Tag Archives: Redemption

Christian Apologetics, Christian Living, Inspirational, Motivational

WHAT IS THE LOVE OF JESUS?

Blue wall“Dear friend, when you extend hospitality to Christian brothers and sisters, even when they are strangers, you make the faith visible. They’ve made a full report back to the church here, a message about your love. It’s good work you’re doing, helping these travelers on their way, hospitality worthy of God himself! They set out under the banner of the Name, and get no help from unbelievers. So they deserve any support we can give them. In providing meals and a bed, we become their companions in spreading the Truth.“ (3 John 1:5-8)

Recently I read an article written by a bishop within the Episcopalian denomination titled, Christians, You’re Not Victims. The provocative title matched exactly what you may imagine was expressed throughout his commentary. Perhaps some would be surprised to read such opinions within Christian thought? However, when carefully reading the article, one would soon discover the bishop has a very different understanding of love, and more important how the love of Jesus should be expressed today, through a post-Christian worldview.

Try to define love and you will arrive at a myriad of definitions that range from the clinical, to the expected standard displays of affection. When you consider how difficult it can be to define love, from a natural perspective, then it shouldn’t surprise Christians that we may also struggle to define and express love. So, I have a question? Where do we turn to best understand Biblical love and or show the love of Jesus?

To best answer my question I needed to understand the concept, definitions and applications of love are not just limited to the synoptic Gospels in the same way Jesus is not limited solely to the New Testament. In the same way Jesus is revealed throughout the entirety of Scripture also the Father’s love gives us an understandable and complete picture of what love is and is not.  Within the Gospels we read how love manifests itself when He instructs, Do you love Me? Feed My sheep. Did you notice Jesus frames the idea of love not in His sheep, as a starting place, but in Him?

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In many future discussions of who and where to demonstrate love, Christians will engage in, I am reminded of John’s words in his small letter (quoted above). In his correspondence he reminds Christian’s of how, where and with whom love begins. In fact, John even goes as far as to say this type of Biblical love is worthy of God Himself! While we may express the love of God to many in need I would also like to challenge us to consider, How can we love those, who are not His sheep if we cannot love one another within His Holy family? Simply put how can any of us express the love of Jesus with the seeking, searching and lost when we don’t share His love with fellow Christians first? Furthermore what does such a disconnect, between Christians, say about our love for Jesus?

Grace and Peace

JOSHUA

Christian Apologetics, Christian Living, Inspirational, Motivational

RUSH…AWAY FROM SELF AND TOWARD JESUS

361846-rush-rush-poster-artRecently I watched a very exciting movie, which happened to be a true story, set on the backdrop of an extremely intense and dangerous sport. The main participants and events surrounding their story was made all the more passionate since these two men shared a genuine personal dislike, toward one another, but a profound professional respect for each other. Though their rivalry lasted a relatively short number of years for a brief moment, in time, their lives dominated their sport.  While each man possessed their own personal flaws one man was unable to escape a lifestyle that not only hindered his career but ultimately even his quality of life; and too often many Christian’s deal with such “flaws” without recognizing the seriousness of their predicament.

Honestly, very few of us know anything about the conviction of sin; we know the experience of being troubled because we have done something wrong; but conviction of sin, by the Holy Spirit, leaves only one reality: Against Jesus alone, we have sinned. When a person is convicted by the practice of a sinful behavior they are made aware of a new and higher reality than their own.  Every conscience power, before the genuineness of Jesus, pales in comparison to the truth of Him; and once His new truth is revealed to us He becomes the gold standard for life and living. We must understand the very act of God’s forgiveness must carry with it a stronger sense of God’s divine justice since God’s ability to forgive comes at the cost of Jesus’ death.

When we approach the welcomed and miraculous waters of God’s grace we greatly appreciate His ability, and desire, to forgive sin. At the Cross of Christ so too was our old self (nature) crucified in favor of a new humanity in Jesus alone. Discovered in the divine nature is the lasting ability to forgive, which is why we cannot take God’s grace as a license to excuse or remain committed to a lifestyle of the old nature, which is destructive to the Spirit of God that should be alive in us.

Oswald Chambers challenges us with these words, “It is shallow nonsense to say that God forgives us because He is love. When we have been convicted of sin we will never say this again. The love of God means Calvary, and nothing less; the love of God is spelt on the Cross and nowhere else. The only ground on which God can forgive me is through the Cross of my Lord. There, His conscience is satisfied.”

A QUICK THOUGHT ON FORGIVENESS. We should never accept a shallow definition of God’s forgiveness as an “easy act” that only saves us from hell and makes us right for heaven. Though forgiveness is a step toward this eternal truth, forgiveness must mean we are divinely forgiven so we can be recreated into a relationship that squarely identifies us with God and Jesus alive in us. The miracle of His redemption is that God changes the unholy us, into the standard of Himself by putting Jesus in our beliefs, nature, language and culture.

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“When he comes, he’ll expose the error of the godless world’s view of sin, righteousness, and judgment: He’ll show them that their refusal to believe in me is their basic sin; that righteousness comes from above, where I am with the Father, out of their sight and control; that judgment takes place as the ruler of this godless world is brought to trial and convicted.” (JOHN 16:8 MSG)

Grace and Peace

JOSHUA

* A brief disclaimer….the Ron Howard film “RUSH” is rated R and therefore contains content, language and practices I do not advocate or condone. If you decided to view this film please keep in mind the there are more important spiritual lessons to be learned from this account, which the filmmaker probably did not intend. Again, if you choose to watch this film please do so responsibly.

Christian Apologetics, Christian Living, Inspirational, Motivational

READY? SET? ACTION!

ahc_79194When Jeannette and I were first married I quickly discovered how different we really were. Through three years of dating, and an engagement period, I thought we were just alike in everything; but then after we said I do I realized we weren’t. That’s not to say our differences were bad or in some way we had deceived one another; it just reminds us that there are many ways, in our similarities, we can still be very different. It didn’t take long for me to discover our differences when after our first disagreement (fight) I wanted to patch things up and move on with a quick resolution. Jeannette, on the other hand, needed some time and breathing room to process our disagreement as well as our resolution. For over sixteen years we have managed to deal with conflict, disappointment, failures and hurts in much the same way as our first argument. And over this period of time I have come to appreciate the value of allowing the process of letting a situation breathe so as long as we are allowing the truth of God to act during that time.

As a pastor I have managed to tackle problems, within the church, from a variety of approaches. In some instances I have pressed, head strong, for a quick resolution with disastrous results; and at other times I have waited, too long, to allow people to process a conflict, which has also ended in unsuccessful outcomes. So after reading a variety of leadership books, conflict management articles and advise from my peers I still felt as if there was no “best” way to deal with any single situation better than what the Bible tells us.

St. James writes the early church and encourages them, “So let God work his will in you. Yell a loud no to the Devil and watch him scamper. Say a quiet yes to God and he’ll be there in no time. Quit dabbling in sin. Purify your inner life. Quit playing the field. Hit bottom, and cry your eyes out. The fun and games are over. Get serious, really serious. Get down on your knees before the Master; it’s the only way you’ll get on your feet.” (James 4:7-10 MSG)

“It is essential to give people a chance of acting on the truth of God.” (Chambers) After the pastor, husband, wife, boss or friend has had their say, in any situation or conflict, the responsibility must be left with the individual. You cannot, and are incapable, of acting for him or her and they must be deliberate in responding in a Christlike manner to any situation. Sadly, when we refuse to act, as Jesus would prompt us through His Word, we become paralyzed and end up exactly as we were before. Have you ever met people who live their life stuck? There are some who refuse to grow up, others who dodge responsibility and others still who assign blame, to others, for their misfortune. If you know this type of person or find yourself here today then return to what James tells us and CHANGE IT!  When one acts, he or she is never the same. And when we act upon God’s Word He begins to work His perfect will in our life immediately!

Too many people play games, with their own lives, by wasting precious time living in stalled action. Once you find yourself repeating a failed behavior, negative thinking or destructive speech immediately let go and allow God to get into your circumstance. The moments we will truly live are the moments when we act with our whole will submitted to His plans and purposes.
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FINAL THOUGHT: IT TAKES TIME, SO ALLOW FOR SOME BREATHING ROOM. While most of today’s post has advocated a quick Biblical response to life’s challenges I would be remiss if I didn’t bring some balance to the topic. Like Jeannette’s needing time to process our disagreement most people do require some breathing room. I personally believe all people would benefit from some time to “work it out.” However, this time needs to be well spent seeking Jesus and allowing His truth to walk us toward His resolution. “Never allow a truth of God that is brought home to your soul to pass without acting on it, not necessarily physically, but in will.” (Chambers)

In every part, or role in life, we play we will always be faced with the truth of God. When we confess we are wrong, but go back again; then we come up to it again, and go back; we are hopefully learning the valuable life lesson that tells us we have no business returning to an old failed way of living and thinking. God’s truth is not a negative reality that is meant to hurt or rob you rather His truths are the finest words of redemption in which Jesus transacts the business of drawing us back to Him. The final step we need to take is to go to Him; and everyone who responds to His invitation lives a life where the supernatural power of God invades and changes them instantly. If you truly want to be free from the burdensome power of the world, your weak flesh and your adversary, understand they are not paralyzed by your words or your actions of self! But the stumbling blocks and barriers will always be halted by your action, and will, that is linked to Jesus and His redemptive power!

Grace and Peace

JOSHUA

Christian Apologetics, Christian Living, Inspirational, Motivational

LIFE LIVED IN THE ATONING WORK OF JESUS!

jwesley“That means you must not give sin a vote in the way you conduct your lives. Don’t give it the time of day. Don’t even run little errands that are connected with that old way of life. Throw yourselves wholeheartedly and full-time—remember, you’ve been raised from the dead!—into God’s way of doing things. Sin can’t tell you how to live. After all, you’re not living under that old tyranny any longer. You’re living in the freedom of God. What Is True Freedom? So, since we’re out from under the old tyranny, does that mean we can live any old way we want? Since we’re free in the freedom of God, can we do anything that comes to mind? Hardly. You know well enough from your own experience that there are some acts of so-called freedom that destroy freedom. Offer yourselves to sin, for instance, and it’s your last free act. But offer yourselves to the ways of God and the freedom never quits. All your lives you’ve let sin tell you what to do. But thank God you’ve started listening to a new master, one whose commands set you free to live openly in his freedom! I’m using this freedom language because it’s easy to picture. You can readily recall, can’t you, how at one time the more you did just what you felt like doing—not caring about others, not caring about God—the worse your life became and the less freedom you had? And how much different is it now as you live in God’s freedom, your lives healed and expansive in holiness? As long as you did what you felt like doing, ignoring God, you didn’t have to bother with right thinking or right living, or right anything for that matter. But do you call that a free life? What did you get out of it? Nothing you’re proud of now. Where did it get you? A dead end. But now that you’ve found you don’t have to listen to sin tell you what to do, and have discovered the delight of listening to God telling you, what a surprise! A whole, healed, put-together life right now, with more and more of life on the way! Work hard for sin your whole life and your pension is death. But God’s gift is real life, eternal life, delivered by Jesus, our Master.” (Romans 6:13–22 MSG)

Of all the preachers, theologians, scholars and Bible commentators I have read, sat under and studied I will always have a special place for John Wesley. Having studied his writings, sermons and life I have discovered few that have expressed the doctrine of sanctification and atonement with such clarity, grace and mercy as Rev. Wesley. While some may take issue with his doctrinal positions, it was Wesley that shaped much of how many approach ministry, people and their personal walk of faith. If you have never read Wesley then I will clue you in on a reoccurring theme that contradicts many of his Calvinist critics. Critics of Wesley often say he, in some way, advocated a position that encourages “self-salvation.” While a casual reading may seem to hint in this direction a careful study  reveals just the opposite. It was Wesley’s teachings on sanctification and atonement that clearly identified we cannot save or sanctify ourselves; we cannot atone for sin; we cannot redeem the world; we cannot make right what is wrong, pure what is impure or holy what is unholy. For Wesley, and many others, all of these great and majestic works can only be accomplished by a sovereign work of God.

But this raises an important question. Since I, or anybody else, are incapable of such atoning works how can we enjoy total faith in what Jesus has done? The answer can only be discovered in how we understand the atoning work of Jesus. Here too it must be understood the idea of atonement is not an exclusively Judeo-Christian concept; yet it is only through Jesus perfect atonement is experienced and lived completely. The challenge facing most believers is we seldom live life in the pattern of persistently realizing what Jesus’ atonement really is. Jesus’ work of sanctification, atonement and redemption is not an experience that is to be lived, one time, like a wedding or wonderful meal and then stored within the deep recess of our memories. Rather, life lived in the atoning work of Jesus is to be expressed daily in which we develop our faith on the great act of God’s redemption which He has performed through Jesus.

If we get caught in the trap of our faith built on experience then we risk developing an un-Biblical type of life where our attention is only fixed on the appearance of our witness and not the testimony of what Jesus is doing, in us, daily. Oswald Chambers warned, “Beware of the piety that has no presupposition in the Atonement of the Lord. It is of no use for anything but a sequestered life; it is useless to God and a nuisance to man. Measure every type of experience by our Lord Himself. We cannot do anything pleasing to God unless we deliberately build on the presupposition of the Atonement.”

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Wesley lived ministry every day and experienced life fully immersed in the daily atoning work of Jesus. Likewise, let us pursue Jesus with such hunger and obedience. As Christians we are also called to life the life of Jesus practically. The life that lives in and with the atonement of Jesus will be one lived in obedience to Him with the guarantee of His grace operating on our behalf. True obedience, with no strings attached, means that we have placed everything on the atoning work of Jesus and as Wesley said, let us say, “The best of all is, God is with us.”

Grace and Peace

JOSHUA

Christian Apologetics, Christian Living, Inspirational, Motivational

LOOKING AT SIN & REDEMPTION THROUGH A DIFFERENT PARADIGM

redemption_series_graphic“In Christ. God put the wrong on him who never did anything wrong, so we could be put right with God.” (2 Corinthians 5:21 MSG)

I’m not trying to be clever, cute or intentionally controversial but something curious happened to me as our faith community has studied the book of Revelation. While Revelation deals with many eschatological and prophetic themes it often wraps them within the idea of covenant relationship, fidelity and a return to an Edenic state.  As I was sharing with my faith family the events surrounding Jesus’ second coming, and His union to a “faithful bride”, I also began to revisit how I have commonly viewed sin and redemption and asked, is there a better way?

By asking such an “out of the box” question I was not challenging God’s prescribed order of events and means by which He restores all things. Rather, like with most things, when I don’t have a clear understanding I turn to spiritual mentors, writings on the topic, opinions and most of all God’s Word to see if I am thinking God thoughts or just well intentioned but misleading opinions? Everyone struggles with what St. Paul called a “thorn in the flesh” whether it be a specific sin or the burdens of the sin nature. Furthermore, we know our remedy has and is always securely placed through the atoning work of Jesus. Yes, despite this truth, sin doesn’t just disappear from our lives and cease to exist. In fact, the sin nature is very much alive, in the world around us, and by default we are surrounded by many elements that attempt to revive the old nature within us.

For over 37 years I have tried to conquer sin, through spiritual pilgrimage, fasting, prolonged prayer, counseling, public confession and begging but it wasn’t until I revisited sin from a different paradigm I was able to better understand His work of redemption. So, here is the first paradigm shift on sin: Sin is a fundamental relationship; it is not a wrong doing, it is a wrong being of deliberate and absolute independence from God.

When you consider the Judeo-Christian world-view its approach to sin doesn’t just deal with specific sins but the very nature of sin itself. This type of worldview therefore places the Bible (God’s revealed Word) as a historical record, prophetic promise, covenant agreements and guidelines for a life that is willing to not just treat the branches or leaves, of the “sin tree”, but is willing to bore down deep to the roots. In considering the ministry of Jesus the first thing He confronted, in humanity, was the heredity of sin and not the specific sins they may have been struggling with. Jesus’ words to the woman caught in adultery went deeper than the sexual sin by confronting the very heart of the sin nature. Which is why Jesus said to her, Go, your sins (plural) are forgiven and sin no more. “The revelation of the Bible is not that Jesus Christ took upon Himself our fleshly sins, but that He took upon Himself the heredity of sin that no man can touch. God made His own Son to be sin that He might make the sinner a saint.” (Chambers)

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Here too we are not just focusing on the action, of sacrifice, but in the act of relationship in which Jesus rehabilitated humanity and returned us back to where God designed us to be. This is why I experienced great frustration in dealing with personal sin by using actions or works to cure my problems. What I needed was what we all need: To break relationship with sin and enter into a faithful relationship with Jesus. Everyone is invited to enter into union with God on the grounds of who Jesus is and what He has done.

Not to long ago I had a rose bush that in its first year bloomed such marvelous flowers. But each year this bush produced less and less until finally it looked as it was going to die. Noticing it was sick I tried a variety of cures only to see marginal change and a worsening of the situation. Eventually I even tried to cure the soil conditions around this bush but this too had little effect. Finally, in one last attempt I uprooted the rose bush and planted it elsewhere. Next spring it came back to life and each year it has grown stronger and stronger with very little need for my direct attention. Like my rose bush many people are desperately trying to redeem their lives, through works and well-intentioned Biblical actions, when what is needed is a literal break with the old sin relationships and engaging in a new intimate relationship with Jesus. Redemption is God’s ‘bit,’ and is absolutely finished and complete! But communion and relationship is a two-way street so consider looking at sin and redemption through a new paradigm; and you may find yourself treating the root of sin is more rewarding than examining the leaves.

Grace and Peace

JOSHUA