Serve the Lord your God and abandon all else

There are a lot of pastors out there who like to say Jesus would use hyperbole in his lessons to his followers to get his point across.

In Mark 9: 42-48, we see this example.

“If anyone causes one of these little ones — those who believe in me — to stumble, it would be better for them if a large millstone were hung around their neck and they were thrown into the sea. If your hand causes you to stumble, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life maimed than with two hands to go into hell, where the fire never goes out. And if your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than to have two feet and be thrown into hell. And if your eye causes you to stumble, pluck it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into hell, where ‘the worms that eat them do not die, and the fire is not quenched.’”

There may be a little hyperbole in Jesus’ statement, I’ve heard preachers say such, but Jesus isn’t exaggerating in these verses.

In our daily life, a believer should seek to never stand between a person and salvation. How important is this? Important enough that Jesus said it would be better for a millstone to be hung around our neck and thrown into a large body of water than for us to keep a person from coming to Jesus.

Charles Spurgeon once noted that everything that offends God should offend us. Much of what is acceptable, and in fact upright, in society today is offensive to God. These compromised morals have found their way into churches and now what is acceptable in society is acceptable in church.

“Where two hearts are bound together in the bonds of love, they are quite sure to endeavor to remove everything out of the way that would cause pain to either,” Spurgeon noted in one of his sermons. “You cannot love me if you favor my enemies. You can have no affection for me if you delight to thrust before me that which vexes my spirit and grieves my heart. True love feels a sympathy with the person loved and learns to put away that which is obnoxious. Now say, Heart, do you put away from yourself that which God hates? Do you hate it because he hates it — not so much because your fellow Christians dislike it, or because the public judgment would go against it — but do you hate evil because it is detestable in the sight of God?”

For centuries empires ruled through divide and conquer. An outside force would move into an area and divide the people against themselves, once a society begins to devour itself, then it was easy for the invader to come in and take charge.

Folks, that is happening in our churches today. The enemy, in this case is Satan, and he is dividing our churches and our land.

At this point in my life I can confidently say I really don’t care about my country, my only goal is to do what is right in the sight of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and trust me, his views run contrary with that of our government and the direction of this land.

Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians 6:17, “Therefore, come out from their midst and be separate,’ says the Lord. ‘And do not touch what is unclean; and I will welcome you.’”

Some have taken this command to the extreme, we call Amish and folks like them extreme, but they have refused to compromise with the world. What have we done? We have wallowed in the pigsty and the stench of our filth covers us. As Jesus concluded in Mark 9:49-50 we are salt, “Salt is good, but if it loses its saltiness, how can you make it salty again? Have salt among yourselves, and be at peace with each other.”

When we have wallowed with the pigs, how can we tell others to clean up their act?

We have failed to separate ourselves from society. We condone sexual perversion; we aid in the breakup of the family; we complain at the slaughter of innocents known as abortion, but we do little to stop it. We have utterly failed in our missionary work in this world, but what if we followed Spurgeon’s advice?

What if, we opened God’s word and opened up a line of communication with our Savior. He will speak to us through his holy word, and then our hearts will begin to align with that of our Savior.

The Pharisees were looked up to by the people in Jesus’ day, we would say they lived commendable lives, but Jesus held them in little regard and he called them the biggest hypocrites and sinners of all.

Many of Jesus’ indictments against them can be directed toward Jesus’ followers of today.

I would hate to count the times when I have caused someone to stumble, or to commit a sin against God. That is something for which I will have to answer for when Christ judges my life. While my salvation may not be in doubt, what I have done for Jesus is. I have offended many and for that I pray for Christ’s mercy.

As an individual believer, as a group of believers, as the corporate of believer known as the church, we should seek to let go of that which causes offense to God, as it would be better for us to go limping into heaven than send a single soul to hell because of the ineffectiveness of our witness to the world.

Do we want to be the church of Laodicea?

“I know your deeds, that you are neither cold or hot. I wish you were one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm — neither hot nor cold — I am about to spit you out of my mouth. You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see,” — Revelations 3:15-18

Will we be this church, or will we be the church of Philadelphia that will keep the word of God and not deny the name of Jesus?

Align our hearts with God. For those who are searching for truth, they should see us and say, “I want what they have?” For the world, we should be an offense, and take that as a badge of honor.

Serve the Lord your God and abandon all else, for nothing else can survive his refining fire.

Just as you are, nothing more needed

As the hour turns late, darkness envelopes a sleepless night as chili-cheese nachos topped with jalapenos do their work on the digestive system.

I was encouraged by a sister in Christ, the one who fed me those nachos, to use that time for Him. The only thoughts that filled my conscience during that time was that I was not worthy to speak the name of Christ, let alone write about his abundant riches. Inside, the still, small voice called out, “Come to me just as you are,” recalling the words of the great hymn by Charlotte Elliott.

The simple and haunting words of the hymn reminded me of my own lowliness and the war raging inside all of us who claim the name of Christ, as noted by the apostle Paul in Romans 7:14-20, 24-25 “We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do — this I keep doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it…

“What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!”

This battle Paul spoke of rages interminably inside the confines of our minds and our spirits. While even if our heart belongs to Jesus, Satan wages an all-consuming battle against us and at times it may seem we are fighting a war that cannot be won. We look at our tree and see it is fruitless and we deem ourselves disappointments and failures, to Christ and our Heavenly Father and to those around us looking to us to see that glimmer of the Blessed Hope that gave us life.

As the tears of failure and disappointment flow down our faces, Jesus stares at us from the cross and beckons us to him; it is not a command, but an invitation. It is an invitation to pour all the doubts and fears upon the foot of the cross and allow him to take control of the battle raging inside us — a battle he has already won.

For those of us who have been washed in Christ’s blood, that is how salvation came to us; but too often we forget Christ and the cross and we walk away from Calvary thinking everything will be fine from then on, but our accepting what Jesus did for us on the cross is only the opening refrain on our journey to our eternal existence in the presence of God and Jesus.

In this broken state, we must remain with Jesus, not going off on our own with prideful zeal as the Pharisees did, proclaiming their superiority; but within this broken, and helpless state, God creates in us a humble heart capable of not just telling, but showing a lost world the riches of God’s love.

There are no great works required of us, we don’t have to teach Sunday School or go on foreign missions, but we must decide to go to and abide with Jesus.

“All that the father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.” — John 6:36

Let’s call this the “great requirement.” The great requirement is that we come to Christ, and we have this assurance from our Lord that if we come to him in faith he will not brush us aside, but welcome us with his healing hands. As he touches us with his nail-scarred hands he imparts life into us, a life that will never be separated from us.

For many of us, that is the extent of our coming to Christ, as we said, we soon go on our way, but if we would just remain with Jesus this crumbled and listless life would have a meaning and purpose beyond our understanding, if only we would come to him.

In Ms. Elliott’s hymn, “Just as I am,” we see the picture of a person with nothing to offer, seemingly broken beyond repair, but what we don’t realize is that is the only way to come to Jesus.

The story behind the song is as heart wrenching as the song. Ms. Elliott’ father and brother were both notable pastors in their corner of England in the early 1800s, yet, at the time the young Charlotte didn’t share their same dedication to Christ, nevertheless, the Elliott home was a meeting place for many a traveling clergyman and quite often Ms. Elliott would engage them in conversation. One such man was Dr. Cesar Malan, of Geneva. Presumably over a meal, Dr. Malan began talking about his faith and he pointed a question to Ms. Elliott.

Ms. Elliott suffered constantly with poor health and was often in severe pain, which made her irritable at times, which may have been the case this time. In any event, she took offense to Dr. Malan’s question about her own faith. Dr. Malan offered to go no further on the subject, and told the young woman he would pray for her to give her heart to Christ and then use the talents given to her by God to enter a life of service to him.

A couple of weeks later, once again miserable, but for different reasons, Ms. Elliott came back to Dr. Milan and posed a question she had to so many pastors about how to come closer to Christ. They gave her the answer to pray more, do more good works, live a more pious life, all of which never seemed right to young Charlotte.

Dr. Malan cut through all of that when Ms. Elliott told him, “I am miserable. I want to be saved. I want to come to Jesus; but I don’t know how.”

He responded to her by saying, “You have only to come to him just as you are.”

The words penetrated the veil covering her heart and she gave her heart to Jesus on that night, but life and the world has a way of trying to tug us a way from our devotion to Christ. As noted, Ms. Elliott was practically an invalid and felt useless in her service to her savior. She often had doubts that ripped at her soul. Such was happening in her life in 1834 as those around her readied for a church bazaar, and the beautiful story is retold in Knapp’s “Who wrote our Hymns.”

"Ill health still beset her. Besides its general trying influence on the spirit, it often caused her the peculiar pain of a seeming uselessness in her life, while the circle round her was full of unresting serviceableness for God. Such a time of trial marked the year 1834, when she was 45 years old and was living in Westfield Lodge, Brighton,” the book noted.

The night before the bazaar Ms. Elliott was unable to sleep or rest. The book notes a sense that everything before her was an illusion, nothing but myths to be dispelled. Instead of giving into her thoughts and fears, with the help of the Holy Spirit, she determined to conquer the doubts. What Ms. Elliott did was write down the formula for her faith in verse form, the gospel of pardon and peace and how that “even now” she was accepted in the Beloved kingdom of her savior.

What sprang from her pen and onto the paper was the hymn “Just as I am.”

Through her sense of uselessness, the light of Christ sprang forth from her, reaching untold millions with her simple verses of testimony.

Some years later Ms. Elliott’s brother, the Rev. H.V. Elliott, noted, “In the course of a long ministry I hope I have been permitted to see some fruit of my labours; but I feel far more has been done by the single hymn of my sister’s.”

In this famous hymn, too often we only hear the first couple of verses during the invitational part of the service, as no one responds to the pastor’s invitation to come before the altar and offer a life to Christ, the song does not go on to reveal its beautiful prose to us. In the fifth stanza of the song it tells us the simplicity of the gospel of Christ.

“Just as I am — Thou wilt receive

Wilt welcome, pardon, cleanse, relieve;

Because thy promise I believe,

— O Lamb of God, I come!”

We too are accepted into the Beloved kingdom of our Savior if we believe on the promise fulfilled at the cross. Even though the world rejects us and spits us out, Jesus never will if we come to him — just come to him, now and for always.

A jon boat full of faith

If only Jesus disciples knew when they were with Jesus what we know now.

That statement has cropped up in my mind many times as there were so many questions I would have asked Jesus that they, as far as we know from scripture didn’t.

Today, we can read the Bible and we see Jesus, at least I hope everybody does, as the Son of God, part of the triune Godhead. The disciples, due to their narrow time with Jesus, mostly saw Jesus as a remarkable man who could do miraculous things. It is evident from scripture until Jesus walked out of the tomb and appeared to them.

There were questions, though, throughout their time with Jesus. They would see him do things and they would marvel.

“One day Jesus said to his disciples, ‘Let us go over to the other side of the lake.’ So they got into a boat and set out. As they sailed, he fell asleep. A squall came down on the lake, so that the boat was being swamped, and they were in great dangers.

“The disciples went and woke him, saying, ‘Master, Master, we’re going to drown!’

“He got up and rebuked the wind and the raging waters; the storm subsided, and all was calm. ‘Where is your faith?’ he asked his disciples.

“In fear and amazement they asked one another, ‘Who is this? He commands even the winds and the water, and they obey him.’” — Luke 8:22-25

According to Luke, the disciples had already seen Jesus raise a widow’s son from the dead, they saw him heal people with sometimes deadly infirmities, restore sight to the blind, they heard him teach; yet they still had a hard time understanding who Jesus really was. They couldn’t quite get it.

To be sure, they were scared of Jesus. Sure, Jesus was a loving and gentle man, but they saw Jesus rebuke evil spirits. They saw how scared those evil spirits were when Jesus came in their presence. They knew for a fact that Jesus wasn’t any ordinary man, but what they didn’t know was if this man was going to destroy the world — or save it.

Let’s get a little perspective here; the boats the disciples were using most likely were fishing boats. Ocean cruise lines they definitely were not. A boat from that time period would be about 27 feet long and about 7 to 8-feet wide and had a flat bottom. In modern parlance it was just a big jon boat.

Knowing this, it was understandable the disciples would be afraid out on the Sea of Galilee in such a small vessel, but they had forgotten something — Jesus was on board.

To be accurate, they hadn’t forgotten about Jesus because they did call on him to do something — he was their line of last defense.

Even though they called on Jesus, and Jesus calmed the storm, Jesus rebuked them for their lack of faith, but why?

It’s not that hard to understand, if we look at the entirety of their time with Jesus up to that point. As noted before, the disciples saw Jesus do things no other prophet, not even Moses, had done before. They heard Jesus’ teachings. No doubt they had one-on-one conversations with Jesus, yet they still didn’t realize that they were safe as long as he was with them. Or, let’s put it like this, they didn’t fully believe they were safe in the presence of God, as Jesus is God the Son.

That’s why Jesus scolded them. In essence Jesus was telling them, “Don’t you know who I am? I am.”

The same can be said of our lives. There will be storms, there will be times of trouble, but if we believe Jesus to be who he says he is, then there is a security for us. The raging storms and the troubles cannot drag us down to the depth of this world, for we have placed our lives, the very essence of our existence into the hands of Jesus Christ. A good example of this is Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson. A devout Christian, Gen. Jackson never did anything without prayer, whether it was entering battle or going for an afternoon walk, he believed in staying in communion with God. The name “Stonewall” came from his unflinching resolve in battle. He was fearless to an extent, but it was a deep abiding faith that kept him from being paralyzed with fear.

Jackson was quoted as saying “he was as safe in bed as on the battlefield.” In other words, Gen. Jackson so believed in his abiding purpose in Jesus Christ that he was immortal until God called him home.

That was the point Jesus had with his disciples. As long as he was with them, nothing in the world could harm them — if that was His will.

So many times when we pray we ask for God’s will in our life, but I believe strongly that God’s will is God’s will, and we should seek for our lives to be lived within his perfect will. It’s an argument in semantics, but if we seek to work for God, then he will help us accomplish our goals, and there was no way Jesus’ goal for his disciples was to drown in the Sea of Galilee.

To my fellow Christians out there concerning our mortal life, God does not promise a long life, a life filled with riches or a life free from pain and sorrow, but what he promises us is life in abundance — of the eternal kind.

What does it take to get that life — faith in Jesus Christ? For those who have accepted that fact, then Jesus has a job for you to do, and cowering meekly in the corner of the boat is not it. He is telling us to, “Have faith, I’ll take care of the storms, you just keep rowing the boat.”

Keep rowing the boat my fellow workers in Christ, our time is short and there are many who still need to hear the gospel of our precious Lord, bend to the oar and push for the goal, then maybe all of us will get to go home soon.

Oh...Those legalists

Oh those legalists — if it wasn’t for the books of John, Paul and Peter and then much of the Old Testament prophets — they could impose their religious Utopia where everybody had a certain way to live, much like Geneva under the generalship of John Calvin.

In the gospel of John, the sixth chapter, something I’ve written on before, Jesus had just finished performing some great miracles, the feeding of the 5,000 and his walking on water over the Sea of Galilee.

To be sure, his followers saw these miracles and were astonished, but they still didn’t know what all Jesus was telling them.

At the Sermon on the Mount, as recorded in the book of Matthew, Jesus tells everybody he was there to fulfill the Law, every jot and tittle. He told them they were to be held to a higher standard of the Law, where every thought is judged — it was a standard beyond even what the Pharisees held.

So it was natural for some of Jesus’ followers to ask in John 6:28, “What must we do to do the works God requires?”

Ask this in many churches and the people will tell you to keep all the commandments given by God. That’s a simple answer and it would be correct, but that doesn’t save us. Even if we were sinless from now on, it doesn’t cover over the sins of the past, it doesn’t square our account with God. Then, even if it did, if a believer sins again what then will be the penalty for that sin.

Nope, Jesus gave the answer to his inquisitors that day. Jesus answered in John 6:29, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.”

That’s it, that’s the answer? Surely the batteries on John’s tape recorder went out that day, or maybe his stenographer took the day off — surely that can’t be it.

The thing is — it is.

When Jesus died on the cross it was an account settling sacrifice. For the people to be able to take part in this miracle, then they must first, believe in what Jesus did for them and then turn away from their life of sin. Our works gain us nothing, it is only through faith that we come to the Father through Jesus Christ.

Step back and look at this for a moment. Imagine spending all of your time worrying about it if you are living right or Hell might be waiting. You would become like the Pharisees who worked diligently day in and day out to make sure they did everything just so, even straining their soup to make sure they didn’t accidentally swallow and unclean gnat. The Pharisees falsely believed if they followed a strict formula then they could earn their salvation.

Jesus freed us from that burden — and sin is a burden, and it seems there are many who try to keep saddling us with that burden.

“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the door of the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to.

“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when you have succeeded, you make them twice as much a child of hell as you are.” — Matthew 23:13-15

God wants us free from those burdens of sin. He wants us to worship him out of love, so, he created a way in which we could do that.
“For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.” — John 6:40

That’s reassuring, that’s a freeing of the spirit. Jesus, if we repent, takes that sin nature from us; he paid the penalty for those sins on the cross. Yes, we will commit sins even after our salvation, but if we confess them to our loving Savior they will be removed from us as far as the east is from the west.

There are many who will hold you to a standard no one can uphold. Out of the love of Christ and through the strengthening of the Holy Spirit we strive to live sinless lives, but we are still under the curse of the flesh and that is why we have a mediator between us and God the Father — our Savior Jesus Christ.

So yes, flee from sin, but don’t let the thought and fear of sin keep us from the work set before us, which is to proclaim that Jesus Christ is Lord above all and it is to him, and him only we owe our allegiance, not a flag, not a country — nothing but our Lord Jesus.

So, take from the words of Paul and flee from the legalism that binds you to this corrupted flesh, “The law is not based on faith; on the contrary, it says, ‘The person who does these things will live by them.’ Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: ‘Cursed is everyone who is hung on a pole.’ He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit.” — Galatians 3:12-14

Live as free people, no longer under the heavy yoke of sin. As we enter another election cycle many will talk about freedom, and setting you free, but know this — there is no freedom under man as we all are under the burden of tyranny. No man, no matter how smoothly he speaks can offer us freedom — freedom only comes through Jesus Christ.

Read and let the words of the Savior pierce your heart, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

On this day, resolve to let Jesus take up your heavy load, nothing you can do will lift the burden, only the nail-scarred hands of Jesus.

Stains that won't come clean

In Shakespeare’s MacBeth, lady MacBeth walks the halls at night in her sleep constantly washing and rubbing her hands.

Her conscience sears her peace and it will not allow her to forget she helped kill King Duncan. Though her hands are clean, her conscience still sees the blood on her hands as she goes about saying, “Out, damned spot! Out, I say!”

Sometimes even the most thorough washing is unable to make us clean. Jesus knew this, even if others didn’t.

“When Jesus had finished speaking, a Pharisee invited him to eat with him; so he went in and reclined at the table. But the Pharisee was surprised when he noticed that Jesus did not first wash before the meal.

“Then the Lord said to him, ‘Now then, you Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside you are full of greed and wickedness. You foolish people! Did not the one who made the outside make the inside also? But for now as for what is inside you — be generous to the poor and everything will be clean for you.’” — Luke 11:37-40

Let’s not take away from this verse that Jesus didn’t wash before he ate, or that the Pharisees were ultra-clean people. Let’s step back in time a couple thousand years and look at some of these rituals in which the Pharisees put their faith.

The Pharisees sprang up from the first Diaspora. With no temple Jewish worship began to be centered around the synagogue, and the Pharisees became what we know today as the rabbis.

They believed, somewhat rightly, that the sins of Israel led to their exile, so the Pharisees began focusing on the minutia of the Law and the tradition of the elders. Some of the rituals the Pharisees followed were not a part of the Law of Moses, yet they still religiously followed them as a passed-down tradition.

This ceremonial washing was a part of that tradition. The washing wasn’t done to clean; it was done to cleanse their hands from spiritual defilement in order to keep said defilement from coming into the body by way of the food their hands would touch.

So, to achieve this cleansing, the Pharisees would dribble a small amount of water onto their hands. The amount of water usually amounted to approximately the volume of a chicken egg, and the hands had to be washed in such a way where the water had to drip off the hands and not down the arms in order to keep the defilement from spreading. If they messed up somewhere along the way in the washing procedure they would have to start over again.

It was a relatively complex ritual and it’s probably safe to say the Pharisee was aghast that Jesus didn’t take part in it. The Pharisee, at that moment, probably lost all respect for Jesus and immediately assumed he was a great sinner, but Jesus, unwashed hands and all, sets the record straight.

Jesus tells the Pharisees they worry so much about the outside of the cup and dish they forget to clean the inside, the portion of the cup and dish actually touching the food and drink.

In a parallel passage in Matthew 23:26 Jesus said, “Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.”

Just like Lady MacBeth, they fuss and moan over the outside, but what’s inside them can’t be scrubbed clean and they can’t figure out how to accomplish this internal housekeeping chore.

The writer of Hebrews, long before “Hints from Heloise” ever existed, told us how to properly clean our bodily homes.

“This is an illustration for the present time, indicating that the gifts and sacrifices being offered were not able to clear the conscience of the worshiper. They are only a matter of food and drink and various ceremonial washings — external regulations applying until the time of the new order.

“… How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God!” — Hebrews 9:9-10, 14

Unfortunately many of our modern churches have fallen under the spell of ritual. They look to acts to give them, or enhance, their salvation.

Try as we might we just can’t do it on our own. We want to. We wish coming to God was like a doctor’s prescription to, “Take two of these and call me in the morning.” Thankfully, it doesn’t work that way.

Even given the simplest ritual, God in his infinite knowledge, knew we would never be able to follow it. Sin has too much of a hold on us. Sin tears at us and looks to cleave our hearts in eternal separation from God.

Sin seeks to keep us mired in an eternal cesspool of filth, but Jesus offers the cleanser to remove the stain of sin — his own blood.

So while the blood of King Duncan could not be removed from Lady MacBeth’s conscience, the blood of Christ can wipe away those sins. The blood of Christ will cleanse our conscience and enable us to stand before a righteous God sinless, just as Christ does.

That is the promise of the gospel. The cross, that terrible cross, was a loving act of mercy that cleared us from all wrong. That mercy that promise is still there for us. It is there for us if we call upon the name of Jesus and ask him to come in and scrub our hearts clean.

Forget the dalliances in ritual; don’t put your faith in what you can accomplish for God, instead look to what God did for you in Jesus Christ.

Then, and only then, will we get the spots sin has put in our lives out.

If you don’t have this stain removing power in your life, pray this prayer, “Heavenly Father, no matter how hard I try I can’t seem to get it right. Even though I think I’m good, sin rules my every move. Lord Jesus, I ask you to enter my life and my heart right now and cleanse me from my sins and restore me in a right relationship with God. Thank you for going to the cross for me and rescuing me from an eternity in hell away from you. Amen.”

———

If you prayed that prayer, then follow up. Don’t let it end there, go before the Lord daily in prayer, become immersed in his holy word and never give in to the world and patiently await the return of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

If you prayed that prayer a long time ago, and who have stayed close to God, turn a helping hand to the young in Christ. Give of yourself more than putting money in a collection plate. Love those around you by giving that which will never perish, the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Are you a citizen, or just a pilgrim

Is it appropriate to tell people to turn back to God on this anniversary of 9-11?

Is it unpatriotic to think your nation has no answers? Does it blaspheme the American spirit to believe our allegiance is to God, and only to God, not a man-made country and government?

Do these questions make you angry? Do they?

What about the word of God? Does it give you pause? Do His words make you angry?

“Listen to me, you descendants of Jacob, all the remnant of the people of Israel, you whom I have upheld since your birth, and have carried since you were born. Even to your old age and gray hairs I am he, I am he who will sustain you. I have made you and I will carry you; I will sustain you and I will rescue you.” — Isaiah 46:3-4

Do you read those words and find hope for a nation? Do you quote 2 Chronicles 7:14, “If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land,” and believe a new golden age will dawn upon America? Do you really believe that?

What if I told you those words from 2 Chronicles were written for the state of Israel? What if I told you your zeal for America clouds your relationship with Jesus Christ? Would those words sting on this solemn day of remembrance? Would those words make you angry? Would they?

Instead of taking oaths, looking to worldly leaders and systems of men to save us, how about a change of heart. Here’s a novel thought, look to the God who knows the end from the beginning, the God who freely gave his life for ours on the cross. Reliance upon God is the key; not self-reliance, not reliance upon others, not Oprah, not the latest book on spirituality, but a complete turning over of one’s self to God. That is our key.

At the crossing of the Red Sea, God alone defeated the Egyptian army. Not a weapon of Israel was wielded, God did it all. Surely He would have driven out the Canaanites in similar fashion, but the people lost faith, even after seeing the hand of God work mighty miracles before them.

Instead, they were afraid.

“We can’t attack those people; they are stronger than we are,” and they spread among the Israelites a bad report about the land they had explored. They said, ‘The land we explored devours those living in it. All the people we saw there are of great size. We saw the Nephilim there (the descendants of Anak come from the Nephilim.) We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes and we looked the same to them.’” — Numbers 13:31-33

For their lack of faith God made them wander through the desert for 40 years, until all of that generation was gone.

If only they would have believed, what glorious thing God would have done for them, and they wouldn’t have had to lift a hand.

Our salvation comes the same way. God can do glorious things for us, and we do not have to raise a hand, because Christ did it all at the cross. He paid the penalty for our sin and if we repent and look solely to Christ then we are imparted with citizenship into the Kingdom of God.

We are not granted dual citizenship; we must choose Christ or the world. We can’t be good Christians and good Americans. We have to make a choice, Jesus Christ, or a world of death. Sure, we can be good, law abiding neighbors who pay our taxes and don’t take from others, but we must always remember we are only temporary residents in the land. Our permanent home is with Jesus Christ.

Do these words make your angry? Do these words convict your spirit?

What did Jesus have to say? When he stood before Pilate and was asked about his kingdom, what did Jesus say?

“My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jewish leaders. But now my kingdom is from another place.” — John 18:36

Jesus was not concerned about Roman politics, he wasn’t concerned with the constant Jewish plotting to get out from under Roman rule. Jesus came to fulfill the Law and to redeem mankind from its sin. On the cross he became the atoning sacrifice required to gain us entry into the kingdom of God.

Do you accept that? Do you?

If not, then what holds you? The word of God is clear. Jesus said man cannot serve two masters. We cannot serve Christ and be a part of this world. If we choose Christ, then we must put to death our sin nature and come out from the world.

As Paul said, we are in the world, but not of the world. We must be living examples of the love Christ gave to us through the cross. If hardship, ridicule and death be our path, then so be it, because our Savior suffered worse for our sake.

As Paul told us in Romans 12:14-21, “Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. Live in harmony with one another (fellow believers.) Do not be proud, but willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited.

“Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everyone. If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. Do not take revenge, my dear friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: ‘It is mine to avenge; I will repay,’ says the Lord. On the contrary: ‘If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.’ Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.”

If we walk through the world with the gospel on our lips and we are hated for it, then we are blessed in the kingdom of God. If you bend under the tyranny the world offers, then stand free at the cross of Christ.

Do these words offer hope? Do they?

Don’t expect national redemption. Don’t expect God to overlook the sins of a nation that turns its back on his gospel.

Instead, be a part of the kingdom that knows no end. Be a patriot of the Kingdom of God and defend it with your life. The world has nothing to offer.

Does what I say make you long for Christ, or does it just make you angry?

Are All Our Sins Forgiven?

By Jack Kelley
Grace Through Faith Ministries

I've received a number of questions about a recent series of online articles disputing the idea that Jesus died for all our sins, past, present, and future on the cross. The articles make the claim that the Bible teaches no such thing. So let's find out. Does the Bible teach that all the sins of our life were forgiven at the cross or doesn't it?

Colossians 2:13-14 reads as follows, When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross. 

The Greek word translated all in this passage is pas.  It means each, every, any, all, the whole, all things, everything.  This would seem to support the claim that all sins past present and future were forgiven at the cross.  It also supports Paul's statement that at the moment of belief the Holy Spirit was sealed within us as a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance. 

And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory (Ephes. 1:13-14).

Taken literally, this means the Holy spirit is the down payment that guarantees the redemption of the acquired possession (us).  This guarantee went into effect when we first believed. (By the way, for those of you who only speak King James-ese, all translation interpretations on this site are from the Greek text that brought forth the King James Version.)

 Now it is God who makes both us and you stand firm in Christ. He anointed us, set his seal of ownership on us, and put his Spirit in our hearts as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come. (2 Cor. 1:21-22). 

This tells us that God has established us as His and has placed His seal upon us as well.  A seal is meant to authenticate ownership, placing it beyond doubt. It's similar to the brand a rancher places on his cattle.  1 Cor. 6:19 says we are no longer ours, we were bought with a price. The price was the life of His Son Jesus. The Holy Spirit is our guarantee that God, who acquired us, will also redeem us.

Hebrews 10:12-14 states that Jesus offered Himself as a once for all time sacrifice for sin that has made us perfect forever.

But when this priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God.  Since that time he waits for his enemies to be made his footstool, because by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.

Once for all time means it applies from the beginning of the Age of Man to the end and continuously throughout. That includes the entire life of every believer. In offering Himself as our sacrifice for sin He has made perfect forever we who are being made Holy. This is an expansion of the writer's claim in Hebrews 7:25 to the effect that because Jesus lives forever He is able to save us forever. (These verses  prove that all interpretations of Hebrews 6:4-6 and Hebrews 10:26-27 that are used to deny eternal security are incorrect on their face.  The same author, writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, could not contradict himself so radically).  

Notice the sacrifice made us perfect forever, even though we're still in the process of being made Holy.  That's a job that won't be finished until the rapture/resurrection. 

Being made perfect forever is what Paul meant when he said, Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!  (2 Cor. 5:17).  The verbs here are in the past perfect tense.  That means  from God's perspective this is all over and done.  Paul said that by accepting the Lord's death as payment for all our sins we've become as righteous as God is (2 Cor. 5:21).  

These statements are all consistent.  Individually and collectively they clearly show that all the sins of our life are forgiven from the moment we first believe.  And there's not a single verse in the New Testament that contradicts, modifies, or retracts these promises.  After all, how could God guarantee our salvation from the moment of belief unless all the sins of our life were paid for and forgiven at the cross?

But We Still Sin!

So how can we reconcile this with the undeniable fact that we still sin?  Remember, in His Sermon on the Mount Jesus explained that sin begins with a thought, whether action follows or not.  Anger is as much a sin as murder, lust is as much a sin as adultery.  He could also have said coveting is as much a sin as theft, and so on. The writer of Hebrews told us that continuing to work to earn or keep our salvation is equivalent to breaking the commandment to keep the Sabbath (Hebrews 4). And James said whoever keeps the whole Law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it (James 2:10).  It's only by using the blood of Jesus to wash away all the sins of our life that God could make good on His promise to guarantee our inheritance.  Here's how He does it.

Because we've been born again, God chooses to see us as the perfect being we will be after the rapture /resurrection.  He can do this because He's outside of time.  Remember, eternity is not just a lot of time.  Eternity is the absence of time altogether and God inhabits eternity (Isaiah 57:15).  Remember God telling Adam that in the day he ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil he would die? (Genesis 2:17)  When Adam and Eve disobeyed, they didn't die then and there. But although they lived for several hundred more years, they were changed from immortal to mortal on that day.  Their eventual death became a certainty and God who is outside time saw it at the moment they sinned. 

Becoming born again is the exact opposite.  We didn't actually become immortal on that day but  our immortality was made certain, and from that time on God saw us as immortal beings. He inspired Paul to write, Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!  (2 Cor. 5:17). Although to us we're still much the same, to God we became a new creation on the day we accepted the Lord's death as payment for our sins. He now sees us as being as righteous as He is (2 Cor. 5:21).  This righteousness comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe (Romans 3:22).      

Paul explained how God is able to do this in Romans 7:18-20.  I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.  For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing.  Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.

For a born again believer, God has separated the sin from the sinner.  God sees our sins as a holdover from the old us and does not consider them to be part of the new us.

What Should Be Our Response To This? 

Does this mean we're free to sin all we want? Are the legalists correct in saying that if God didn't threaten us with the loss of our salvation we would all become the worst kind of depraved sinners? Millions of born again believers whose lives are radically different stand as evidence to the contrary. We all still sin from time to time but the direction and focus of our lives is not the same as it once was, and we can testify to the fact that we've been changed.  Although Paul said everything is permissible, he also said not everything is beneficial or constructive.  Therefore we no longer seek our own good but the good of others (1 Cor. 10:23-24) in the hope of winning the prize for which God has called us heavenward in Christ Jesus (Phil 3:14). Paul was not talking about his salvation, which he already had, but rewards he hoped to receive at the Bema Seat judgment (1 Cor. 3:10-15) after the rapture.

This is why the loss of our salvation is never threatened.  Our belief in our eventual immortality matches what God has already seen for us, and in the meantime we strive to heed Paul's advice to live up to what we have already attained (Phil 3:16).  This is our spiritual act of worship (Romans 12:1) in gratitude for what we've been freely and irrevocably given.

But what about those true believers who don't respond with gratitude and who don't seem to have changed, living pretty much the way they did before they were saved? Is the gift rescinded? The promise broken? The guarantee revoked? I haven't found a single verse that threatens them in this way.  How could there be when all the sins of their life are paid for, including the sin of ingratitude. 

What I've found is that for the most part, these ungrateful souls live defeated lives here and forfeit rewards in the hereafter.  These are the ones Paul said will still be saved but only as one escaping through the flames (1 Cor. 3:15).

Here on Earth they have union with out fellowship, never experiencing any intimacy with God.  As a result their Christian walk consists of movement without progress, battles without victories, and service   without success.  They're on the right side of pardon but the wrong side of power, having justification without sanctification.

Jesus described them in the parable of the sower and the seed, saying they're like the seed that fell among thorns. It germinates and grows but because it's choked by the thorns, it never matures to bear fruit.   Because these believers are too concerned with the ways of the world, they never mature as Christians and never produce anything of value to the Kingdom (Matt. 13:22).  At the Bema Seat they'll stand before the Lord with nothing to show for the incredible gift they were given because they will fave failed to implement the wonderful plan He had for their lives.

The New Testament is crammed with admonitions and encouragement to allow the Holy Spirit to change the focus of our lives from the things of this world to the things of the next one, from the things we can see, which are temporary, to the things we cannot, which are eternal (2 Cor. 4:18), to be made new in the attitudes of our mind (Ephesians 4:23) no longer conforming to the patterns of this world (Romans 12:2).  In short, to live up to what we've already attained (Phil. 3:16).  

Some believers who fail to heed these admonitions will find themselves having escaped judgment simply because on a single day in their otherwise unremarkable life they made a decision that changed everything.  For some it will be the only smart decision they ever made, but they will have made it in faith, which is all that matters (Ephesians 2:8-9) because having made it, all the sins of their miserable existence were forgiven and they became a child of God (John 1:12-13), adopted into His forever family (Gal. 4:4-5). 

When the time comes, those who failed to make that decision would gladly trade the riches of the world to change places with them.  But as indescribably generous as the gift they received on that day is, it was only the first installment on the life they could have had. Whether out of ignorance or rebellion they turned down the rest, refusing to allow the Holy Spirit to guide them into it, until finally the still small voice within them could no longer be heard. 

I sometimes wonder if the loss some will suffer at the Bema Seat (1 Cor. 3:15) will appear as endless warehouses of unclaimed blessing or if the tears the Lord wipes from their eyes will be tears of regret upon learning what they could have done through Him had they responded to the Holy Spirit's prompting.  Only time will tell. But at least, it will all be in the past, because Rev. 21:4 goes on to say that from then on there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain for the old order of things will have passed away. All their sins were forgiven from the day they first believed.  Selah 08-27-11

Follow the voice of the Shepherd

By WAYNE STEWART

July 24, 2011

Here’s a question worth pondering, when the Master calls do you know who it is; or how about this, do you mistake the someone else’s call for the Master’s?

Let’s take a look at John 10 and see what Jesus has to say.

“The one who enters by the gate is the shepherd for the sheep. The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice. But they will never follow a stranger; in fact, they will run away from him because they do not recognize a stranger’s voice…

“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. The hired hand is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it. The man runs away because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.

“I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me — just as the Father knows me and I know the Father — and I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd.” — John 10:2-5, 11-16

This passage of scripture is full of symbolism all people must take to heart and understand. This is not some allegorical story Jesus is telling, but he is instructing people on how Jesus deals with those who are called by his name, and he also warns those who are called by his name not to listen to another voice, and Jesus also warns those who would seek to take his sheep.

First, let’s go over what Jesus told the people. Jesus said he enters by the door. There is nothing nefarious with Christ, nothing sneaky, Jesus only comes where he is welcome. The doorkeeper, the Holy Spirit, then opens the door and Jesus calls for those who believe to come to him. The Greek word for called in this instance is “kaleo,” which means to invite, which is what Jesus does. All are invited, but only a few heed the call; there is a secondary meaning to “kaleo,” as it also means to receive the name of something. So, Jesus comes into the sheep pen and invites people to take the name of Jesus upon them.

Jesus then calls his sheep by his name and they follow and notice what the scripture says, Jesus leads them out. Dealing with livestock can be a frustrating experience. Around here people like to drive cattle, usually, but sheep and goats are a different story.

Sheep and goats tend to develop a relationship with the shepherd and it is against their instinct to run away and be in fear of their Master. Instead, they will follow the shepherd anywhere. The shepherd leads the way, the shepherd keeps away the predators that would ravage the flock. The shepherd knows the way home.

This is exactly how Jesus deals with believers. Jesus will never push, you choose to follow or get left behind. We know from Paul there are all kinds of spiritual battles being fought around us, but there is comfort in knowing that Jesus already has defeated the enemy. Jesus defeated Satan and fulfilled the penalty of sin when he voluntarily gave his life up on the cross. Jesus defeated death when he walked out of the tomb three days later.

Being called by the name of Jesus allows us, his sheep, to share in his victories sealed by his name.

“And you also were included in Christ when you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation. When you believed you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit.” — Ephesians 1:13

That is our brand and for the true believer it means nothing Satan or the world throws at us will ever separate us from our faithful shepherd.

Then, beginning in verse 11, Jesus gives instructions about the role pastors should have. Pastor David Guzik wrote, “The bad shepherd thinks the flock exists for his benefit, but the good shepherd lives (and dies) for the good of the sheep.

“… The faithful pastor will, as an under-shepherd, display the same characteristics as the Good Shepherd. He will sacrifice for the sheep, know the sheep, and be known by them. He will be a shepherd and not a hireling who does not care about the sheep.”

 Last week the power of the “Word” was the topic. It is important all believers immerse themselves in the word of God. One of the problems these days is reading the Bible is an afterthought to most people. The good shepherd speaks to his sheep through the word. And, if the sheep do not know the words from the Shepherd, how can they discern when a thief is calling?

So, beware brothers and sisters, be sure it only is the Shepherd’s voice you hear.

Now, before wrapping this up, we will come to the end. In John 10:17-18 Jesus said he voluntarily gives his life for the sheep, and he, by his own power, takes his life back up again. Through this power Jesus offers life to the believer. Through God’s infinite mercy, this salvation is offered to all, Jew and Gentile alike. All are welcome to come to Christ. There are no prerequisites to pass, but it can only be through Christ, as Jesus is the only shepherd that can lead the flock to the Father.

Don't give in to man's praise

 By WAYNE STEWART

August 7, 2011

Classrooms are filled with students who know the answer, but refuse to answer when the teacher asks the question.

Nobody wants to be wrong. Nobody wants to go against the grain. They would rather be considered dumb and popular than a smart loner. The times never change.

Jesus performed miracles for everybody to see. Even the Pharisees marveled at what Jesus could do, but they could not shake themselves from their own little clique and flee the safety of the group for the life being offered through Jesus Christ.

“Yet at the same time, man even among the leaders believed in him. But because of the Pharisees they would not openly acknowledge their faith for fear they would be put out of the synagogue; for they loved human praise more than praise from God.” — John 12:42-43

How true those words ring true today. Too many people seek what the world has to offer. Too many people desire acceptance from the world. Too many people look for love and significance from that which only seeks to devour them.

The human spirit has desires only Jesus Christ can fulfill; yet most people will look to anything but the cross. Anything but the cross.

“Today the revelation of God is treated with indifference, or talked of as if it deserved no reverence or credit,” Charles Spurgeon said in a sermon delivered in 1885. “Unbelief has sapped the foundations of the social fabric.”

The world derides believers as being stupid, backwards and bigoted. These barbs are flung from the medial and the so-called learned of modern society. Too many people are immersed in this heretical world and are too afraid of loosing its bonds and coming into the light of the truth.

The “enlightened ones” have so undermined the Christ-based foundation of our society that true believers are now pariahs. Still, Christ urges those who are called by his name to stand firm, and Jesus, still in John 12:44-46 gives us this encouragement.

“Whoever believes in me does not believe in me only, but in the one who sent me. The one who looks at me is seeing the one who sent me. I have come into the world as a light, so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness.”

Truly, the world is a dark place. Over the past few years it seems the world has been brought to its knees. Drought grips the area, while torrential rains flood lands to our north. The financial world has been brought to its knees, yet people still hide from the truth.

Many people hear the truth of Christ, and believe the words are good and powerful and hold them warmly in their hearts, but they fail to confess Jesus as Lord of all — that is a faith lacking.

“What they feared: being put out of the synagogue, which they thought would be a disgrace and damage to them; as if it would do them any harm to be expelled from a synagogue that had made itself a synagogue of Satan, and from which God was departing,” Matthew Henry astutely noted of the Jewish leaders who had inclinations toward Christ. “What was at the bottom of this fear: They loved the praise of men, chose it as a more valuable good, and pursued it as a more desirable end, than the praise of God; which was an implicit idolatry, like that of ‘worshipping and serving the creature more than the Creator.’ They set these two in the scale one against the other, and, having weighed them, they proceeded accordingly.”

In these scales, do you, or do you see people weighing what the world has to offer against life. Yes, that is what is at stake, a couple minutes of pleasure versus eternity with the risen Savior.

This is what it boils down to — illusion versus reality. For those who don’t believe, at least do this — listen to the message of Christ with an open heart. If after hearing it, the Holy Spirit still doesn’t stir you then walk away.

If you read John 12:20-41, you will see God will eventually harden the hearts of those who continually reject the offers made by Jesus. This truth is inevitable, but that should not deter believers, in fact it should make us redouble our efforts to reach a people thirsting for the gospel.

Most will walk away, but what about the one who is willing to reject the world and come to Christ — that soul should be worth all of our effort.

Don’t fall into the trap of sin

 By WAYNE STEWART

 August 19, 2011

Mention the word sin and people will bristle.

In many churches sin is never mentioned, out in the world the word is equated with religious zealots. The oft-quoted mantra of, “You can’t judge me!” is trotted out and believers cower in fear. No one, believer or not, enjoys the light of truth shined upon them.

So, the subject of sin gets pushed under the rug. Believers say, “I’ve been redeemed. I am free.” That’s true, as the apostle Paul confirmed, but he also warned against such libertinism.

Sin is a subject that shouldn’t be glossed over. Sin causes separation. Sin keeps the lost away from God and sin also interferes with a believer’s relationship with Jesus Christ. Sin is the proverbial elephant that’s been in the room since the Garden of Eden.

Out of sin come two incontrovertible facts: All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God; and there is not a sin Christ’s blood cannot cover.

Following will be a few passages of scripture that will deal with sin:

“Then the Lord said to Cain, ‘Why are you so angry? Why is your face downcast? If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must rule over it.” — Genesis 4:6-7

“The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group and said to Jesus, ‘Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?’ They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him.

“But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, ‘Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.’ Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.

“At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. Jesus straightened up and asked her, ‘Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?’

“No one sir,’ she said.

“Then neither do I condemn you,’ Jesus declared. ‘Go and sin no more.’” — John 8:3-11

“God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” — 2 Corinthians 5:21

“But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his son, purifies us from all sin. If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” — 1 John 1:7-9

There is a requirement to be saved. The would-be believer must place their faith in Jesus Christ, believing on his death on the cross and his resurrection; it also requires repentance.

To place our faith, means we put our very lives into the nail-scarred hands of Jesus. Repentance means to change our minds. When we repent we actually change our minds toward sin. What at one time held allure and intrigue is to become abhorrent to a believer. While the believer is freed from the Law, a new creation is begun with the Holy Spirit within us as we begin our transformation into what Christ will have us to be, which will be realized at the resurrection of believers. So while we have been redeemed there is a war raging inside of us with our sinful nature, as Paul tells us in Romans. Through a love of Christ, we strive to live a life free from sin. There are times, many times in my case, when I falter, but a believer in Christ should always be in a state of repentance and as John noted in his first epistle, if the believer repents, then Christ will forgive us.

Remember what repent means, it means to change ones mind toward something. Notice what Jesus said to the woman caught in adultery, go and sin no more. In other words, Jesus told her to repent, change your mind toward sin.

As a believer we should desire not to sin, not consider our redemption as a license to live a life of debauchery. What kind of witness is that to a lost and dying world?

Many people like to bring up the sin of homosexuality. Some will say Jesus sacrifice on the cross paid for that sin and they continue in that destructive lifestyle. It is true Christ’s blood paid for that sin, but let’s look at this example.

Imagine you are a bank robber. After you become saved you realize your sins and turn away from your desire to rob banks. Yes, if you robbed another bank Christ’s blood would redeem that sin, but you are aware that is a part of the life put to death when you accepted what Jesus did for you and you flee from it.

The same is true of homosexuality, or adultery or the sin of sex outside of marriage. Yes, Christ’s blood paid for those sins, but Christ asks us to “Go and sin no more.” Jesus asks us to change our mind toward those sins and to flee from them.

That should be our desire, to live a perfect life devoted to Christ. It is not required, but living that kind of life shows our fruit and it shows to whom we belong.

Even for the believer, sin is crouching at our door, just as God told Cain, but through the blood of Jesus Christ, who became sin for us, we are given the keys to conquer it and he has cloaked us with his righteousness.

Now we must take the charge of Jesus to go and sin no more.

Relying on a house of cards

By WAYNE STEWART

There is endless talk these days of the government stepping up to fix the nation’s debt problem.

The people of this nation are looking for a man-made solution. If everybody would take a step back for a minute, they may find all the problems arose because of man-made solutions — garbage in, garbage out.

None of the problems are new, sure, they may be peculiar to a specific culture or society, but they all boil down to the same problem — man’s reliance upon man.

“Your choicest valleys are full of chariots, and horsemen are posted at the city gates The Lord stripped away the defenses of Judah, and you looked in that day to the weapons of the Palace of the Forest. You saw that the walls of the City of David were broken through in many places; you stored up water in the Lower Pool. You counted the buildings in Jerusalem and tore down houses to strengthen the wall. You build a reservoir between the two walls for the water of the Old Pool, but you did not look to the One who made it, or have regard for the One who planned it long ago.” — Isaiah 22:7-11

Let’s have a little history lesson; the time of Isaiah 22 is after the fall of the Northern Kingdom to the Assyrians. Scripture tells of a time when Assyria laid siege to Jerusalem, yet God confounded and routed the Assyrian army with a plague and the siege was lifted. Isaiah is looking past that to when Babylon would overrun Jerusalem, destroy the Temple and send many of the inhabitants into exile.

See, God had shown himself powerful to the people, he could and would fight Judah’s battles if only the people would turn to him. As J.A. Motyer noted, the people of Judah, “did not, of course, abandon faith per se. Everybody lives by faith. It is part of the human condition. Financiers trust market forces, militarists trust bombs, scientists leaders trust nature’s regularities. Jerusalem’s leaders trusted Egypt.”

This is a common failing of all men as we tend to trust what is believed to be tangible, but what they fail to realize is God is more real than the paper on which this is printed. God is powerful, faithful and He will do what He says; and God, through Jesus Christ asks us to give up self and abandon everything for him.

That’s a lot to ask of somebody, but it’s exactly what God has always desired from us — a simple walk based upon faith. In the Garden, God told Adam everything is his and he can have it all; just don’t eat of that tree. They didn’t trust God and looked where that got us, now we have to buy and work for our food and daily sustenance all while living with the burden of sin.

Several generations later God had brought a nation out of the mightiest country in the world at the time. Through mighty works God drowned much of the Egyptian army in the Red Sea, yet the people still did not believe God could care for them. After defeating the Egyptians the people called Israel didn’t believe God could drive the Canaanites out of the land He had promised Abraham all those years ago, so for the next 40 years they were destined to wander the desert until that generation was gone.

The truth of the matter is God doesn’t need anything from us. He is God, after all, but He does desire something from us, and in his loving mercy he has given us the choice of choosing Him or ignoring Him.

Looking back at Isaiah 22:11, the people are indicted for ignoring God, the one who brought them up out of Egypt, and trusting in their own strength and ingenuity. In verse 10 of that same chapter a census was taken so the people would know their own strength, but what is the strength of man compared to God? No, we can’t do it on our own.

Let’s look at this nation’s recent history. The United States has the most powerful military machine the world has ever seen. It overthrew the Iraqi army in a matter of days; and it drove out the Taliban with just a handful of troops, but since that time it has been stuck in a quagmire. What has all that might done for the country as it continues to lose lives in those far-off places.

This nation has trusted in its strength, and its economic prowess. Uber-patriots talk often about “American Exceptionalism,” but what is that but God’s favor. This country has abandoned God, much the way the people of Judah. Instead of God, we look to our own mind for solutions. Instead of falling on our knees we write our Congressman. When will God say, “Enough!”

“The weakness of Judah now appeared more than ever,” Matthew Henry wrote concerning Isaiah 22. “Now also they discovered their carnal confidence and their carnal security. They looked to the fortifications. They made sure of water for the city. But they were regardless of God in all these preparations. They did not care for his glory in what they did. They did not depend upon him for a blessing on their endeavours. For every creature is to us what God makes it to be; and we must bless him for it, and use it for him. There was great contempt of God's wrath and justice, in contending with them. God's design was to humble them, and bring them to repentance. They walked contrary to this. Actual disbelief of another life after this, is at the bottom of the carnal security and brutish sensuality, which are the sin, the shame, and ruin of so great a part of mankind. God was displeased at this. It is a sin against the remedy, and it is not likely they should ever repent of it. Whether this unbelief works by presumption or despair, it produces the same contempt of God, and is a token that a man will perish wilfully.”

It is time to stop putting faith in ourselves, our government, our institutions, even our churches. It is time to abandon the old precepts and look again to God. Don’t sign your life over to a dead government, instead give your life to the Living God who allowed himself to be nailed to the cross and placed in a grave to put an end to our sins. Turn that sin over to Christ, and rise with him from the tomb.

With Jesus comes the promise of life, everything else is death.

The world passeth away

By JOSEPH CHAMBERS

Paw Creek Ministries

Not only is the world about to pass away but every person of this world and living by this world’s pleasures and compromises is going to be judged with it. Make yourself a list of everything that is of this world and greatly loved by this world and those are the things that will not be part of God’s coming Eternal Kingdom. When you are finished then separate yourself from all those worldly things and you will be ready for God’s Holy Spirit to possess you and to go in the Rapture. This separation must be the work of Christ’s Grace and the cleansing of His Blood or it is nothing but self-righteousness.

Apostle John echoed this wonderful truth in his First Epistle. He said, by the Holy Ghost, “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.” (I John 2:15-17)

The church world has become so worldly that the world is perfectly ready to be churchy. The mega-religions (churches, ministries, etc.) are a perfect picture of this sad development. Big time religion has replaced old-time religion and even the secular world knows it’s all a sham. The power of the Blood is still mighty to transform. The beauty of this transforming power is that Christ becomes the center focus of those it touches. This is not a redemption that starts without and works inward but it starts within and works outward. “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new“. (2 Cor. 5:17)

Romans is the book called “The Romans’ Road,” but those that walk it must receive all of it. The Spirit said, “Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin“ (Romans. 6:6). This life is absolutely the greatest life of our human existence. Anything less is sub-human and misses the precious glory of our Lord.

The Kingdom God is presently rising in spite of what we see in the natural. In fact it has always been true that the darkest moments are just prior to the dawn. When sin gets so arrogant and haughty, that’s when God the Father says, “That’s enough.” I like what Peter said on the day of Pentecost as he preached his mighty sermon. He made it clear that the entire plan of God was on target. “Therefore being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, he hath shed forth this, which ye now see and hear. For David is not ascended into the heavens: but he saith himself, The LORD said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand, Until I make thy foes thy footstool.” (Acts 2:33-35)

When I read that passage this morning as I was before the Lord, my spirit leaped with joy. This world and the worldly crowd does not appreciate the Godly saints that do not want the world and it’s compromise. They do not just reject us, they hate us. We are a sore thumb to them and they want to destroy us. Be sweet while they fester, we will be out of here just before most of them implode. Many will already be judged even before our escape.

Consider everything that has so captured the imagination of our present society. Take every expression of the world and consider how little of it will fit the coming Kingdom of God in the Millennium and in New Jerusalem and the entire Redeemed World. The entertainment world of night life, drinking, dancing, and often immorality will be non-existent shortly. The jewelry and cosmetic industries will be out of business. The immoral dress styles and all their designers and manufacturers will be bankrupt. The tobacco and alcohol crowd will be assigned to the region of the damned.

The producers of smut will be in the Lake of Fire along with every corrupt soul. The Saints will be beautified with the glory of righteousness. There will be no effeminate men and masculine women dressed in the cross-cultural styles of a debauched society. I guarantee that every one of you know this already when you dare to really think biblically. Listen to this breathtaking Word from Jesus Christ. “And he said unto them, Ye are they which justify yourselves before men; but God knoweth your hearts: for that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God.” (Luke 16:15)

Everything this world and the worldly crowd love and chase are things the Bible says are an abomination. You can actually judge right and wrong to a great degree by what the world thinks. If they love it you should run from it. Sure we live in this world and we must use certain things for a normal existence. Jesus prayed for us like this. “I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.” (John 17:15-17)

The Methodists under John Wesley lived this separated life or they were not allowed to be Methodist. Dwight L. Moody would walk to preach on Sunday before he would pay to ride a carriage on the Lord’s Day. On and on we can trace Christianity when it was real and when society was being shaken to the teeth by Holy Ghost conviction. When separation from the world returns to the Saints, the Spirit of conviction will shake our communities. Nothing else will survive the coming upheaval.

Joseph Chambers

jrc@pawcreek.org

The Word, the power to save

By WAYNE STEWART

Sit through any church service and a lot is said about, “the word.”

Now to be sure, “the word” can mean many different things. Put a capital “W” in front of it and you get another name for Jesus Christ, as can be found in John 1:1, but mostly when we see “the word” written in the Bible it concerns the revelation of God to his people — which of course had its ultimate manifestation in Jesus Christ and his finished work upon the cross of Calvary.

From the time of Moses to the apostle John on the isle of Patmos, God chose to bless the generations with the spoken word.

A preacher once said, “God could have chosen to bless us with golden jelly beans laid by pigeons, but instead God chose to bless us with the word, and aren’t we the better for it?”

The simple answer to the posit is, yes, because it is through the word of God, something Christians call the Holy Bible, we can actually learn about God and his plan for mankind and his path for our salvation.

“Therefore, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent and humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you.

“Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues in it — not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it — they will be blessed in what they do.” — James 1:21-25

James, the half-brother of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ makes it known the “word” planted in you can save you.

Notice the word “planted.”  A person can read the Bible all day long, but unless the Holy Spirit plants it in the reader’s heart then the word will never take root, but on the other hand the Holy Spirit can urge a person toward the word, but until they read and receive the word there is no seed to plant.

In other words, the word of God, when combined with the Spirit of God, is a believer’s source of life.

“The Word of God is a living seed containing within itself God’s own life, which, when it is received into our hearts, springs up within us and ‘brings forth fruit after its kind;’” R.A. Torrey wrote, “for Jesus Christ, the eternal Word of God, is the living germ hidden in his written word… Of no other book could such things as these be said. Hence we say, the Word of God is the instrument in His hand to work in us and for us regeneration and salvation.”

Through the word God has not only revealed himself to us, but has involved us in his work.

This should be wonderful news to any believer, but especially to those who are lost and trying to find some truth in this world. Sadly, though, there aren’t enough Christians out there willing to turn off the TV and open the word of God and experience the life that is within it for all who will believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.

“The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you — they are full of the Spirit and life.” — John 6:63

In Ephesians 6:10-17 Paul tells the church in Ephesus to put on the whole armor of God in order for believers to take a stand against Satan. Paul sums up his analogy by saying, “Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.”

We know the word of God points us to our salvation, which is faith in Jesus Christ, but the word of God also protects us from the evils of Satan, and also acts as an offensive weapon against the enemies of God. Try as it might, the world cannot overcome the word of God, though many rail at its teachings, they only roar because in their hardened hearts they know the Bible contains the words of truth.

When a believer is immersed in the word of God, the body may be destroyed, but there is nothing Satan can muster that will separate the believer from their destiny with Christ.

No other words, but the Word of God, can give, or even promise life. The word of God is the believer’s sustenance in a time of drought and dearth. The word of God, the Holy Bible, to borrow the words of Dave Hunt, is God’s love letter to mankind.

So, instead of using God’s holy words as a paper weight, or as a dust collector on a shelf, open the pages and look inside limitlessness of a God who wants you to come to him through His son, Jesus Christ. Read the words, because there is no other conclusion to be made.