Saturday, November 27, 2010

Faith by Hearing, Not By Sight

Romans 10:17

If someone were to tell you that they had seen a man jump into the air and fly away, it is doubtful that you would believe it. You know man cannot fly and you know it based upon the fact that you have never seen it happen nor have you known anyone else that has. Even if 10 or 20 people claimed that they had seen the man fly, you probably would not believe it until you could see it with your own eyes, for as they say, “Seeing is believing”.

While we may be convinced only by what we see, our faith in Christ and His finished work is built on an entirely different foundation. To doubting Thomas, Jesus said, “Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed” (John 20:29). Jesus is pronouncing this blessing on all of us; those who believe that He has risen and we have never felt of His wounds. I accept that blessing!

In the world, our eyes are what we use to convince us of reality. This is why we believe that we are sick based upon our symptoms. We believe that we are under poverty based upon our lack and we believe that we are unrighteous based upon our latest failure. All of these things are seen with our eyes, but for the redeemed they are not necessarily true. Your sickness was placed into Jesus’ body at the cross, so you have His health (Isaiah 53:4). Jesus was made poor so that you would be made rich (2 Corinthians 8:9) and you have been made righteous because Jesus was made to be sin (2 Corinthians 5:21). These things are facts, even if you do not see them yet.

As believers, we walk by faith and not by sight (2 Corinthians 5:7) because we know that the just live by faith (Romans 1:17). Since our faith is our strength, we want to be found strong in the faith and not weak (Romans 4:19, 20). We can’t build our faith by begging God for more or by going through life’s difficulties, but we are promised that we can build it by “hearing the word of God”.

Did you know that some of the earliest Greek manuscripts of this verse do not say “word of God” but rather “word of Christ”? The early church fathers believed that in order to have your faith increase under the New Covenant you needed to focus on the words of Christ. This does not necessarily mean the words written in red in your Bible, but it agrees with the statement that God made from heaven on the Mt. Transfiguration, “This is my beloved Son: hear Him” (Luke 9:35).

Hear what Paul says about Jesus in his writings on the New Covenant. Hear what John says of the love that Christ has for you. Hear what Peter writes about the manifold grace of God and hear what the prophets like Isaiah say about the one who will be called Wonderful. When you feast on Jesus and His loveliness, your faith shoots high like a rocket. It pulls your eyes off of you and your circumstance, and it puts your focus on Jesus where it belongs.

As you face the world today, be influenced by what Jesus says about you in His word rather than what your circumstances tell you. You have been given peace through Jesus and His health and wholeness is yours. Let your faith grow as you hear more of that!

Friday, November 26, 2010

None Made Righteous By the Law

Romans 10:1-4

Paul had a burning heart for the salvation of his Jewish brethren. Verse one alone shows us that Paul did not consider you to be “saved” just because you were a Jew. In the same vein, you are not saved just because you attend church or you have a pastor in your family. Zeal for God is great, but if there is no saving knowledge with that zeal then it is just what the Greek says that it is “excitement, fervor of spirit”.

This set of verses were not written to insult the intelligence of those who seek religion for their answers, but to show us that no act of religious fervor on our part can bring us to the pristine level of God’s righteousness. Paul gives them credit for their zeal, but admits that it is “not according to knowledge” (Romans 10:2). The Greek word for knowledge here is ‘epegnoses’ which means, ‘correct knowledge’. It was used earlier in the book in Romans 3:20 when Paul stated that “by the law is the knowledge of sin”. Israel thought that they were capable of doing what was right in the eyes of God, so God provided them with the Law; not to teach them how to do right, but to show them ‘correct knowledge’, which was that they could NOT live up to His standards of holiness.

If you are ignorant of what God’s righteousness is, then you might go about to establish your own righteousness. Israel, because they had the Law, had become convinced that by the keeping of the Law, they could be found righteous in God’s eyes. However, their misunderstanding of the purpose was not much different than many people’s understanding of it now. They felt that a man was righteous when he did what he was told to and didn’t do what he was told not to do. There are people in the church now that would say “Amen” to that!

To submit yourself to the righteousness of God, you must come to the knowledge that among men, “There is none righteous, no, not one” (Romans 3:10). No righteous act that you can do can ever be viewed by God as anything more than a filthy rag (Isaiah 64:6). His righteousness is found in the finished work of Jesus Christ at Calvary. Jesus was made to be sin so that you and I could be found righteous through that sacrifice (2 Corinthians 5:21).

The moment that Christ fulfilled the Law of God through a perfect life and a sacrificial death, the Law was to never again be viewed as a vehicle by which man could achieve righteousness. Though he was never able to be righteous through the Law anyhow, at least after Calvary, we had something else to set our sights on, and the Law was to fade away.

Paul said that when Moses came down the mountain, carrying the Law of God, he covered his face with a veil, because the glory that came from the Law was the glory which “was to be done away” (2 Corinthians 3:7). In other words, Moses did not want Israel to see that the glory of the Law was ALREADY FADING! Unfortunately, Paul said that many people still have that veil over their heart when they read the Law, refusing to see that its glory has been replaced (2 Corinthians 3:15).

Remove the veil and bask in the glorious light of the Spirit, finding your righteousness in Christ and His finished work.

Thursday, November 25, 2010

Know Jesus? You’re Never Ashamed

Romans 9:33

Jesus was the Rock that was in the wilderness which provided Israel with water when they were thirsty (1 Corinthians 10:4). As a crucified Savior, Christ is called a “stumbling block” (1 Corinthians 1:23), a “stone of stumbling and a rock of offence” (1 Peter 2:8). However, to those who will believe, the preaching of His glorious good news is “the power of God unto salvation” (Romans 1:16). When Paul realized the great power of that good news (gospel), he declared, “I am not ashamed…” (1:16).

As Paul goes deeper into this great epistle to the Romans, he returns to that theme of not being ashamed. Here, Paul declares that “whosoever believes on Him shall not be ashamed” and then in 10:11 he quotes from Isaiah:

“They shall not be ashamed that wait for me” (Isaiah 49:23).

Under the direction of the Holy Spirit, Paul is being led to address a topic that has caused unnecessary guilt and condemnation in many people. I am referring to a statement made by Jesus, which I heard preached and taught growing up as a motivator to get Christians to witness and evangelize:

“Whosoever therefore shall be ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation; of him also shall the Son of man be ashamed, when He cometh in the glory of His Father with the holy angels” (Mark 8:38).

I had heard that if you were too nervous to tell someone about Jesus or to take a stand against your friends cussing or lying, etc, then you were being ashamed of Jesus and when you stood before God, He would hang His head in shame at you and send you to hell. I spent so many prayers as a young person and even into adulthood, asking God to forgive me for not witnessing for fear that I had shown myself ashamed.

Pay attention to Jesus’ audience in that verse. He is addressing the “adulterous and sinful generation”. This cannot be you and I because we are married to Jesus alone and we are a “chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people…which had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy” (1 Peter 2:9, 10). The “ashamed” to which Jesus is referring is the refusal to accept Him as Savior. You have already said “Yes!” to Jesus, thus you are not viewed as “ashamed”.

Paul is stating emphatically that it is impossible to be considered ashamed of Him if you have accepted Him as Lord. The very act of acceptance is the denial of shame, and no one who is born again and knows the love of God could ever be ashamed neither of His salvation nor of His loving grace and favor.

I personally believe that Paul’s fanatical defense of the message of grace contained in the book of Romans is his response to a time period where he may have felt some shame and isolation in his preaching of grace. We know that he faced public opposition to the grace message by Alexander the coppersmith and that his first answer to him caused abandonment by all of his followers (2 Timothy 4:14,16). After having been strengthened by the Lord, Paul is never again ashamed, either in public or in private to “preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things!” (Romans 10:15).

Wednesday, November 24, 2010

The Unsettled Soul

Acts 15:24

This verse is from the opening sentence of a letter that was written and approved by the early church fathers in the first Council in Jerusalem. The apostles had gathered together to settle the issue as to whether or not the Gentile believers were to be told to keep the Law of Moses after they were saved. The final verdict from the host pastor (Apostle James) was, “We trouble not them, which from among the Gentiles are turned to God” (Acts 15:19).

The letter contains four things that the apostles felt should be preached to the Gentile believers: that they abstain from meats offered to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and from fornication (Acts 15:29). Three of these four things pertain to dietary laws that the Jews observed; where they ate nothing that had been previously sacrificed to another god and that they never eat an animal that had not been properly bled out. The final restriction, fornication, is the only moral message delivered, which Paul mentions in detail in 1 Corinthians 6:15-20.

When the apostles agreed on this four-point message to the newly converted Gentiles, they decided that this needed to be done because “Moses of old time hath in every city them that preach him, being read in the synagogues every Sabbath day” (Acts 15:21). They knew that the Law of Moses was being read and preached as the standard for living in every village in the Jewish world. This repetition of the Law of Moses was placing a burden on the backs of the Christians as they were being told that grace will save them but that works will perfect them. Paul comes against that particular mode of preaching in Galatians 3:1-5.

Let’s take a closer look at this opening sentence of the apostolic letter to the Gentile Christians:
“Forasmuch as we have heard, that certain which went out from us have troubled you with words, subverting your souls, saying, ‘Ye must be circumcised, and keep the law’: to whom we gave no such commandment” (Acts 15:24).

The word ‘subverting’ in the King James is a bit hard to understand in our modern tongue. In Greek it means ‘to unsettle’. The troubling words that were being preached by so many were unsettling the souls of the Gentile Christians. Would it not be unsettling to learn that you are saved by grace through no works of your own but then after you are saved you must do a laundry list of things to stay saved? It was unsettling then and it is unsettling now!

The letter clearly states, “We gave no such commandment” emphasizing that the apostles were against the preaching of the law to Christians. What is so dangerous about a believer hearing the Law? Isn’t the Law just and holy and good? Yes! In fact, Romans 7:12 tells us that, but man has no ability to squeeze one drop of that just, holy and good out of the law. When the law enters, sin goes crazy due to the fact that the law was designed by God to show man that he is a sinner (Romans 5:20; 7:9; 1 Corinthians 15:56). It is the “ministry of death, written and engraven in stones” (2 Corinthians 3:6). When a believer hears the law, he becomes condemned at his inability to live it perfectly and that condemnation always leads to more failure. The very law that demands our holiness lends us no help in becoming holy!

Grace must be the message proclaimed from the housetops! Grace is a person and His name is Jesus (John 1:17). Proclaim Jesus and His loveliness and right living will always follow. The Holy Spirit has seen fit to lay upon us all “no greater burden than these necessary things” (Acts 15:28). Even those things mentioned by the apostles were given to the Gentiles simply so that they would not offend the Jews that they were around (1 Corinthians 8). You are free in Jesus!

Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Cast the First Stone!

John 8:1-11

Many of our devotions have covered the things that transpire in this passage of scripture, but we have yet to take a close look at it exclusively. There are things contained here that shed such glorious light on the mission and message of Jesus that to look at it only in passing is to do a great disservice to the glorious New Covenant.

The men that bring the woman caught in the act of adultery are within their Jewish rights to do so: she was caught sleeping with a married man, thus she is guilty. My question is, “Where is the man?” These men are not concerned with actually keeping the Law, simply with seeing if they can catch Jesus in a trap. Mosaic Law says that the adulteress be stoned to death, so they are morbidly curious to see what Jesus will say.

Jesus “stooped down, and with His finger wrote on the ground” (John 8:6). Much speculation has been made over the centuries as to what He wrote. Some say that He may have written down their hidden sins to remind them what they had done. Others think He may have written out the 10 Commandments or some other fine point of Law. Whatever it was, it did nothing to convince the crowd who “continued asking Him” (verse 7).

It may be more important to note where He wrote than to know what He wrote. They find Him sitting in the temple courtyard, which was a broad floor of smooth stone. The floor would have been covered with a rather thick layer of dust as there was no way to stop the foot dust from flying in off of the streets. When Jesus wrote on the ground, He was actually writing on the stone floor, pushing the dust the way one might write “Wash Me” on the back glass of a dirty vehicle. Though the words have been lost to history, the method still preaches its importance.

After instructing the men that they who were without sin should cast the first stone, the crowd drops their rocks and disperses, one by one. Jesus has given them permission to kill the girl, thus fulfilling Mosaic Law. Notice that He never told them not to kill her; He just told them to be sure that they were qualified. She certainly deserved to die, but did they deserve to be the ones to execute her?

Jesus turns to the woman and asks her where her accusers have gone. He is pointing out to her that she is free to go, for there is no one left standing who was an eye witness to her crime. Instead of running, she stays near the man that writes on the ground and He gives her the gift of no condemnation, “Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more” (John 8:11).

God wrote the 10 Commandments (Law) with His own finger on Mt. Sinai. Jesus will later call Himself “I Am” (John 8:58) in this very chapter. When He wrote on the ground of the temple, Jesus was using the same finger that had etched the Law into stone to write a new law in our hearts. The Old Covenant demanded that all sinners die, but the New Covenant has provided one man to die for us all. We could never cast the first stone, for we all deserve to die, but Jesus has written His love and grace on the stones of our temple and we can now all go free.

You have been given the gift of no condemnation, now go and sin no more.

Monday, November 22, 2010

When Jesus Rests His Head

Luke 9:58

This passage comes at the beginning of a trio of statements made by Jesus as tests of discipleship. A man approaches Him and wishes to be a follower. Jesus explains that even the animals have a place to sleep at night, but He has nowhere. We have no record as to whether this turned the man away or not, but we do get an inside look at the mind and the heart of our Savior.

While the moral of the story is that we should be prepared to give all for our Savior, even our security and comforts if necessary, the higher lesson learned is that Jesus was a man on a mission. From the beginning of time, God saw the cross as the way to save mankind, and He destined His Son to go to that cross. Long before Adam sinned, even long before Adam was created, God had predetermined that Jesus would be the sacrifice for sins. Due to this fact, it is important to remember that when we read the Gospels, there was nothing shocking to Jesus about His coming death in Jerusalem. In fact, Jesus knew it was coming from the start (John 9:39).

The phrase that Jesus uses regarding His rest is “the Son of man hath nowhere to lay His head”. The phrase, “lay” is the Greek word ‘kleno’ and it means “to recline”. Jesus is speaking in the natural, with a spiritual emphasis: He has no place to call home and He has yet to finish His work. We are often too quick to stop what we are involved in long before we finish. How many projects have you started and then life got in the way, and things didn’t get completed? We are a people that move from one thing to the next, often without finishing the thing that we are working on at the moment. Perhaps we think that the next thing will bring more pleasure, or perhaps we are just quitters.

Jesus was far from being a quitter! In fact, He teaches us the principle of never stopping until you are finished. The Apostle Paul had this in mind when from a Roman prison cell he wrote to young Timothy, “For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, and I have kept the faith: henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness” (2 Timothy 4:6-8). Paul was not ready to be offered or to depart until he had “finished” the course. Finishing what he was here to do was important to Paul and it should be important to us.

Jesus suffered all of the cruelties of the cross for you and for me. So complete was His work there that He cried, “It is finished” just before He died (John 19:30). However, if you will notice, He knew that “all things were now accomplished” in the 28th verse, before He ever said, “I thirst” (John 19:29). Noticing that there was one thing left to be done, Jesus put off yelling “It is finished” until He had drank the sour wine for us, so that we could be freed from the sins of our fathers. As the old song says, “When He was on the cross, I was on His mind”.

Just after “It is finished”, the text says, “He bowed his head, and gave up the ghost” (John 19:30). The word “bowed” is the Greek word ‘kleno’; the same word used in Luke 9:58 for “lay His head”. At the cross, when He had sufficiently paid for you and me, Jesus finally found a place to lay His head. Aren’t you glad that He didn’t rest until He had said, “It is finished”?

Sunday, November 21, 2010

The Best of Both Worlds

Mark 10:29-31

Some people think that heaven is the greatest reward for the believer. I believe that heaven is going to be beyond words, but I do not think that Jesus went to all that trouble to suffer and die so that we could spend the rest of our lives suffering until we get home. Jesus said that He had come that we might have life and have it more abundant (John 10:10). He didn’t mention eternal life there, just abundant life. Are we living the abundant life?

Peter mentioned to Jesus, “Lo, we have left all, and have followed thee” (Mark 10:28). There is a hint in Peter’s voice of pity as if he feels sorry for himself for all that he has had to give up in his pursuit of Jesus. Jesus responds that anyone who has left the things of this earth behind for His sake, “and the gospel’s” has the assurance of a great reward coming (10:29). Immediately, we are so conditioned to see our reward as spiritual and eternal, that we often miss the specifics that Jesus gives us in this next, crucial verse:

“But he shall receive an hundredfold now in this time…” (Mark 10:30). I stop the verse at that point because I want to focus your attention to the timing of the hundredfold blessing. Jesus has just promised us that whatever He is about to say applies to us “now in this time”. This has nothing to do with eternity or our heavenly home, and Jesus is not downplaying how incredible that our new home is going to be. He is just affirming that the abundant life can start now, and we should always be ready for it.

Just how specific is this “hundredfold” blessing? Jesus minces no words. Look at what we give up first then we see what we get in return. We give up house, brethren, sisters, father, mother, wife, children and lands. In return, God gives houses, brethren, sisters, mothers, children and lands, “with persecutions; and in the world to come eternal life” (Mark 10:30). Notice that there are some slight differences. We give up “father” but we don’t get a hundredfold “fathers”. We give up “wife” and we don’t get a hundredfold “wives”. This is Jesus showing us the sanctity of one marriage and confirming that we call no man ‘father’ but Him (Matthew 23:9). This also indicates that the multiple brothers, sisters and mothers are our relatives within the family of God (Mark 3:35).

With God’s hundredfold blessings come “persecutions” and there is simply no way around this. People will mock and deride you for believing in a good God that is not mad at humanity and that freely gives us all things. Even well-intentioned Christians will sometimes persecute you because you refuse to see God as fuming in fury at a sin-ridden world. Have no fear if they persecute you because then you know that you are in good company!

Not seeing the fullness of the hundredfold blessing in this life? Not to worry, if you have been planted in the good ground of God’s grace and favor, you will bring forth, but it may not be all at once. Jesus said that the seed from good ground will bring forth fruit, “some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirtyfold” (Matthew 13:8). If He is the one doing the work, don’t worry, you’ll get there.