Dale Cresap's blog

Are you a competitive person? Do you play to win? Is there any other way to play? But you can play to win and still enjoy the game if you lose. Have you ever wrestled with me? This is a different sort of engagement than playing a game of ball or cards. Most games are deliberately structured to be contests of equal conditions so the better player may prevail. But wrestling with me is obviously an unequal contest. Yet I’m still eager to engage in it. Are you? What would winning or losing look like in this context? Would you expect to win? Would you want to?

My word tells you to examine yourself and to judge yourself. How well do you do this? Can you be sure that you are doing this well? Can you accurately evaluate your performance at evaluating your performance? Is it possible that others can see things in you that you can’t see in yourself? Do you see things in the lives of people you know that they don’t appear to be aware of? Is there anyone that you trust enough to ask for an evaluation of things present in your life that aren’t working for you; that are holding you back?

How do you view me? One perspective says that I am a consuming fire. Does this seem far removed from your routine church activities, and your doctrine? Does it seem consistent with a view of me as harsh, exacting, judgmental, and punitive? Does it speak to retributive justice? Your doctrine also declares me to be a God of love and mercy. Do you wrestle with these two concepts to reconcile them? Could they both be true at once? Are you open to enlarging your thinking that it will encompass love as a consuming fire?

Are you persistent in pursuing answers for your questions? Are you asking the right questions? This part of the equation is not as often addressed as the matter of getting the answers right, but what is the value of the right answers for the wrong questions? What questions do you have? Do they address matters of eternal significance? Are they enduring questions for which it is not reasonable to expect definitive answers quickly? Are you comfortable living with unresolved questions?

How do you view me? This is an important question because it influences everything you do. Do you view me as harsh and exacting? The servant who did hid his talent in the earth and led a life of inaction, paralyzed by fear. The other servants lived lives of full engagement without knowing if their efforts would be successful or not. They rejoiced to present their increase to me. The unprofitable servant accused me of being harsh and unfair. The profitable servants did not express their views of me in words, so you will have to infer them by their actions.

You get to choose your own spirituality. No one can impose it on you against your will. Yet is there any decision that is more consequential? Your spirituality is your life orientation toward ultimate meaning and purpose, so everything hinges on getting this right. Can you do this from scratch? In other areas of life you have the advantage of those who have gone before so you don’t have to derive the principles of physics and civics and medicine on your own from first principles. This same principle applies to your faith as well.

Do you have a methodical approach to evangelism? Does this make it easier to present my message? Do you study the interactions that I had with people, such as the woman at the well, to learn how I approached this task? What do you find? Did I ever use the same approach twice, or did I adapt the presentation to the unique situation in every case? If you agree with this does it make it difficult to develop a methodical approach? I was led by the Spirit to do the work of the Spirit, and you can be too.

You may recall the account of an event after my resurrection when I appeared in a closed room by walking through the wall. This is recorded as a miraculous event and evidence that a change had taken place in my physical being. I said that my followers would do even greater works than I did. Can you walk through walls? Your church has walls. Do they serve to confine you and separate you from those who are outside? Do they serve to keep you in or them out, or both? Can you go through the walls of your church to engage and connect with those outside, and see my image in them?

Are you a self-made person? How many people do you meet who claim that no one ever gave them anything, so they take credit for all of their success? No newborn child takes care of their own needs. An enormous amount of effort went into getting you to that point, and even more comes after before you are able to fend for yourself. Your parents put in this effort in advance with no idea of how you would turn out. So no one has a valid claim to their own success. This alone is the basis for a lifetime of humility and gratitude, giving back, and paying it forward. 

If you were interviewing applicants for a position, and the future of the world depended on getting the right person, who would you choose? If one applicant said, I had a dream and then I went out and did exactly as the dream directed without consulting anyone, and then I had another dream, and carried it out as before, and so on. Would you hire this person? I did. Joseph who stood in as my father on earth had to be able to accept divine direction apart from the religious establishment of his generation, for actions that were not explainable in any familiar context.