Category Archives: Jesus & The Gospel

Empowered to Serve

Posted on March 13, 2012 | 1 Comment

Last week I wrote a blog about the reality of God’s Kingdom touching earth through miraculous deeds, and the fact that the Bible testifies that those things continue in the church today.

Knowing many people who read my blog personally, I know that the “charismatic,” “continuationist” viewpoint is one that some do not agree with, or still have questions about, and I hope to continue to handle this topic tactfully, in order to not offend those people.

As I began pursuing the gifts of the Holy Spirit a few years ago while attending an independent Baptist college where the common believe was that the gifts have ceased, it seemed like such an overwhelming issue and there were many questions in my mind as to how the gifts should be incorporated into church and life. Because those around me did not believe the gifts continue, I didn’t have anyone to turn to to find the answers I was seeking.

On top of that, I saw many charismatic leaders on Christian television who, it seemed, used the gifts as a way of making a name for themselves, and to gain status in the world. I knew there was something wrong with this, and it served to add to the ammunition of those opposed to my beliefs.

It didn’t take more than a look at 1 Corinthians 12-14 to tell me that the basis for using the gifts is love, but the other day as I was reading in Matthew, another passage caught my attention that I believe it speaks to this issue as well, and I want to share it here:

Then the mother of the sons of Zebedee came up to (Jesus) with her sons, and kneeling before him she asked him for something. And he said to her, “What do you want?” She said to him, “Say that these two sons of mine are to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your kingdom.” Jesus answered, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I am to drink?” They said to him, “We are able.” He said to them, “You will drink my cup, but to sit at my right hand and at my left is not mine to grant, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared by my Father.” And when the ten heard it, they were indignant at the two brothers. But Jesus called them to him and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. It shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be your slave, even as the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Matthew 20:20-28)

These disciples, who had walked with Jesus for a while by this point, who had been given authority to heal and cast out demons, and who were to some degree were helping to lead the masses following Jesus around, now come to Jesus and completely miss the point of the mission of God. They miss the mandate to bring the Kingdom of Heaven to earth (Matthew 6:10), and instead, come looking for more authority that would come to them by having the seat of power next to Christ when the Kingdom is fully come.

Jesus calls them on it. He goes into this teaching that seeking power for oneself is a trait inherent in establishing an earthly throne, but that this is not how things work in God’s Kingdom. Instead, the power of the Kingdom is given most to those not seeking power itself, but who are instead seeking to serve others from a selfless, compassionate heart, just like His own. He even uses himself as the  example, as He had been telling the disciples that He was on His way to Jerusalem to die for the sins of His people.

Now, the reality is that people can use God-given authority and power from a sinful, self-serving heart and still see the power work. Jesus said that on the day of judgement “many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’” (Matthew 7:22-23)

However, for those believers who are legitimately seeking God’s power for the purpose of transforming their world into a Kingdom culture – “on earth as it is in Heaven” – then Jesus says, these people will be the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven.

From this truth, to those reading who are seeking how the gifts are to be used, allow me give you some very simple scriptural advice for this pursuit:

  • Make sure your heart and mind are working from a position of Christ-likeness. “So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus…” (Philippians 2:1-5)
  • Don’t seek a logical answer to mysteries of faith. Just go after God to do something  miraculous, and watch Him work. “Pursue love, and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts…”(1 Corinthians 14:1)

When we are acting out of the love of God, with a mind to serve others and bring God’s Kingdom to earth, the Holy Spirt will be there to empower us and to see us through. It really is this simple, as long as we don’t let our systems of theology get too deep for our faith to handle.

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Posted in Christian Living, Evangelism & Missions, Jesus & The Gospel, Spiritual Gifts

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The Tangible Kingdom

Posted on March 6, 2012 | 2 Comments


As I have been slowly working through the book of Matthew in my devotion time, there are certain themes that seem to recur again and again in the ministry of Jesus and the disciples – things like “the Kingdom of Heaven,” the testimony of things  seen, and the idea of bearing fruit.

Very early on, in Matthew 4:14, after he had been tempted in the wilderness, the scriptures tell us that “from that time Jesus began to preach, saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 4:17).

Now, this message sounds very familiar to the message preached by John the Baptist, except that in Jesus’ preaching ministry, the Kingdom of Heaven was never preached as a concept but as something tangible. It was demonstrated to the people through acts of divine mercy such as healings and deliverance from the demonic.

In fact, after John the Baptist had been arrested, he was hearing what was going on with Jesus and decided to find out about this man for himself:

“Now when John heard in prison about the deeds of the Christ, he sent word by his disciples and said to him, ‘Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?’ And Jesus answered them, ‘Go and tell John what you hear and see: the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them. And blessed is the one who is not offended by me.’” (Matthew 11:1-6)

John is sincerely asking the question, “Are you the coming Messiah” and Jesus response is, “What do you see me doing?”

Now, I am adamant that Christians must know and love the scriptures as the foundation for life and ministry, but my sincere fear is that too many Christians believe that preaching the Bible is the only validation needed for a ministry to be fruitful, and that when preaching from the Bible, people, including non-believers, should simply take them at their word that their teaching has authority.

While I agree that the Bible has authority and that our ministry will be held accountable to the scriptures, what we see is that Jesus didn’t send John a message highlighting all of the Old Testament passages that validated Him. Instead, His answer was to point to His many, on-earth manifestations of the Kingdom of God as His apologetic.

He even later tells his disciples, “ blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears, for they hear. For truly, I say to you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it” (Matthew 13:16-17). The thing that the prophets of old longed to see and hear was the proclamation and the signs that the Kingdom of God had come to earth.

Jesus’ entire ministry on earth was filled with example after example of this message: “the Kingdom of God is in your midst,” and then he showed them this reality in the restoration of lives, both body and soul.

And it didn’t stop with Jesus!

Jesus’ teachings to the disciples through the parables in Matthew many times consisted of analogies in which the Kingdom of God is like a tree or plant that once it has matured will be judged by the fruit it bore. Wheat is separated from the weeds by bearing good seed (Matt. 13:24-30). A good tree will always bear good fruit, and a Child of the Kingdom will bring forth Kingdom fruit (Matt 12:35).

If the Kingdom of God has come to a person through faith in Christ, then they will begin to bear fruit demonstrating that they are no longer on the same playing field  as the world.

This is why when Jesus taught the discipels how to pray, the first request made was, “Your Kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matt. 6:10).

Jesus was telling His disciples that to have a heart like His, their desires must be to see the reality of God’s Kingdom manifested in the world, so that the world “may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 5:16).

This became practical when Jesus “called to him his twelve disciples and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal every disease and every affliction” (Matthew 10:1). And they did!

And it didn’t stop with the Apostles!

The Bible tells us that this same authority is carried by all believers if we will only have the faith to see God’s Kingdom come. Jesus said so Himself:

And he said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.” (Mark 16:15-18 ESV)

“Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father. Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it. (John 14:12-14 ESV)

I know that many people, including many who read my blog, fall into a cessationist category that believes these gifts were only for the Apostles to perform to testify to the validity of their ministry as Christianity was being birthed. However, in the world today there are too many people who still doubt our God, and His goal is still to capture their hearts.

Scripture continually testifies that the same ministry passed to the apostles has been passed to us today, and that the Holy Spirit is here to empower us to accomplish the work.

As those sent on mission with Him to reach the lost and dying world, I believe all of us need to really consider our Kingdom theology. Do we believe that is is just a concept to be embraced in our heads, or is the Kingdom something we really do believe can become tangible “on earth as it is in heaven?”

At the bare minimum, it does no harm to believe God still does the miraculous and touches people with the reality of His Kingdom today, just like He did in the book of Acts. So then, why don’t we pray for that? And just imagine for a moment the revival that might happen around us if and when He does?

The guarantee that we have is this: “this gospel of the kingdom will be proclaimed throughout the whole world as a testimony to all nations” (Matthew 24:14). I don’t know about you, but I want to have a part in that.

Lord, do it again! Amen.

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Salvation Leads to Salvation

Posted on February 21, 2012 | Leave a comment

The other day, I started reading the book of Matthew, and as I typically do while reading, I had some thoughts come to mind that I wrote down to come back to and think on later. And it didn’t take long in Matthew for one of these thoughts to come to me.

The book of Matthew starts with the genealogy of Christ, and the situation surrounding His birth. Upon finding out that his fiancé, Mary, was pregnant before marriage, a man named Joseph, is trying to decide how to handle the situation.

“But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet:“Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel” (which means, God with us).”  – Matthew 1:20-23

To Israel, long before the time of Joseph and Mary, the prophecy had been given that a Messiah would come who would be both a King in the line of David and a Prophet like Moses. And even in Isaiah 7:14 we find the passage the angel quoted about His name being ‘Immanuel’ signifying that this Messiah would somehow be God in the flesh. The Jews knew all of that, and it is why they had many expectations of what Jesus was supposed to be like and how He would live. But the thing that sticks out to me here, though, is that the angel doesn’t come and tell Joseph that this Son would be the King of the Jews or a great prophet.

Instead, the angel tells Joseph to name the child Jesus, which translates as “Jehovah is Salvation,” because the life mission of this child is that “He will save His people from their sins.”

Now, of course anyone familiar with the Christian story knows that Jesus came to be the Savior of the world. Even those who barely know anything about Christianity have probably heard John 3:16 at some point. Have you ever considered this, though, that even Jesus name – His born identity – is wrapped up in this one mission.

What interests me about this, however, is not that Jesus identity is wrapped up in the mission of saving people from their sins. It is that as believers, our identity is wrapped up in His identity, which was wrapped up in the mission. Meaning that our identity, too, is wrapped up in the salvation of the world.

What I mean by this is that when we are born again by grace through faith in Christ, the Bible makes it clear that we are being transformed into the image of Christ – the image of the Savior. This means that since Christ’s mission in life, above all else, was to save people from sin, then our new-found mission now that we are in Christ is the same as His. We are, above all, to be heralds of the Gospel — the ‘Good News’ that Jesus made a way for humanity to be saved.

Another way to say this is that our own salvation cannot be separated from the salvation of the world. They are inextricably linked. Let me give you some biblical evidence of this:

  • “He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.” –1 John 2:2
  • “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.”    –Ephesians 2:10
  • “All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation” –2 Corinthians 5:18

In each one of these scriptures, the writers jump straight from our salvation to the salvation of others. We are saved and then we help others find salvation. That is the biblical pattern.

Here’s what that means: your job, school, hobbies, friends, family, etc., etc., are given to you by God to be stewarded for the salvation of the lost world. Your God-given identity is found in Christ and because of that your life is to be “the aroma of Christ” to the world, and it is now a part of who we are that, “as commissioned by God, in the sight of God we speak in Christ.” (2 Corinthians 2:15-17) That means in word and deed, it’s our mission.

We live Christ in the world, and we speak Christ to the world. Salvation leads to salvation, and the mission that Christ set in motion continues on.

So let me ask you this. When was the last time you let someone else know that God has come (“Immanuel”) to save His people from their sins (“Jesus”), and that they too can find freedom in Him?

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Pixelated – Taking a Closer Look at Our Lives

Posted on February 14, 2012 | Leave a comment

I have a graphic design friend who is a genius at his job. Watching him work photoshop is like watching a master pianist quickly playing his keyboard to create something beautiful. Out of sheer inspiration after seeing him work his magic, I decided that I need to learn to do what he does. Unfortunately, as with most things, it is harder than it looks.

I have come to understand some of the basics of using programs like photoshop – working in layers, and using the different tools – yet it is usually the picture I am trying to create or manipulate that gives me the most problems.

In the digital age, colors are no longer blended together like mixing paint. Instead, everything you see on your computer screen is made up of extremely small squares called pixels that are each made to look a certain color, and as your eyes see the transitions from pixel to pixel, it appears that the colors are blended together to create the beautiful graphic you are looking at…

That is, unless you are looking at a graphic that I designed. Then, although it may be difficult to figure out exactly why, there usually seems to be something that is wrong.

My problem in using photoshop is that I cannot get the pixels to blend or run together to create the specific shapes that I am needing to make. Now, you can look at some of my little creations and they look ok, but then some, there is just something off-putting about them. It isn’t that they look bad, or that you can’t tell what it is supposed to be at all, it is just that at the pixel level, something is going wrong.

I think our lives are very similar to digital artwork.

When we look at our lives, it can be like we are seeing the picture on a computer screen. When asked how our life is going, we tend to say that things are going well or that their not, talking about the whole picture.

We also tend to break down our lives’ “whole picture” into different categories such as work, family, school, hobbies, friends, etc. These categories, then, would be like the colors that blend together to make our life what it is.

Now, this breakdown of our lives is usually as far as most of us go. Especially in casual conversation. We may get the whole life question, “How are things going?” But then at other times, we get the smaller color-specific questions, “How’s the family,” or “How’s work going?”

If that’s as deep as we look, though, then what about those times in our lives when everything is going good, yet something still seems to be completely be out of sorts and we can’t quite put our finger on the problem? Work is great, home life is great, and we have some free time to pursue our hobbies, yet for some reason, and we just can’t figure out why, there seems to be something wrong somewhere. These are the times that many of us tend to shut down and stress out. I think the problem lies in that most of us are not trained to do the pixel work in our lives.

You don’t have to look to the pixel level of the picture to see the separation of colors. Pixels are what you have to look at when you must begin to blend those colors together. This is the area where your family life and business life must overlap. This is where we can say things are going well at work, and things are good at home, but there is something in that transition that just isn’t right.

Before I stretch out the analogy too far, let me state my point as simply as I can.

As Americans we tend to look at our lives either as one big general picture, or categorically as the array of colors, but to take a digital pallet of colors and form them into a masterpiece, you can’t ignore the pixel level. The shades of colors must match up and blend together smoothly.

What if your life, no matter how good things seem to be going in each area of it, doesn’t match up? Let me give an example: Let’s say your home life is that of a solid Christian family that serves their local church, is involved in community service and wants to be a force for good in the world. Your work life, on the other hand, is that of a shrewd businessman who uses underhanded business tactics to build your business and keep customers. Although both of those things may be working great for you within their own realm, whenever you try to keep those things lined up with one another, you can’t blend the pixels together to make it work. They don’t match up.

So what do we do?

I think the place to start is to sit down and look at your God-given purpose and calling in every area of your life. If God is the Lord over your life, then He will work things to make you the person He wants you to be in each category of life and the whole picture will be beautiful and glorifying to Him.

If, however, you decide to determine your own life purpose and direction, then each area of your life will become very self-serving and ultimately disjointed. You may end up with a complete picture, but it will be obvious that something is wrong.

Where to start?

Try this. Sit down for an hour or two and make a list of every category of your life and then spend some time in prayer asking God what type of person He wants you to be and how He wants you to lead and serve in that area.

As He begins to give you that direction, if you will walk in obedience as His Spirit leads you, I promise that the pixels of your life will start to smooth themselves out. In following Him, your life will become the beautiful picture it was intended to be.

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Have you had a chance to check out the new website for Heart of God International? Here it is. Let us know what you think. 

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An Open Letter to Sasha Laxton

Posted on January 24, 2012 | Leave a comment

If you have not yet read any of the recent news articles about Sasha Laxton, the child whose parents are raising him as “gender-neutral,” you can do so here.

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Dear Sasha,

I know that you are too young to understand what I want to tell you right now. I also know that you will probably never read this letter, but still my hope is that one day this beautiful truth will find it’s way to you one way or another.

What you may already know is that your parents are kind of crazy. Not crazy because they are trying to raise you as a gender-neutral kid, but crazy because all parents are crazy to one degree or another. Also, though, they are crazy over you. Everything they are doing as parents is because they love you and although they are misguided, deep down they really do want to do what is best for you. I hope you remember that when you get older. It’s a blessing that many children do not have.

However, what I want you to know is that no matter what your parent’s intentions are, there is no such thing as a gender neutral person. You see, having decided that equality between humans means that differences must be abolished, our society is going to great lengths to ignore reality. The truth is that you are a boy and we can’t ignore that. Physically, you have certain body parts unique to little boys, and you also have DNA and hormones that will one day grow you into a man emotionally as well. Sure, you can find doctors who can change a lot of those things, but to do so is to mutilate who you are meant to be.

I know that phrases like “meant to be” will be foreign to you at this point in life, and I’m sure you will hear the opposite of that plenty from people near you. Nevertheless, it is true. You do exist with a purpose, and being a boy is part of that.

See, the reality that people like your family want to ignore is that men and women were created equal, yet different, by a God who doesn’t make mistakes. The Bible says that God created humanity as male and female, and then stepped back and said that it was “very good.”

Later on in the Bible a great King named David sang this as part of a song to this God:

“For you formed my inward parts;
you knitted me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works;
my soul knows it very well.
My frame was not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes saw my unformed substance;
in your book were written, every one of them,
the days that were formed for me,
when as yet there was none of them.”
(Psalm 139:13-16 ESV)

My favorite part of that song is when he says, “I am fearfully and wonderfully made.” It was true of King David, and it is true of you, Sasha.

God made you to be who you are, and that includes the fact that you are a boy. That doesn’t mean that you cannot grow up to be sensitive, like things that our culture doesn’t consider masculine, or refuse to be a macho “alpha male.” What it does mean, though, is to deny what God has wonderfully created you to be is a slap in the face to a Heavenly Father who loves you infinitely more than your parents here on earth are able to.

He sees you in His perfect love, and wants you to grow up to be a mighty man of God, who follows in the example of His firstborn Son, Jesus Christ.

See, Jesus got a bad reputation, too, because although He was the epitome of what it means to be a man, He didn’t fit into the box of what His culture thought He should be. However, He didn’t bow to meet anyone’s expectations, either. Instead, He lived His life committed to following the path God laid out for Him, even though that path carried with it a lot of pain.

Sasha, I know your life will be confusing, and that you are going to have a lot to deal with one day as you begin making real life decisions about who you are, and who you want to be. Just know, that no matter what pressures you feel from outside, and no matter what it is your desires are going to lead you to become, God loves you, and wants you to follow Him. He has the best plan for your life if you are willing to follow Him.

If the life of Jesus-follower is the one you decide, I hope your parents will still be as open-minded about the decision you make. Maybe through your journey they could meet this Jesus, too. Know this, though, there are many of us out here who you will never meet, but we are praying for you all the same.

I hope you find your way to accept who you are, even in the face of those who want to deny it.

May God bless you and keep you,

Sincerely,

Scott Ingram

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Law Breakers

Posted on January 17, 2012 | Leave a comment

Scenario: You are driving down the highway on a long road trip. The speed limit is 70 miles per hour, but knowing the chances of getting ticketed are slim, you push it up to about 73. Going around a long curve you are passed by another driver doing at least 85mph, which makes you mad. Then, at the end of the curve you see a police officer who pulls you both over and gives both of you a ticket.

Question: How do you respond?

If you are anything like me, you get really upset because you clearly weren’t speeding like that guy was speeding. He obviously deserved a ticket, but we were barely going over the speed limit. The cop could have let us off with a warning.

The thing is, in our minds we have a skewed sense of what’s “fair,” that in reality leans toward our own benefit. We certainly think the other guy should get a ticket for his obvious speeding, yet, although we were intentionally going over the speed limit, we don’t think we should get the ticket because we were barely breaking the law. It’s “guilt by comparison.”

The reality is that too many of us expect that same version of justice when it comes to our faith. We think that the judgement of God towards sin will be slanted in our favor because although we do struggle with minor sins, it isn’t like we’ve killed anyone. Since most of us live our lives only barely breaking God’s laws, and on that day there will be so many people at the judgement seat who have done way worse that we did, it is only fair that God punish them and not us.

Deep down we really want God to be like that police officer who we can negotiate with and get off with a warning. However God’s judgement on humanity must be seen more like that of a judge in the courtroom rather than the cop who may let you off because you weren’t doing too much over the speed limit.

I remember one time in High School when I got a ticket for not stopping behind a stop sign. I did stop, but it was about 10 feet after the sign. I even had good reason, too. It was late at night and I was on a road coming out of the pasture. Had I stopped behind the sign, I would not be able to see traffic coming from either direction due to the brush that extended all the way to the road. So, instead of stopping at the sign, I stopped at the roadside so that I could actually see traffic. To my dismay, though, I stopped at the roadside right as a police officer passed and who quickly turned back to give me a ticket. Because I didn’t have the skill to talk my way out of it, I had to go see the a local judge.

I thought that surely once the judge heard my side of the story that I would be let off, but that isn’t how things work in court. The judge only had one question for me. Did you stop behind the stop sign like the law requires. “No, but…” I was cut off. The judge didn’t care about my “but” once I had admitted to breaking the law.

God’s judgement will be the same. Did you keep my commandments? “No, but…” It won’t matter what we have to say next. If you break the law, the justice of God demands punishment.

The scariest part of this is that the Bible makes clear that everyone is guilty of breaking the law, and deserves the wrath of God. You can’t negotiate your way out of this. You can’t compare yourself with others to try and prove you aren’t as guilty as they are. It won’t matter. You can’t talk your way out of this ticket. You have sinned against God, and He will see to the punishment.

The good news is, though, that God is a God of mercy and He doesn’t want to punish all of humanity. He wants to show grace and offer forgiveness of sin. The problem is that the law requires punishment for the crimes committed?

That’s where the story of Jesus comes in. In order for God to meet the demands of the law, while also offering forgiveness of sins, He came into humanity and bore the punishment of our sins for us. That is why Jesus died on the cross, and that is the only “legal” way we have of finding forgiveness in the eyes of God’s law.

Most people don’t think they need a Savior, which is usually an issue of pride. They tend to think that they are decent people and that God will overlook their sin as long as the morality scales lean more toward good than bad. The problem is, they are judging this by what they judge is fair, instead of what the judge says is “legal.”

What you need to know is that it doesn’t matter how far over the line you cross into sin, the punishment is the same – death and eternal separation from God in hell. Either you will face that punishment yourself, or you will accept Jesus as your Savior who paid the ransom for your guilt when He died on the cross.

There will be no morally good people receiving eternal life, only redeemed ones. What will be your plea when you stand before the Judge of Creation? “Forgiven in Christ,” or “Guilty as charged?”

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Celebrating New Year’s for Eternity

Posted on December 26, 2011 | 1 Comment

Well, it is now the last week of 2011. It almost seems as though the year just began, and now it’s over.

Many of us at this time of year begin to do some introspection of ourselves and analyze our lives over the past 12 months. We ask what we did well, and what we could have done better. We enjoy recalling the happy times and still feel sadness over the losses.

Although January 1 is only another date on the calendar, for most of us it marks a new beginning; a new season of life. It’s a chance to start over. But then you give it a few months into the new year, and we all return to the words of King Solomon:

“Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher,
     vanity of vanities! All is vanity.
What does man gain by all the toil
     at which he toils under the sun?
A generation goes, and a generation comes,
     but the earth remains forever.
The sun rises, and the sun goes down,
     and hastens to the place where it rises.
The wind blows to the south
     and goes around to the north;
around and around goes the wind,
     and on its circuits the wind returns.
All streams run to the sea,
     but the sea is not full;
to the place where the streams flow,
     there they flow again.
All things are full of weariness;
     a man cannot utter it;
the eye is not satisfied with seeing,
     nor the ear filled with hearing.
What has been is what will be,
     and what has been done is what will be done,
     and there is nothing new under the sun.
Is there a thing of which it is said,
     “See, this is new”?
It has been already
     in the ages before us.
There is no remembrance of former things,
     nor will there be any remembrance
of later things yet to be
     among those who come after.”
(Ecclesiastes 1:2-11)

When we look at things from Solomon’s perspective, what we must realize is that we continually live between New Year’s celebrations. The farther behind us the last one gets, the closer we are to the next. And there is nothing that really changes on those days except the numbers on the calendar.

If we can be really honest with ourselves, if this is the totality of human existence — we live, and work, and watch the years come and go, until we finally die — then it really is all vanity. If this endless cycle is all we get, then we must purpose ourselves to take as much joy from our brief and meaningless existence as we can. “Let us eat and drink for tomorrow we die” (1 Cor. 15:32).

But for the Christian, our vision is much bigger than this. In Christ, our hope is set on the idea that there is something more than this life. We are eternal being created in the image of the eternal God. This thing that we find ourselves in now is only a small glimpse of the joys that we will experience when we move on and dwell with Him forever.

What that means then is that as Christians, we don’t despise the joys of the world as some have done, but we don’t look to worldly joys for our ultimate satisfaction either. Instead, we delight in God as we enjoy the good things He has made and allows us to experience here, year after year, and we look forward knowing that the days will only get better and better forever with God.

Yesterday morning on my way to church, I was listening to a song by Aaron Keyes that says, “You’ve only just begun to show your greatness and power. We’ve only just begun to see Your almighty hand,” and this thought came to me. Even a million years into our eternal existence with God, those lyrics will still be true. We will only have seen and experienced the beginning of the goodness of God. Even in eternity we will find that there are new aspects of God to delight in every day forever, and it will never get old.

That is why Christians have for centuries, now, declared in song that “when we’ve been there 10,000 years, bright shining as the sun, we’ve no less days to sing God’s praise than when we first begun.” Every day of those 10,000 years will be filled with more and more reason to praise God. His goodness will overflow forever. We will never run out of time or reasons to delight in Him.

So bringing it all back down to earth, today: 2012 is about to enter the scene, pushing 2011 out for good. And in this new year as in the old, there will be reasons for celebration and reasons for sadness. So, just for now, before getting overwhelmed with grand ideas of how life will be different in the new year, can we just stop for a moment and recognize that no matter what has happened in the past or what the immediate future holds, that what our hearts are really longing for is to see and experience God’s goodness that will last for eternity.

If you haven’t taken the time to do so before, let me invite you one more time in 2011: “Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good!” (Psalm 34:8) And then as we move into 2012, realize that the joy that comes truly is only just the beginning of what God has in store for you for eternity.

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Why Do Bad Things Happen to God’s People?

Posted on December 19, 2011 | 1 Comment

 

“Why do bad things happen to good people?” We hear that question a lot. It very well could be the oldest cliche in the English language.

As a Christian, we know the default answer: “There are no good people.” Right? I mean, Jesus Himself told the rich young ruler, “No one is good except God alone” (Mark 10:18).

So then, if there is no such thing as a good person, then the question is not legitimate.

But for the Christian – those who have put their faith in the work of the cross and have been adopted as God’s children – the question changes. We do know that we are “not good,” but that doesn’t change the fact that we are God’s possessions.

So for us, the question changes. “Why do bad things happen to God’s people?”

And here is where we come into one of the most confusing aspects of the Christian life.

Right now, I have multiple friends who are Christian and living lives submitted to Kingdom work, yet (although very different circumstances from one another) are dealing with major suffering in their lives. Realizing that in times of crisis people’s emotions are heavily involved, this question can’t just be answered appropriately unless we are first clear on the nature and character of God toward His sons and daughters.

If you are born again in Christ, you are not under the wrath and punishment of God.

God cannot pour His wrath out again on a sin committed by a Christian who’s sin has already been dealt with on the cross of Christ. If Christ took the wrath of God for you, then it would be unjust for God to pour out punishment for that same sin again. Injustice is against the nature and character of God.

The truth is that if you are a Christian, all of God’s desires for you are all out of love and intended for your growth toward maturity in Christ-likeness. In fact, is is because of what we know of God’s grace, through the sacrifice of Christ, that we can understand what God means in the Old Testament when He said things like, “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for good and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart” (Jeremiah 29:11-13).

God ONLY EVER seeks good for His people!

So then, back to the question at hand. “Why do bad things happen to God’s people.”

I suspect that the individual reasons for every bad thing that happens are as wide spread as the bad things themselves, yet I think the one thing that is certain in every one of them is this: God wants to use these things to draw you closer and closer to Himself.

The reality is that if God only ever gave you good things, and showered you with every blessing you wanted, you would lose a sense of love for Him and instead hold a sense of entitlement toward His stuff. That is what happens at the fall of man in Genesis 3, and what is repeated in human nature over and over again, as shown by the example in Romans 1:18-32. God will not stand to have spoiled children.

This is the difference between punishment (which Christ took for us) and discipline, which God promises to all that He loves to keep us from being spoiled brats.

 “And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons?:

‘My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord,nor be weary when reproved by him.For the Lord disciplines the one he loves,and chastises every son whom he receives.’

It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons”

(Hebrews 12:5-8).

What God wants more than anything else is for you to grow up into maturity as a child of God, and one that will run to Him when things go wrong or when you fail, rather than running away from Him. That is what this discipline is for. God is training us in righteousness as His children.

That thought, then, brings me to one of my favorite passages of scripture: Psalm 51:3-12

“For I know my transgressions,
and my sin is ever before me.
Against you, you only, have I sinned
and done what is evil in your sight,
so that you may be justified in your words
and blameless in your judgment.
Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity,
and in sin did my mother conceive me.
Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being,
and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart.
Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;
wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
Let me hear joy and gladness;
let the bones that you have broken rejoice.
Hide your face from my sins,
and blot out all my iniquities.
Create in me a clean heart, O God,
and renew a right spirit within me.
Cast me not away from your presence,
and take not your Holy Spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
and uphold me with a willing spirit.”

This passage demonstrates the epitome of Christian maturity: “God, I know that I am a sinner, I have always been a sinner, and my sin is directed against You. I also recognize that You are the only one that can clean me up, forgive me of my sin, and make me new again. God, no matter what that process looks like, don’t send me away. Don’t take your Spirit from me. Keep me close and give me strength to endure.”

That makes a great prayer, and one I wish I remembered to pray more often. However, in my little paraphrase, I did leave out one phrase from the scripture that none of us really want to acknowledge is there. Is is phrases like this that our eyes tend to pass right over because they make us uncomfortable.

“Let the bones that you have broken rejoice.”

What? In God cleaning us up and bringing us back to Him, bones get broken? That certainly isn’t the Christianity that most of us signed up for. And yet, in the context of the scriptures there is beauty in the pain that God will bring us. Broken bones CAN rejoice when they’re broken for a reason. Matt Chandler says it like this: “Sometimes God will crush your fingers to get your hands off of what will harm you. And that’s been true in every book of the Bible, in every year in the history of man.”

So why do bad things happen to God’s people? The answer is always to make us better at being God’s people. To put it very simply, when things go right most of us forget about God and don’t pursue Him, but as soon as things go badly, we pray more, we read the Bible more, and we run to Him more looking for hope. So God delights in sending us blessing but He also sends the bad things to draw us in. Or to use the words of J.I. Packer, “And still (God) seeks the fellowship of His people and will send them both joy and sorrow to detach their hands from the things of this world and attach them to Himself’.”

Christian, no matter what you are going through today, I pray that you will be encouraged. God is not out to get you. Quite the opposite. God is for you, and is working things out for your good (Romans 8:28).

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Love God and Do As You Please

Posted on December 12, 2011 | 4 Comments

“Love God and do as you please.”

I think that is a great statement.

Don’t agree? Well, don’t label me a heretic just yet.

That is actually a quote from St. Augustine of Hippo, or rather a modern version of a quote from Him.

Augustine’s exact quote within it’s surrounding context is this: “Once for all, then, a short precept is given thee: Love, and do what thou wilt: whether thou hold thy peace, through love hold thy peace; whether thou cry out, through love cry out; whether thou correct, through love correct; whether thou spare, through love do thou spare: let the root of love be within, of this root can nothing spring but what is good.”

And to offer the modern translation of that last phrase in the paragraph, I have seen it translated this way: “Love God and do whatever you please: for the soul trained in love to God will do nothing to offend the One who is Beloved.”

Now, let me reiterate. I think that a great statement?

The reason I bring this up is that it goes hand in hand with my post from last week when I said, “…we as Christians no longer live our lives according to a list of commands — “do this and don’t do that.” We no longer submit ourselves to a rigid pattern of what is right and wrong or good and bad. Instead, as Christians we live our lives according to one standard: will doing this thing or not doing this thing draw me closer or push us farther from God?”

I know that when we as Christians begin talking about Paul’s statement that all things are lawful to u, it becomes really easy for us to slip into the category of belief where the grace of Christ becomes a license to sin. However, the Paul that says all things are lawful to us, is the same Paul that says we are not to continue to sin so grace can abound (Romans 6:1). Then we also have James saying that when a person knows the right thing to do, but doesn’t do it, to him it is sin (James 4:17).

I still don’t think this changes what I said last week, or what Augustine is saying in the above quote, but rather determines how in the love of God, we are to interpret and put into practice the freedom we have to do all things as we please.

So back to Augustine’s quote: What he is saying is that if you are living your life with a mind continually set on loving God, then nothing else you can do following that will be sin. To put it another way, if our primary objective is to love and please God, then no other thing we determine to do secondarily will offend or grieve God.

I think this is why the Bible tells us to “delight ourselves in the Lord and He will give us all the desires of our heart” (Psalm 37:4). It is because when we delight in Him, our desires will naturally be pleasing to Him.

This is why Paul goes into and extended explanation in Romans 14 to say that if you have faith to eat meat offered to idols, eat it, but if you don’t have that much faith, it would be sinful to eat it. We are accountable to our level of faith and the effects on our conscience and the conscience of those around us at the time.

Although I’m hesitant to use it because I don’t want this to become a post on the debate over alcohol use, I think that this is a fair, modern equivalent of this passage. If you have faith enough, while loving God and others to drink alcohol (like most Presbyterians), then there is no sin in doing so. However, if you do not have the faith that grants your conscience freedom to drink alcohol (like most Baptists), then it would be a sin for you to do so. Neither side, though, is wrong. The problem comes in when one side declares theirs the absolute way for all Christians, and pushed their level of faith onto others.

Now, let me get pretty confrontational here to both sides of the use of Christian freedom.

To the people who are going to run with what I say here and act like you are incapable of wrongdoing due to the freedom we have in Christ, remember that Paul tells us not to use our liberty as an opportunity for the flesh (Galatians 5:13). There are some things that you need to abstain from no matter how much you desire to do it, because at least for you, giving into those desires may never happen in faith and out of love for God. There will always be something you must abstain from because it will damage your love for Christ. And hear me clearly, those things may well be things other people can do without any problem.

If there is nothing in your life that you feel the need to abstain from for the sake  of your relationship with Christ, then chances are, you don’t have a relationship with Him in the first place.

On the flip side, to those who are proclaimers of absolute rules that in their version of Christianity, everyone must keep. You are just as wrong. And oftentimes, you are sinning by your efforts to return a liberated brother to religious bondage under your own subjective set of rules. It is an affront to the grace of Jesus Christ who for freedom’s sake has set us free (Galatians 5:1).

The truth is, if you are a person who requires absolute adherence for all Christians to your own selective list of right and wrong, I fear that you really do not understand the gospel which offers liberty to the captives. And to be honest, while there is a biblical command on others to not offend a brother with their freedoms, I also must agree with Martin Luther when he condemns those who oppress their brothers with legalistic bondage and says:

“There are some who have no understanding to hear the truth of liberty and insist upon their goodness as means for salvation. These people you must resist, do the very opposite, and offend them boldly lest by their impious views they drag many with them into error. For the sake of the liberty of the faith do other things which they regarded as the greatest of sins….Use your freedom constantly and consistently in the sight of and despite the tyrants and the stubborn so that they also may learn that they are impious, that their laws and works are of no avail for righteousness, and that they had no right to set them up.”

Luther was not commanding the use of Christian freedom to offend the conscience of a brother, but rather insisting that we regularly offend the false piety and legalistic religion of those who have seen the offer of free grace, yet continue back to a life of “grace by works.”

I think if I return to the alcohol example, I can explain this better. Alcohol use, in scripture, is clearly something that should be done with maturity so as not to become enslaved to it’s effects, but never is it outright forbidden. The Gospel, then, delivers both, the alcoholic, and the “grace-by-abstinence” preacher to a place where they can enjoy God’s creation.

It delivers the alcoholic from their bondage to the drink, and for that former abuser, it is probably a good idea, at least for an extended period of life, to abstain from all use of alcohol in and effort to grow in their sanctification and love for Christ. That is this person loving Christ first and their lifestyle following.

On the other hand, though, the Gospel also frees up people in bondage to religious rules to have a glass of wine and lighten up (Ps. 104:15). You can enjoy alcohol without becoming a slave to it, because Christ is your first love, and everything else is flowing from that.

Again, I’m not debating alcohol here. The fact is, there is a good and righteous way to use everything on the planet, and then there is a sinful and rebellious way to do so. This is why we have the simple commandment given to us that whatever it is we decide to do, do it to the glory of God (1 Corinthians 10:31). If you can glorify God and do whatever it is by faith, do it. If you can’t do it to His glory, then don’t. But whatever you do, don’t turn this thing in either wrong direction, whether it is freedom for everyone to do whatever they want, or to a new lifestyle of selective rule keeping based on your own conscience and lack of faith. Instead, preach freedom to those who can walk in freedom, and maturity to those who cannot.

When all is said and done, God created the world and everything in it and then stepped back, looked at it, and said that it was “very good” (Genesis 1:31). For the Christian, then, who has been restored to the love for God intended in the Garden of Eden, this world and everything in it was created for us to enjoy and to honor God with. When we can learn to do that, we will truly know what freedom is and how Christ intends us to live.

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Identity Crisis

Posted on December 5, 2011 | 2 Comments

“Christianity is not a religion, it’s a relationship.”

I’m sure you’ve heard that old adage before. What people mean when they quote it is that the only hope for the Christian is not in religious actions or pious discipline, but only in our relationship with the Savior, Jesus Christ. This is because after the fall of man into sin, even our best actions are not good enough to save us. Sin is the human identity. In fact, in this state, even our most righteous actions are so disgusting to God that in the original language of the bible they are compared to both menstrual cloths and fecal matter (Isaiah 63:6 and Philippians 3:8 respectively, although the English translators make an effort to use less offensive language).

That means that the Christian (or any other religious person) who is trying to clean himself up in order to be acceptable to God, is working towards a completely unattainable goal. If your righteous acts are as disgusting to God as the things we humans flush down the toilet are to us, what makes us think that God is sitting in heaven hoping we’ll make more of those things to “offer” to Him? Do you want to find those under your tree on Christmas morning, and if they are there, do you think you’ll accept that the person who gave them to you did so out of love? I wouldn’t.

God is not up in Heaven telling us “be more righteous.” Instead the Holy Spirit is continually trying to get us to the point of realization the we do not have the ability on our own to be righteous at all. Our only hope is to accept the fact that Jesus already paid the penalty for our sinful deeds (both the morally bad and morally good ones), and then by faith to clothe ourselves in His righteousness, freely offered to us by grace.

I struggle with this.

I hold on to a religious attitude toward Christianity way too often.

I stress out over my lack of ability to measure up to the “standard” of what a Christian “should” be. I look at myself and know that I am not good enough. And the fact is, no matter how much harder I try, I can’t seem to fix myself.

The problem is that when I hold on to this religious approach to the Christian life, it KILLS my relationship with Christ. Instead of running to Him as one loved despite my failures, I try to run away from Him as one who thinks that God could never love me like this.

I try, fail, and end up hiding from God. That is what religion gets me.

That is completely backwards from the truth of scripture.

Scripture first tells us that once we receive salvation from Christ, our identity is changed.

The bible tells us that “while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8) meaning that our identity is not changed by works. Or as 1 Corinthians 1:30 says, “…you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us… righteousness and sanctification and redemption…”

If you are in Christ, then terms like ‘sinner’ and ‘unrighteous’ no longer apply to you. That is no longer your identity. This is why later in 1 Corinthians 6, after identifying types of sinners like idolators, adulterers, thieves, greedy people, drunks, and more, Paul goes on to say, “And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.”

Did you catch that? That is who we WERE in the past. NOW we are WASHED (that is, cleaned up), SANCTIFIED (meaning set apart for God), and JUSTIFIED (or NOT GUILTY), by God’s Spirit in the name of Christ.

That means that we are already righteous, we are just waiting on our lives to catch up. Even that fact, though, does not throw us into a legalistic, religious pursuit of holiness. Instead, it leads us into a lifelong pursuit of Christ. In fact, another truth we find in scripture is that the only way we are going to get our lives “fixed” is by spending time with Christ, and it is while observing Him that we are “transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another” (2 Corinthians 3:18).

Paul even seems to imply that Christians are no longer capable of committing sins when he  says, “ ‘All things are lawful for me,’ but not all things are helpful. ‘All things are lawful for me,’ but I will not be dominated by anything” (1 Corinthians 6:12). This is because we as Christians no longer live our lives according to a list of commands — “do this and don’t do that.” We no longer submit ourselves to a rigid pattern of what is right and wrong or good and bad.

Instead, as Christians we live our lives according to one standard: will doing this thing or not doing this thing draw me closer or push us farther from God? Will it help us “run with endurance the race that is set before us,” and keep our eyes fixed on “Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith” (Hebrews 12:1-2)?

I believe this is exactly what Paul is saying in Galatians when he tells us, “…the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me (Gal. 2:20),” and ”it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for “The righteous shall live by faith. (Gal.3:11)”

So not only is our salvation by faith alone, but our sanctification is by faith alone as well.

I am very burdened by the fact that too many Christian leaders, even many that I personally know and respect, miss this point. They fall back into a life of seeking sanctification under the law, and leading others back into this slavery. “Don’t watch that movie.” “Don’t go to that place.” “Don’t hang out with those people.” “Don’t drink.” “Don’t cuss.” “Don’t listen to that music.” And then at the end of the day, when these people have kept their list of rules, they get puffed up in self-righteousness, offer up their used tampax to the Lord, and still don’t understand their identity in the Lord.

So, Christian, just for clarification sake and to put an end to this identity crisis, let me simply allow scripture to tell you who you are in the Lord no matter how big of a failure (or how big of a success) you think you are right now:

  • You are God’s child — John 1:12
  • You are a friend of Jesus — John 15:15
  • You are justified — Romans 5:1
  • You’ve been united with the Lord and are one with him in Spirit — 1 Corinthians 6:17
  • You’ve been purchased by Christ…you belong to God — 1 Corinthians 6:19-20
  • You’re a member of Christ’s body — 1 Corinthians 12:27
  • You’ve been chosen by God and adopted as his child — Ephesians 1:3-8
  • You’ve been redeemed and forgiven of all your sins — Colossians 1:13-14
  • You are complete in Christ — Colossians 2:9-10
  • You have direct access to the throne of grace through Jesus — Hebrews 4:14-16
  • You are free from condemnation — Romans 8:1-2
  • You cannot be separated from the love of God — Romans 8:28
  • You are free from any condemning charges against you — Romans 8:31-34
  • You’ve been established, anointed and sealed — 2 Corinthians 1:21-22
  • You were washed…you were sanctified. You were justified in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God — 1 Cor 6:11
  • You are hidden with Christ in God — Colossians 3:1-4
  • God started this work in you, and he will bring it to completion — Phil 1:6
  • You are a citizen of heaven — Philippians 3:20
  • You haven’t been given a spirit of fear, but of power, love and a sound mind — 2 Timothy 1:7
  • You are born of God, and the evil one cannot touch you — 1 John 5:18
  • You are a branch of Jesus Christ, the true vine, and a channel of His life — John 15:5
  • You have been chosen and appointed to bear fruit — John 15:16
  • You are God’s temple — 1 Corinthians 3:16
  • You are a minister of reconciliation — 2 Corinthians 5:17-21
  • You are seated with Jesus Christ in the heavenly realm — Ephesians 2:6
  • You are God’s workmanship — Ephesians 2:10
  • You can approach God with freedom and confidence – not because of your obedience…but because of Jesus’ obedience — Ephesians 3:12
  • And finally, when you are faithless, he will remain faithful…because he cannot disown himself — 2 Timothy 2:13

(This list of scriptures is borrowed and adapted from UnearthedPictures.org)

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Did you know that in January I will be moving to Haiti for about 6 months to assist the leadership of Heart of God – Haiti‘s, Victory Center Orphanage. Unfortunately my current level of fundraising for this trip is not quite adequate. Would you consider making a charitable contribution or perhaps a small monthly donation to my ministry to help me serve these wonderful people? A gift of any amount will be greatly appreciated and all gifts are tax-deductible.

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