Saturday, August 28, 2010

He Ever Lives

Genesis 18:23-33

Our text is regarding Abraham praying for the sparing of Sodom due to the righteous people living there. One of those people was his nephew Lot, who would actually prove to be the only righteous one in the entire city. Abraham starts the intercession by asking God if He would destroy the righteous with the wicked, which of course God would never do. He then asks if God would spare it for 50 righteous, then 45, then 30, then 20 and finally, 10. Each time that Abraham lowers the number, God agrees to spare the city if He can find that many righteous.

There are two important things about Abraham’s prayer: the manner in which he prays and the place that he stops. His manner is very shaky, with trepidation and fear, showing us that he fears to even petition God in this way. He calls himself “dust and ashes” (verse 27), he begs, “let not the Lord be angry” (verse 30), and then asks again, promising to speak “yet but this once” (verse 32). He is afraid of a God that just promised to make of him a “great and mighty nation” (verse 18). Why would he be afraid to ask for anything, knowing that God has favored him?

A lack of understanding of covenant is one of the downfalls of the modern Christian. If we knew who we are because of Jesus Christ, we would stop praying as Abraham prayed in this chapter. We need not beg our Daddy God, for it His desire to give us the kingdom: “Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom” (Luke 12:32).

We should also look at where Abraham stops his prayer. Based on the prayer itself, can we assume that if Abraham had continued his trend of taking the number down, and had ended at only 1 righteous, would God have agreed to spare the city? God had already agreed 5 times to Abraham’s prayer, so why not ask once more. I have often wondered if Abraham stopped praying too soon!

I used to preach this passage of scripture by saying “Don’t stop interceding! If you stop too soon, people may not get what they need”. I didn’t understand that I was making God distant and hesitant to move. This brought shame to the covenant of Jesus Christ, who never moves because we are persistent or because we are good. If this is not how this passage is to be interpreted, then what should we glean?

“Wherefore he is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them” (Hebrews 7:25). Jesus is now the intercessor! He “ever liveth” to do that very thing. Rest assured that He will not stop petitioning the Father on your behalf. Where man may stop at “will you spare it for 10?”, Jesus will continue on until there is only you! You are of such importance to Christ that while you were an enemy in your mind against God, Christ died for you (Colossians 1:20, 21; Romans 5:10).

Take solace in the fact that your Redeemer ever lives to intercede on your behalf. Nothing can befall you that Jesus has not already conquered. You are deeply loved and highly favored in Christ Jesus.

Friday, August 27, 2010

Come, Lord Jesus!

Revelation 22:17-19

Oh the joy that John must have felt as he received the Revelation of Jesus Christ! The apostle was already identified as “the disciple whom Jesus loved” because he recognized the love that Jesus had for him, but to see the incarnate, glorified Christ and then catch a glimpse of the future of planet earth must have been overwhelming.

On closing the book of Revelation, John wishes for Jesus to come quickly (Revelation 22:20). All that he has seen has not caused him to wish that Christ would delay his return, which would be the natural response if believers were going to go through the horrendous events of Revelation. Instead, knowing that the church will be removed so that these things can come to pass, John invites Christ to come back as soon as possible.

The visions of the Revelation were so awe inspiring that John claims both the Holy Spirit and the bride (church) ask for Jesus to come (Revelation 22:17). This is interesting, because it shows that the Holy Spirit on this earth is longing for Jesus to come and take the church home. We may feel ready to begin our eternity in heaven, but can we imagine how the Holy Spirit longs for this to end? Just as the Spirit and the church long for Christ’s return, John longed for any that was thirsty for Jesus to come now, while there is time to “take the water of life freely” (Revelation 22:17).

A couple of oft quoted verses come next in this chapter, both warnings of doom and judgment. Verse 18 warns that no man should add anything to the contents of Revelation, and verse 19 furthers it by adding that no man shall take away from the words of this book. This warning is to keep us from reading too much into or from taking away from the importance of this great Revelation. This book falls at the end of the New Testament, not just because the events are largely futuristic, but because they are in the deeper end of the knowledge of the redeemed. Unfortunately, many new converts jump right into Revelation with no foundation on the grace of God to help them. This causes some to add and take away from the revelatory power of this book. Let each one of us find the truths of this book as we grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ.

The original Greek rendering of verse 19 also clears the clouds a bit about a popular, but untrue teaching. The text reads “God shall take away his part out of the book of life”, but the Greek actually says “God shall take away his share of the tree of life”. The difference is crucial, because the first rendering brings a doctrine into the church that God has a cosmic book that contains all names and that some are being erased or blotted out, while others are being re-written and added back based upon the way that they are living. God has no such book, for His redemption is paid for in blood, not in works. Do not fear, He is not removing your name from “the book”!

Just as John prayed for Christ to come soon, I pray the same; not because life is miserable here, but because He is so great, and when we see Him, “we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:3).

Thursday, August 26, 2010

If Our Heart Condemn Us

1 John 3:20, 21

Sometimes our head and our heart do not agree. We think one thing, but our heart speaks something else to us. As believers, changing the way that we think about God is crucial to our walking in freedom and liberty, which Paul bore out so many times and in so many scriptures. Right thinking leads to right living; so wrong thinking would lead to wrong living.

While our minds are being renewed to think like Christ, our hearts often speak just as loud, and sometimes louder. We can become confused about who we are in Christ, even though our head knows all of the right answers and the right scriptures. When these moments of confusion arise, some believers tend to feel that they are less of a saint because of the way that they are “feeling”. This connection between how you feel and who you are can lead to restlessness and hopelessness.

The Apostle Peter must have felt this same confusion, when he denied knowing the Lord on the evening before Christ’s death. Following this terrible event, Peter feels so downtrodden and confused that he decides to abandon fishing for men and go back to fishing for a living. Jesus appears, walking by the sea, and blesses Peter with a boat-load of fish, much like He had done when Peter first met the Master. Peter abandons the boat and wades ashore to find that Jesus has prepared a meal and is ready to dine with His disciples.

There is no mention of Peter’s failure in that conversation over breakfast, but Jesus does ask “Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me more than these?” (John 21:15). The question is aimed at Peter’s heart, wondering if Peter loves Jesus more than he loves his old lifestyle. Peter says, “Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee” (21:15). His answer is built around what he knows and what he hopes that Jesus knows. In other words, Peter is not so convinced that he does love Jesus enough, but He hopes that Jesus knows more than He does!

John, who was witness to these events on that day, writes that if our hearts are to condemn us for our actions or for who we are, “God is greater than our heart, and knoweth all things” (1 John 3:20). Though our emotions tell us one thing, God knows what we do not know and we are better to appeal to His knowledge of us. Peter may not have an assurance of how he feels about Jesus, so he can only trust what Jesus KNOWS to be true. While I may not always FEEL saved, I trust that God knows more than I do.

If my heart does not condemn me then I can have confidence toward God (1 John 3:21). This confidence leads me to ask whatever I want to of God and be sure that I will receive it. If a believer is not sure about who they are in Christ, they cannot be confident that their Heavenly Father only wishes to do good to them and for them. If you think that He wants less than this for you, then you know that you are condemning yourself, contrary to Christ’s finished work.

Don’t worry about the last part of verse 22, which speaks of keeping “his commandments”; for John is not placing you back under the law. Read on, and learn that “This is his commandment, that we should believe on the name of his Son Jesus Christ, and love one another, as he gave us commandment” (1 John 3:23).

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Judgment Begins at the House of God

1 Peter 4:17

I heard this verse quoted a lot when as I grew up in the church. It was preached as a way to warn the saints that they needed to clean up the way that they were living for when God’s judgment begins it will begin at the house of God. We went through several waves of this in the churches, as every time a Christian leader would fail, this verse would be brought up that God was beginning His judgment, and He was starting with the church.

This instills fear in the reader and in the hearer, for it sets God at a distance, always ready to rain down judgment and quick to begin doing so in the local church. Before we panic, perhaps we should investigate both the context of the scripture, and the meaning of God’s judgment.

Peter has been writing about saints undergoing persecution and sufferings. He encourages the Christian not to be ashamed of their sufferings and to “glorify God on this behalf” (1 Peter 4:16). He deflects any glory away from the saint for suffering and points it heavenward towards God because all glory for should go to Him for any victory on our behalf.

The time of God’s judgment has already come, which Peter bears out. This is not a threat of future judgment, which modern churches should preach is around the corner, but rather one that began at Calvary against sin and will ultimately end in the final Day. Judgment began with the house of God for it is there that Christ is crucified on the brazen altar. We rest beneath that judgment against our sins; a price so steep that Peter says the righteous “scarcely be saved” or “saved with much difficulty” (4:18).

The price that Jesus paid at the cross was with “much difficulty”. Please know that salvation came neither easily or cheap. What Jesus did at Calvary was an absolute necessity for our soul’s salvation, and it came at the highest cost in the universe. Jesus had to be robed in the likeness of sinful flesh and then be condemned for all of the sins of the world. This caused a temporary separation between the Father and the Son, and all of it was done for us!

If you and I are saved with great difficulty, how can a sinner and an ungodly man expect to appear before God with any hope for salvation? God allows certain “judgments” to come upon His people in order to make us who we are. Just as a parent allows difficult moments to arrive in the lives of their children without stepping in and stopping them all, God watches with a loving eye to see our development in the midst of a troubled world. We are not always quick to jump in with our children because we want them to have proper development; such is God’s chastening in His church.

Rest assured; God’s chastening is not found in breaking your legs and giving you cancer for your actions. He judges based on the finished work of Jesus, not upon your works. His chastening is instruction; just as you would give to your child. You can be firm but fair, and your Heavenly Father can do even better. We are who we are because of Jesus, but we become what we become by walking this walk every day. Do not fear the judgment which begins at the house of God, but welcome it, for by this are you saved.

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

What God Has Forgot

Hebrews 8:10-12

When I was a child growing up in the church, we would sing a song that said, “God can do anything but fail”. I was always fascinated by the paradox that the song introduced; that Almighty God could do anything except mess-up, which meant that there was something that God could not do. I remember pondering on this every time the choir performed it.

I am not as intrigued by that paradox as I once was, but there is another one that still fascinates my imagination: that God knows all things all of the time and has a perfect memory, yet He cannot remember any of my sins. I don’t mean to insinuate that God does not have the ability to remember my sins, but simply that God has chosen to wipe them out of His mind. He does not do this to prove that He is merciful, or to show Himself to be a “good guy”. God forgets our sins because this proves to us that He is righteous.

Paul told us that God proves His righteousness by being perfectly just. If man puts faith in Jesus Christ, God must honor his faith by justifying that man completely. Anything less than this and God would prove to be unrighteous (Romans 3:26), for it would be the equivalent of God saying that Jesus’ sacrifice for our sins was not enough.

The New Covenant which Jesus cut with the Father at Calvary is better in every way than its predecessor, the Old Covenant. We now have God’s laws written into our very minds and hearts, instead of on tables of stone (Hebrews 8:10). This does not make us slaves to “doing right” and “shunning evil”; it simply brings righteousness out of us instead of us putting righteousness on from our external works. He does the work in changing us, while we just enjoy the change!

There could be no enjoyment in this salvation if our sins and failures were constantly nagging us and hanging over our heads. To ensure comfort and peace within the heart of man, Jesus paid for our condemnation in His flesh (Romans 8:3). If Jesus was condemned in His flesh for our failure, how can a righteous God ever condemn us in our flesh for our failure? The peace and assurance of salvation is wrapped up in whether or not the believer truly feels that they are completely forgiven for their transgressions and sins. If you believe that God is still somewhat against you then you are at war with Him constantly. Correct knowledge of your standing in Christ leads to the correct living that all of us want so badly to achieve.

Have no fear that this knowledge will lead to more sin in your life. The opposite is true, and this is why Satan opposes this message so much. The more law and works that are injected into your life, the more that sin takes over (Romans 5:20; 6:14; 7:9). The more that you dwell on His finished work and your forgiveness, the more that grace will bring victory in you (Luke 7:47; Romans 6:14; 1 Corinthians 15:34; 2 Corinthians 3:18).

Monday, August 23, 2010

Scripture is ‘God-Breathed’

2 Timothy 3:15-17

“All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16).

The Greek structure of verse 16 says, “All scripture is God-breathed”, meaning that God is the author of the Bible, which we refer to as “the Word of God”. Just as God breathed into Adam and made him a living soul, God breathed out the words that constitute the Bible, making it a living thing.

John stated that Jesus was the Word (John 1:14) and that He was with God from the beginning (John 1:1). Whatever Jesus spoke, He spoke because the Father had given those words to Him (John 17:8). Those very words made the disciples clean (John 15:3). With these facts in mind, we can conclude that whatever Jesus spoke was first uttered from the lips of the Father; and whatever the Father had ordained in His Word, was what Jesus personified.

When Paul wrote these words to Timothy, he refers back to Timothy’s own childhood, and how he had studied the Jewish writings from his youth. “And that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus” (2 Timothy 3:15). Being a Jew during the time of the writings of the New Testament, there would be only one possible source for Timothy’s scriptural understanding: the Old Testament. Paul is reminding Timothy that from the days of his youth he has been reading of the coming of the Messiah, and Jesus was that Messiah.

If Paul could inspire Timothy to return to the scriptures in order to find Jesus, then we are within our rights to look for Christ in the pages of the Old Testament as well. What God breathed into the text was spoken through Moses, David, Isaiah, etc. These men were writing of events and happenings, but were also seeing great things in the spirit realm, many of which they no doubt had little knowledge of. Prophecy is like looking at a mountain range, where you see only the peaks in the distance. You can’t tell how far away one mountain is over the other and you cannot see the valleys in between. These prophets saw things that they couldn’t understand, but they wrote them down anyway.

When Jesus began to minister to the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, he spoke to them of all of the scriptures concerning Himself, using the law and the prophets (Luke 24:27). He opened the writings of Moses and the prophets and showed these men the scriptures that spoke of Jesus. Though His name is never used in the Old Testament, Jesus is everywhere, for God breathed Him into the pages.

As you study the Old Testament, please do so with Jesus in your eyes. If you read it as the story of a hidden Messiah, it becomes an adventurous set of books, filled with nuggets of wisdom. If you view it as a way to live, you will walk away heavy and confused, with no vision of the finished work or what Jesus did to redeem all of mankind. Remember that as you see Jesus in the scriptures you are “thoroughly furnished unto all good works” (2 Timothy 3:17).

Sunday, August 22, 2010

You Are Dead

Colossians 3:1-4

The title for today seems kind of morbid, doesn’t it? “You are dead” is not a very encouraging way to start your day I’ll admit, but within context of the scripture, it is quite encouraging. The “old you” is gone, with all of its sins and transgressions, and the “new you” is alive through the life of Jesus Christ. When someone meets you that hasn’t seen you since your conversion, they may very well say, “You have changed. You aren’t the same person that you used to be”, take it as a compliment; for you are dead!

Just because your old man is dead does not mean that you never fail, but it does mean that when God looks at you, He sees nothing but your new man. This is why Paul emphasized that your life “is hid with Christ in God” (Colossians 3:3). It is not your old man that is hid; remember it is dead, but it is your new life that is hidden. Inside of the sacrifice of Christ is the new you, for Christ is living through you to the glory of the Father.

I have heard it said that Jesus is walking next to the believer, defending them from harm. Actually, Jesus is living through the believer so that they are more than a conqueror. You never need fear that you will go somewhere that Jesus will abandon you or leave you alone. You cannot run Him off or run Him out, for He has purchased you with a price. When God views you, He cannot help but see Jesus, for it is the blood of the Lamb that marks the house of your heart.
Paul continues with, “When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory” (Colossians 3:4). Christ is not a part of our life, He IS our life! My life is non-existent without Christ, for the old me is dead. Without Jesus, there is nothing to define me, and that is a wonderful thing to cherish. We are all just a fading shadow without Christ; but with Him as our Comforter and guide, we are the living, breathing, righteousness of God.

Since we know that we are a new creation, and that Jesus is living through us, we should set all of our attentions on showing forth Christ in our daily lives. While we live a life of abundance and favor, we are to keep our desires toward heaven; with glorifying the Father in the forefront of our hearts and minds. The Christian life is not about doing the right and shunning the wrong; it is about a relationship with the Father. Once we know who we are in Jesus, there should be a daily desire to show His love and grace to the world around us. As long as we are consumed with getting new things and being someone on this earth, we are thinking very little about presenting Christ to a world in desperate need of salvation.

May you relax today in the knowledge that the old man has passed away and that your new man is hidden with Christ in God. Now, take that knowledge and do something great with it! You have a chance to set your affection on Godly things, with the finished work of Christ in your sights. Will you squander another day looking for your own pleasures, or will you share of His love with a hurting world?