drink the wine. We invent machines and tools to help us save time in order to have extra time, but in the end we still seem to have no time. We are frustrated and very uncomfortable.

What do you think is up with that? And what are we going to do about it?

James 3:17 “But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere.” It would be simply brilliant if we stopped what we were doing and turned to face the Lord. It just seems wise to find out what He’s got to say. Not so we can shut Him up, but because all our own efforts are getting us no where…. like Jonah, we need to stop running away and meet with Him. i really believe the discomfort will continue until we turn ourselves to meet with God Almighty.

Mind you, i don’t believe God has sent work into our hearts, that we would labor mindlessly as some sort of vindictive punishment, that is not His character. i fully believe if there is laboring and work in our hearts it is because we have put ourselves there. Listen though, that doesn’t take into account that in the middle of transition, it is highly likely there’s going to be struggles and expasperations, ‘cause there are. i’m talking about our evading issues, running from God and metaphorically plugging our ears singing “La-la-la-la” to drown out the call of God.  It is more that He has simply allowed us to have our determined self-focus, self-determination, and self-declaring which all is an effort to leave Him out of our lives.

An old horseman had a very difficult horse once. i asked him what he was going to do to persuade the horse to yield and do things the man’s way. He said, “I’m going to simply give him his head, and let him run square into the law.” He did exactly that the next time the horse wouldn’t yield, and ended up deep in the most awful briar patch you ever saw, cut, poked, and frustrated. After a couple times like that, the horse and the man got along just fine. Funny how that works.

God has given this nation it’s head and will let us go as we insist until all our efforts completely come to a grinding, radically uncomfortable halt. Do we r-e-a-l-l-y think we can ignore the Lord? Do we really think He’s just going to take a passive-submissive posture towards the very creation He created? C’mon, who are we kidding?

Is it possible, we in America are so uncomfortable with life that we just don’t notice the world around us?

Let me complete the story which i began all this with…the man in the first part of this conversation stopped his own actions, prayed morning, noon, and night…sought the Lord with all he had, and for all he was worth….in his looking for the Lord, God has given him a vision of what’s next. Life is largely still a puzzle, but things are moving, not so fast he’s lost his way, but bit at a time as the Lord grows his character to fit the next appointment. Inch by inch, life is a cinch. Yard by yard it’s very hard. We need a vision of where we’re going so we’ll know how to be where we are. Think about it!

Our time is up and we’re at the end of the road for this production of Outposts, a semi-live broadcast from the late night cascading banks of the Ockluhwahhah River. i’m Social Porter sitting on the deck with Tony, Paul and a late evening cup of coffee, talking and laughing, cutting up and watching the river flow by. Tonight, as usual, has been brought to you by Living In His Name Ministries, Area 22 Guitars, Miss Jackson at the DeLuxe Beauty Shop, Frank Edney at the Hot Spot, Bruce and Mildred Harrell, White Knuckle Studios, and Trinity Bakers, where there’s always something good in the oven.

Music was by the Pete Minger Quartet, The Brecker Bothers, Dissection, Bill Bruford, and Jazz for a Rainy Day.

Isaiah 51:1 “Listen to me, you who pursue righteousness and who seek the LORD: Look to the rock from which you were cut and to the quarry from which you were hewn;” Acts 17:27-28 “…so that they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us; ²⁸ for in Him we live and move and have our being…”.

The Lord is our direction, He alone is our comfort, and in Christ alone will we ever in this life gain the peace we need. Let us cease from our own works and seek Him. Just stop from our own doings and stubborn way…. turn and face God. It’s time to inquire of the Lord, don’t you agree?