Christian Responsibility

Jude 1:20, 21

When instruction is given in the New Testament, it is for the edification or the building up of the believer. Instruction in the Old Testament was given by command, and if not adhered to would lead to curses and even death. Thank God that Jesus came and took the curse so that we could be free!

This is not intended to indicate that the instructions of the New Testament are not important. These were written down by the founding apostles of the church, those who had seen Jesus face to face and were now trying to put down their thoughts, guided by the Holy Spirit, for all to benefit by.

Jude was the half-brother of Jesus Christ, but neither scripture nor history shows him taking much interest in being known as such while Jesus was on this earth. To his credit, once Christ has ascended, Jude becomes a follower of Christ, and instead of using his family position to further his ministry, he calls himself a “servant of Jesus Christ” (verse 1). It is from a man with this kind of integrity that we can take some instruction on Christian responsibility.

Jude gives two things that every believer must do themselves: Build themselves up and keep themselves in the love of God. The first, he says, is done, “on your most holy faith”. This links your strength from day to day on having your faith properly placed in Jesus Christ, but then gives the mechanism by which we bring this about as being, “praying in the Holy Ghost” (verse 20). This is the believer’s right and privilege of praying in tongues, which builds them up and speaks to God (1 Corinthians 14:2, 4). Every child of God should use their prayer language every day. If you have never done so, pray to the Father that He give you this manifestation of His Holy Spirit. It is His good pleasure to do so (Luke 11:13).

The second instruction in this passage, given by Jude is found in verse 21, “Keep yourselves in the love of God”. Paul sounds as if he says something totally different when he reminds the believer, “that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38, 39).

There is no contradiction here, as Paul is reminding us that there is nothing that can come between God’s love for us, but Jude is telling us to keep ourselves there. Don’t allow your circumstances to convince you that God does not love you. Paul says that God does love you, while Jude wants you to remind yourself of that every day.

By keeping yourself in that love, you are living under the constant mercy of God (verse 21). Only within the framework of God’s precious love can we understand His wonderful mercy. To see His love for us is to see His heart of compassion and concern.

While all of the world falls around you saint, keep yourself in the love of the Lord today. You can’t do this by effort and works, but rather by remembering His love for you. Don’t forget that very famous verse, “For God so loved the world…” (John 3:16). His “so” love is “so” big!

Prosperity

3 John 2

I spent many of the early years of my ministry attacking while I preached. What I mean by that is that I felt that part of the job of a gospel preacher was to be a sheriff against all of the ills of the pulpit. If someone preached something that I didn’t think was right, I felt that I had an obligation to go after not only the message but in some cases, the man behind the message.

There are so many things wrong with that that I won’t even begin to list them, but I will point out that oftentimes I was attacking things that I did not understand. As well, I was going after things that I had not even studied. I was preaching from the angle of what my circle of influence had taught me was right, and I was interpreting the Bible the same way. This is a dangerous and loose way to live and preach because it has no room for you to change your mind and even less room to be wrong.

I can’t put my finger on the moment that it changed, but I thank God that it did! He brought a revelation of His love to me and I have never been the same. I know now that I know very little and that is more liberating than I ever imagined that it could be.

One of the messages that I hammered hard against, and yet never studied, was the message of the “prosperity gospel”. First of all, I believe that term is misleading. There is no “gospel” (good news), but the “gospel of Jesus Christ”. The prosperity message is not the gospel, only Jesus’ finished work is the gospel. In that case, the question should probably be phrased, “What is the ‘prosperity message’?”

The Bible is decidedly clear that God wants you to prosper. John prayed for the reader of his third epistle to “prosper and be in health, even as thy soul prospereth” (verse 2). He had a solid confidence that the soul of a believer is prosperous, not because of their works, but because of Jesus’ finished work. He desired that every other area of their life line up with their souls.

Paul told the church that if we will receive the abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness that we should reign in life through Jesus Christ (Romans 5:17). This says nothing of reigning in heaven, but rather on this earth. The believer was not saved to simply look forward to dying! We were saved to have life, and have it more abundantly (John 10:10).

I shrank away (and still do for that matter), from people placing the emphasis on what we get out of Christianity, rather than on Jesus and His finished work. Much of the prosperity preaching and teaching focuses the believer on the results of the covenant rather than on the Jesus of the covenant. We need not look toward what Jesus can give but rather toward Jesus as the “author and finisher of our faith” (Hebrews 12:2).

God wants you prosperous, and He wants you to reign in life, but He wants YOU even more! Seek the righteousness that is found only in knowing Christ and all of these other things will be added to you. True, biblical prosperity lies in exposing the believer to a constant stream of the love of God, showing the loveliness of Christ, and glorifying His finished work. Accept this, and ready yourself for God’s prosperity.

Love One Another

2 John 1:5, 6

The commandment which was from the beginning is that we love each other. Jesus called it a commandment on which all of the law and prophets depended (Matthew 22:40). John says that we have heard it from the beginning and that we ought to walk in it (verse 6).

The command to love one another is part of the law of Christ, and it springs from a divine love, placed in the heart of a believer by the Holy Spirit. Paul said, “The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us” (Romans 5:5). The New Covenant saint has God’s desires and laws written into their heart and in their mind (Hebrews 10:16). If God is love, then the believer will love also (1 John 4:7).

The law of Christ is what James called, “the law of liberty” (James 1:25; 2:12). This law is from the inside out, while Moses’ law was from the outside in. While Christ’s finished work brings goodness out of the believer, Moses’ law tried to force goodness onto the believer, but it offered no helping hand. In other words, you could know the law and that knowledge would give you no assistance in keeping the law.

As it regards love, the law demanded it. “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself” (Leviticus 19:18). This was a straight-forward command. There was no room for wiggle or interpretation. You must love others with the same passion and fervor that you love yourself. Of course the law does not tell you how to do that, so the adherent is left frustrated and condemned.

Christ’s law of liberty and love fulfills all other law (Romans 13:10). When one does love their neighbor as themselves, they have taken all other law and wrapped them into one. While the Old Covenant of law and works simply told you to love, the New Covenant of grace and goodness loves you first, empowering you to love others.

There is no limit to the amount of love that will spring out of the heart of the believer who knows that God loves them. Jesus faced Satan in the wilderness with the knowledge that He was God’s “beloved” Son. The “beloved” know that they are loved and they rest assured in it. Out of this knowledge, they love naturally, not by obligation, for no obligation can make you love. The believer loves because they can’t help it!

Do you have someone in your life, be it at work or your neighbor, who is making it difficult to love them? We all have encountered someone like this in our lives. Instead of focusing on loving them every day, placing yourself under the work of love, simply feed yourself on the knowledge that you are loved. As you become convinced of how much He loves you, you will automatically, though often slowly, begin to have a love for that unlovable person.

What do you have to lose? Know how loved that you are, and watch that love spill over.

Constant Cleansing

1 John 1:7

When we come out of the darkness of sin and walk in the glorious light of Jesus’ truth, we not only fellowship with other believers, but we have a constant flow of the blood of Jesus Christ to cleanse us from all of our sin. His blood is a permanent fixture in the life of the redeemed, ever flowing to cover all of our failures and sins. This flow turns the scarlet sins, “white as snow” (Isaiah 1:18).

Jesus stood on the final day of the Feast of Tabernacles and cried out for all to hear, “If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water” (John 7:37, 38). He timed this announcement to coincide with the High Priest pouring the water from the pool of Siloam over the altar in the temple. Every Jew that was gathered that day would not have missed the point of Christ, “I am the High Priest. Follow me and you will never need another”.

This is the same theme that Jesus delivered to the woman at the well in the Samaritan village of Sychar. She came to the well at the hottest part of the day, while all other women came at sunrise. She obviously had grown weary of hearing the whispers about her 5 previous husbands and her live-in lover, so she came to the well to draw water, alone. Jesus met here there, being led of the Spirit for this one woman, and told her that she would thirst again if she relied only on physical water, but if she turned to Him, He would give her, “a well of water springing up into everlasting life” (John 4:14).

Jesus ever lives to make intercession for the believer (Hebrews 7:25), so His work, though finished at the cross, is ever ongoing in application. When we accept Christ as the payment for our sins, we receive the Holy Spirit as the evidence or “down-payment” of our inheritance (2 Corinthians 1:22). The Comforter then goes to work in the believer, constantly reminding them of their place in Christ, with the blood of Jesus always washing over them to keep them pure.

Without the constant cleansing of the Spirit, you and I would be guilty nearly every moment of the day. This guilt would not be from breaking the 10 Commandments or some other moral law of God, but from the dietary and sanitary laws of God. Everything from sexual emissions to a woman’s time of the month would make Israelites unclean. These were things that they could do nothing about, but that did not lessen their guilt. They were always washing and re-washing in an attempt to stay clean.

Christ pours His blood over us every moment of every day so that we always remain non-offensive to God. Though we fail, the ever present blood of Jesus makes us appear in God’s eyes just as Jesus appears.

Some find fault with these statements, saying that Jesus can’t possibly cleanse us from future sins, because we have not confessed them yet. Confession is for the unbeliever, and Paul never tells the believer to confess in order to receive forgiveness. We do confess so that our loving Father can embrace us, but not so that we can receive of His goodness. If Jesus cannot forgive future sins, then none of your sins are gone, for He died 2,000 years before you committed them!

Rejoice in the knowledge that the blood of Jesus Christ is constantly cleansing you and you are as clean as Jesus in the eyes of the Father.

(For more information on this topic, contact the ministry and ask for Pastor Paul’s sermon titled, “Constant Cleansing”. We will send to you as our gift. Thank you.)

Don’t Forget That Your Sins Are Gone!

2 Peter 1:3-9

Peter tells the believer that they have been given a “divine nature”, which is the very nature of God. With that divine nature in every one of us, our lives are now elevated to a position that they could never have been prior to our conversion. Because of this new position, we are expected to see “all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue” (1:3), at work in our lives.

Notice that the things pertaining to life and godliness only come out of us as we increase in the knowledge of who God is within us. From this knowledge we then see the following progression in our lives: diligence, virtue, knowledge, temperance, patience, godliness, brotherly kindness and charity. As these fruits grow in your heart, they guarantee that the believer will never be “barren nor unfruitful” (verse 8).

Peter is basically stating the same thing that Paul did regarding the fruit of the Spirit. These wonderful by-products of knowing the Lord should always be springing up within the heart of the redeemed. Fruit grows naturally, and needs only the God-given elements to do so. No coaching or prompting on our part makes the apple tree give apples, so no prompting or works on our part makes the heart produce fruit.

Why tell us that these things should be in our life if they must be brought out by the Spirit? If they are not there, then how can our knowing that we lack them help us to bring them out? Peter answers this question in verse 9:

“But he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins.”

If the believer lacks any of the virtues listed in verses 5-7 it is not because they are not consecrated enough. It has nothing to do with their works or their effort, but rather they are blinded as to who they are in Christ, and they have little spiritual insight into their position in Him. Furthermore, they have forgotten that the blood of Christ has taken their sins away.

So many problems could be avoided by all of us if we would remember on a daily basis that we are forgiven of our sins. The knowledge of forgiveness silences the voice of condemnation in our heart and lets us live free in the wonderful grace of God. When we recognize that we are forgiven, our spiritual eyes are opened and we see God’s purpose for our lives. His fruit begins to explode in every area of our being and we walk in the “exceeding great and precious promises” (1:4).

Remember that your old sins are gone and walk free in these sweet promises of our Father. Have a great day believer!

Colorful Grace

1 Peter 1:6; 4:10

Peter uses the word “manifold” two times in his first letter. Actually, he uses the Greek word “poikilos”, which means, “colorful”. The word can also be translated as “divers”, as in “divers kinds of tongues”, used to describe the many different dialects of tongues that can be spoken. In either case, Peter is describing two things in this letter that come in all shapes and sizes.

The first “colorful” item is found in 1 Peter 1:6, when Peter describes that some Christians are “in heaviness through manifold temptations”. These temptations can be Satan’s attempts to get one to sin, and though verse 7 shows us that it is a trial of faith, we can’t be certain whether or not these were persecutions or sinful temptations. Either way, they were varied and in great number.

When Peter uses the term “manifold” or “colorful” again, it is in quite a different manner. This time he speaks of every Christian receiving the gift of grace, and how each one is then responsible to minister that grace to one another, “as good stewards of the manifold grace of God” (1 Peter 4:10). Now, it is God’s grace that is colorful, seeing as many people are taking it many places to minister to many different cultures.

It is vital to know that no matter how varied Satan makes the attacks against you, God has grace that covers that attack. Satan has no creative power, so each time that he tries something, be it a temptation to sin or an attack against you, it is a duplicate of something that he has tried many times before and in many ways. Christ died at Calvary to destroy the works of the devil (1 John 3:8), so all of God’s power is available in your situation, no matter how great or how trivial.

We so often limit God and His grace, placing Him within the box of our culture, our race, our status, our denomination, etc. His grace is so beyond our ability to fathom, and beyond our ability to use up. The finished work of the cross provides for every single need and God parcels out His grace not according to man’s worth, but according to His love. Thank God for that!

Don’t stress today over an area in your life. Rest in the knowledge that for whatever the difficulty there is in your life, there is grace to cover even that. Multi-colored problems call for a multi-colored solution. Thank God that we have a Redeemer who is touched by the feelings of our many different infirmities, and has been tempted in all points that we have, yet without sin. His victory brings us victory.

God’s rainbow represented a covenant of promise to Noah. God’s rainbow of grace still hangs in heaven (Revelation 4:3), and it now represents the covenant promise between Father and Son. You are in Christ, so His colorful grace is in you.

Grace to the Humble

James 4:6-8

The book of James is written to the Jew. We learn this from the outset, when he greets, “the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad” (James 1:1). It is important to remember this when you read James, for many things will sound strange to the ear of someone who is coming off of the Apostle Paul’s writings. Paul addresses the church and his writings are the complete message of grace that was given to him by the Lord Jesus (Galatians 1:12).

Some have pitted James’ writing in direct contrast to Paul’s, stating that Paul and James were having a verbal spat about what true faith was. This is patently incorrect as neither Romans nor Galatians (Paul’s essential documents on grace) were yet written. James’ theme is “religion”, or the service of religion on the outside. He doesn’t claim that works are greater than faith, but that faith should always be identified by the works that it produces.

For the ear tempered to the soft tones of Paul’s gospel of grace, the 4th chapter of James booms with judgment. Remember that James is preaching to the scattered Jews, and many of them have never come into the knowledge of grace. Most are still working the works of the law in order to achieve righteousness, and of course, they are falling woefully short. James accuses them of having lust in their hearts; of being adulterers and adulteresses and friends of the world. Paul would say none of these things in his letters. Again, we are dealing with two different audiences.

Suddenly, in verse 6, James uses “grace” for the first time. The English word “grace” is used in 1:11, but it is a different Greek word meaning “beauty”. The “grace” of James 4:6 is Paul’s “grace”, often translated “favor”. James is just now getting around to telling the reader of God’s grace. Without Paul’s powerful revelation of God’s grace, James can only understand this wonderful gift in small segments. Even he, without that revelation realizes that God’s gifts must transcend our ability to receive them. In spite of all of the bad that the reader is doing, James says that God has “more grace”. Paul would confirm this when he would write, “Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound” (Romans 5:20).

James now adds that God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble. For James, this is not an original thought, but is pulled from his memory of Old Testament scripture. Proverbs 3:34 says, “Surely he scorneth the scorners: but he giveth grace to the lowly”. James is making the only connection that he knows to get someone into the grace of God. It is Paul who will reveal that it is justification by faith, but James says something that is not at all contradictory to that doctrine, “Submit yourselves therefore to God” (James 4:7). The “therefore” shows us that in light of the fact that God’s grace moves on us when we are humble, James concludes that in order to walk in God’s grace you must submit yourself to God. When submitted, you can resist the devil and he will flee and then you can draw near to God and he can draw near to you.

Only those who have humbled themselves can ever walk in God’s abundant grace and favor. It is pride that thinks that sanctification can be achieved by removing things from one’s life, or by consecrating more. For every rich, young ruler that turns away saddened by the demands of the law, there is a Zacchaeus who is rejoicing in grace. Which one are you?