'Jesus came to undo what Adam so disastrously did...'

Grace. John Newton called it amazing. He was right. But sometimes I forget why. What makes it amazing? It is almost like good health: I don’t, with awareness, appreciate it all the time, but when I finally get over that cold or the flu finally breaks THEN I see how great my good health is.

Saved from what? This is a book title but also a great question. Sin is deteriorating our world like time rots an apple. I realized yesterday that I forgot how bad, gross, grotesque, wrong, deadly, dark, painful, hurtful and harmful, haunting and horrifying, sick and unsavory sin is. One sin. Just one sin and the entire universe was thrown off kilter and everything suddenly had an expiration date. When I was younger I often thought of how many shin-kicks Adam would receive in Heaven: ‘I made it to Heaven, no thanks to your efforts, Adam’ Whack! Think of this. Each individual sins–goes against God’s way he ordered things or commanded them to be–many times in one day; each ‘little’ sin has the power to kill the universe; no wonder we are a mess!

All of society and humanity is not one big happy Brady bunch family chillin on earth like some continuous beach vacation. We are killing each other. Sin affects everyone and everything around you. You think you are keeping it to yourself; you think you are containing it so it only affects you? That’s like what I use to do when I was three: if I close my eyes no one can see me. Sorry, but you trying to be sovereign over your own sin isn’t working. It isn’t working for me either. We all see it. Adam and Eve tried hiding behind some trees after they sinned; they tried containing and running away from their disobedience, avoiding it like it didn’t happen. But sin literally killed everything.

Funerals are so hard because death, though normal, is unnatural. Sin did that. It made something beautiful into something gross. It pained what once was jubilant and happy; it distorted good; it high-jacks righteousness. We think, like many characters in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, that we can control sin like they thought they could control the ring. But it always ends up controlling us. We become ITS slave and sin OUR master.

What’s so amazing about grace? It saved us from all of this. We are no longer under that realm; there is something more real than that: Jesus Christ. From all of this he saved us to walk with him eternally in what the Garden of Eden was supposed to become. Only in Jesus can the consequence of sin be unplugged and powerless.


‘[Jesus] came to undo what Adam so disastrously did, and lead us back through the jungle to the garden. He crossed the ravine, the unbridgeable gulf between sinful man and holy God.’ [[Sinclair Ferguson]]

something far more interior: faith expressed in love

There is much in the book of Galatians but the paramount issue is what the Gospel of Jesus Christ is and isn’t. Paul is furious in the letter and a big part of his wide-eyed name calling is that some scum bags were trying to be extra spiritual and say you weren’t a Christian if you didn’t follow their lead. Pious Christians can easily read this now and be appalled at those who demanded circumcision as part of salvation... yet we do the same thing all the time. There is always the, ‘If I had Jesus plus ____’ then I’d know I’m REALLY saved; or the, ‘She does [or doesn’t do] _______ so she MUST not be saved.’ We like outward indicators. All of us do, no exception.

But Paul says in Galatians 5 that the Gospel has something to do with a far more interior issue: faith working through love: the issue of the heart. (I hear you mumbling your counter arguments of citing James and Micah 6.8 and so on, hold your britches and listen). The Message puts a section of Galatians 6 very clearly: ‘[Those who would try and add to the Gospel] want an easy way to look good before others, lacking the courage to live by a faith that shares Christ's suffering and death. All their talk about the law is gas. They themselves don't keep the law! And they are highly selective in the laws they do observe. They only want you to be circumcised so they can boast of their success in recruiting you to their side. That is contemptible’

No need to cut things off. Jesus is enough. There is not some secret spiritual key that if you do God has to love you more (remember that whole Jesus dying for you and raising from the dead thing?). No more hoops to jump through. Jesus did it for you. You want to memorize Romans? Okay. You can’t use it to leverage against God though (and this should free you that if you sputter and forget about it for a week or year you can start up again, no condemnation [chapter 8]).

I think it is easier for us to control our outward actions and appearance and so we make those things the standard for salvation or justification or sanctification or our standing with God (or someone else’s); outward actions are easy to compare and I like comparing myself–wrongly–to other people so I can make sure I’m okay with God. A lot of the Pharisees and these bozos in the Galatia region and our own hearts are living in fear when we attempt to lower God’s standard of perfection into a few simple rules. We are terrified that Jesus isn’t enough. But he is.

What seems most wild and elusive, like trying to ride and untamed stallion, is our own heart. Yet this is where the magic happens, this is where God brings the change. We are told that God exchanges the old heart and gives a new one that actually wants to follow his way.

People were always asking Jesus if he was the One and as proof they always wanted signs. Jesus was usually pretty ticked at the interrogation. Salvation is here. It comes through what Jesus did. See it. Bask in it. Don’t you dare water it down with your rules either, for if you steal a Christian’s joy by confusing the Gospel with your rules God will crush you.

Monday is for Morons: 02-20-2012

The Gospel is for you!

Do you believe it?

It is a fact, so.... deal.


Let's pretend for a moment you have a best friend, he or she is THAT person. You are two peas in a pod, you know each other more and better than anyone else. You don't have to finish one another's sentences because who wants that, really? You WOULD do anything for this person. You've experienced much of life together, gone through the fun and the easy and the tough and terrible.

What if the hardest situation and circumstance came two days ago. Your amigo in arms needed you the most, more than ever before.... and you completely abandoned them; you left your best friend in the whole world out to dry. They needed your presence and you were not where on the map; they needed your words and you were silent; they needed you and you were purposely running away?

Let's pretend your best friend is God.

The Apostle Peter didn't have to pretend, he owned this scenario; he lived it. He is the reality of this idea, its fulfillment. Peter--the rock!--told Jesus, 'Everyone else may leave you when the crap hits the fan but not me, not this guy.' It was not long after that Jesus was taken capture, tortured and killed and Peter was found in the dark, cold night writhing in bitter weeping and feeling like he betrayed the world in leaving Jesus' side. Can you imagine the thoughts that might have run through Peter's head? He confessed earlier that Jesus was it, that Jesus was the son of God, the long awaited Messiah who'd save the world! He heard the voice of God affirming these facts too. And he did not have the moxie to say he even knew Jesus, let alone die with him.

You may have a sense of this in your own life as well. You feel that your sin is another spit in the face of God. You think, 'If I REALLY loved God I would not keep failing and sinning!'

Sometimes I'm surprised that it was Judas and not Peter who ended up killing himself. To think of the guilt and depression which engulfed Peter....too much it seems.

Some days later Peter and the boys came to shore from sailing. As Peter stood on the cool sand, the smell of his lineage flowing through his nostrils he heard his future... his present; Jesus made sure that Peter knew that the God whom he betrayed loved him.

This is for you. This is the Gospel. Your sins are many, God's grace laughs at them because the punishment for those sins has already been paid for in Jesus' death on the Cross.

I’m a Gentile. How Ya Doin?

Last night I taught a few willing listeners about some of the things the Apostle Paul is talking about in his letter to the Saints in Ephesus, specifically the second chapter, verses 11 through the end.

There is a lot going on in this passage and I’m not starting it all up. One point, however, stuck out to me, it glared and glistened as it dribbled out of my mouth last night: I’m doubly undeserving of God’s grace.

The Jews, as Paul talks about in Romans 3, were some privileged dudes. They had all the oracles and promises of God; they had the Temple; they had–for good and bad–the whole history; they had Abraham and Isaac and Jacob; they had their promised land and their circumcision (yikes!). The Gentiles (this includes myself and probably most of you), by contrast, had nature... boom! Yea. That is about it. Paul talks in Romans 1 that the Greeks had nature to reveal to them the God of the Universe and even that truth we all suppressed....umm....I think with their divine inspiration the Israelites had a leg-up in this case.

So thinking about the fact that no human being had the right to be called God’s children (first part of Ephesians 2), we can throw some more impossible into this cake and say that Gentiles (non-Jews) were not even a consideration for this dance.... we weren’t even a name that had been crossed-out, we were not even written down in the first place!.... or so it seems.

In Romans 9 and onward Paul discusses how Gentiles were the most unlikliest of unliklies to receive the blessing and mercy and grace of God’s salvation. No one deserves God’s mercy. But if anyone did it was the Jews. And here I am, as Gentile as a pork sandwich on Passover Day, receiving daily the full benefits of Jesus’ sacrifice on the Cross and the glory of his resurrection. This is amazing! Now go ponder how great you are in light of that (pour me some sarcasm, please!)

mutable minds

Every time I hear the positive thinking idea–think of good things and you’ll feel better about life and yourself–I want to lash out, shake the person and say, ‘Life is really hard! Wake up!’ I don’t and probably won’t ever actually do that. But I am a realist (back off on calling me a pessimist, you always-hopefulls), and I work in possibilities, not probabilities: so if it is not outside the realm of happening–though perhaps unlikely–it is a legitimate concern, idea, potential, etc.

Now as a result of having this mind of mine which entertains every option, I see the world as a flaming mess with little hope for saving. This is sad. There is a great deal of truth in my conclusion but there is equal folly, for God is able to literally do anything within his power–which is limitless–and that includes remaking and redeeming all things... which he actually is planning on doing.

This is where something the Apostle Paul said is interesting, namely, we can change the way our minds think. In his long letter to the Christians in Rome, Paul said that our minds could be ‘renewed.’ Obviously this does not mean that we get our old brain taken out and a new one put inside. But it DOES mean that we can change the paths our thoughts usually tread, the ways and perspectives we think through life.

Oh my, you’ll be ‘fixed’ in a jiffy. Not even close! This does not mean you must hit your spirituality in to hyper-mode, be a monk and sing in solitude while you eat Haggis around honey bees and brew beer. It does mean that as we further realize who God is, what he has always been doing and understanding what we and this whole world were made for, the more that stuff ‘clicks’ and sinks in, the more we think in a way that says, ‘God is my reality and his words are the supreme truth.’

The mind is renewable for everyone. You do not have to remain in the old and poor patterns you always used; you don’t have to use the same bad logical of your past; you don’t need to be who you were–which is not how God made you to eternally be.

Jesus not only died for our sins, but he died for our minds as well.

Nothing means nothing

I was visiting a church one morning with a friend. We decided to go to Sunday School (we were in college so I think it was only because we both miraculously woke up earlier enough to go). I have no recollection of what the lesson was about. But one ending comment has remained ingrained in my thoughts: ‘Now the end of Romans 8 says a lot of things, but it does not say WE can’t squirm out of God’s hand.’

As I picked my jaw off the ground I was wondering if what I heard was actually said. So I asked my friend and his reaction was similar to mine. This ‘teacher’ was trying to ruin people’s lives!!

Paul, at the end of Romans 8, spouts off a list of things which do not have the power or authority to undo what Jesus said was done. The list is not meant to be exhaustive but to encompass everything and anything, things which we do not even perceive or understand to believe. Particularly to this situation I’d highlight Paul’s words ‘anything else in all of creation.’ This Sunday School teacher got it dead wrong. Nothing, no power, no entity, no other will is able to mark out Jesus’ words and statement of fact and reality ‘It is finished!’ No, lowly and down-on-yourself individual, not even you can slide out of God’s promise.

When God does it we can, in this instance, with relief say, ‘What’s done is done and nothing can change it.’ When we think we can unravel God’s plans and promises we must not know the God in the Bible and we must not know the power of Jesus, both then and now.

We sin a lot. Sin is despicable and deplorable and wicked and counter-good. God has completely forgiven his children though our eldest brother’s payment for us: Jesus really pay it all, it is not just a song.

Monday is for Morons: 12-12-2001

I woke up to the insistent dribbles of rain forcing their way to ground. Not only was it raining, but it is almost cold enough to make snow. What a lousy combo. I don't know about you but on a day like this I'd rather sit around a fire and drink something hot as I engulf myself into a great read... NOT go outside and do something.

Remember John in the New Testament? Not Jesus' brother who probably wrote 5 books of the Bible; the other one, the one who dressed like Tarzan mixed with an Eskimo and baptized people. Well he was put into prison and knew things would probably not end terribly well for him. I imagine him in some feces infested cell, darkened by some Mid-Eastern night, wondering about that guy everyone was calling Jesus: 'I wonder if he really is it; I wonder if he really is the one we have all been waiting for.'

Maybe you are wondering the same thing. Maybe you you're just feeling . . . bleh. On a cold, raining day it is easy to feel blasé. Well John, instead of wondering until his head fell off, sent some of his dudes to go ask Jesus if he was 'it,' the Messiah Israel was waiting for. Jesus answered them by telling the messengers, 'Report back to John what you yourself are seeing. I heal the corrupted and I preach good news to the poor.'

Jesus is the Messiah not only Israel, but the whole world, YOU, have been waiting for. It is okay to have blasé Mondays because Jesus is come. And for those who would come to HIM with their broken-down lives full of disgusting and many sins he will forgive. He has footed the bill already. And he will continue to do so for all time.

Don't let the day moderate your heart, go to Jesus who is full of mercy.

The Legend of Legacy

Have you ever dreamed about how you would be remembered? How history would speak of you? I have. I’ve had tons of crazy and exciting ideas regarding the way generations down the road would perceive me in all my glory. When I first became a Christian, in my silly zeal I wanted to be a missionary somewhere dangerous with the hope of being martyred!

But we hear it all the time don’t we? ‘What’s going to be the legacy you leave behind?’ ‘How will you make an impact on the world?’ ‘Will your decedents be proud of who you were?’ But more awkward, if you are a Christian: ‘What will history say of your work for the cause of Christ?’ ‘How many people will greet you in Heaven who, if it were not for you, would not be there’ ‘How many people will you have discipled?’ ‘Will you have an -ism attached to your last name because of your scholastic or dynamic ministry?’

Oh the burden of building such a great legacy! You need to get workin on that yesterday! You need to do so many great things and impact so many important people who will then go on to influence a certain nation who has never heard the Gospel of Jesus Christ before!

Unfortunately we have traded an act of love in for a a ragged, selfish and melting dream of meaning something in the world, of being someone, being known; we have tainted good charity for me-zeal.

As one pastor pointed out, ‘What was your great, great, great grandmothers name?’ You know what, if it wasn’t for ancestry.com you’d be unknown to your own great, great, great grandchildren, but even then they will, more than likely, not know you–who you are, what you were like, how you smiled, what made you tick.

It is hard to find people in the Bible who care about their legacy like we are so often told to do. And the guys and gals we do find in the Bible who are concerned about such things end up on the opposite side of God’s favor because they were worried about how they would be remembered, not how they loved their Maker and their fellow human beings.

Remember in the book of Esther, the idiot Haman was trying to promote himself and wanted all his friends and family and nation to worship him . . . but he ended up being hung on his own gallows. Remember Peter how he stuck his neck out when he said, ‘Lord, I’ll not forsake you’–he was saying, ‘look at me! I’ll be better than everyone else!’–but he too ran away when the possibility of persecution came. Or the king in Daniel who lost his marbles and lived like an animal so God would make him see that he was nothing. Or most pointedly the author of Ecclesiastes who taught that all things in this world, no matter how great you made them or influenced them, will be passed on to someone else who didn’t do a thing to deserve it.

You see, Christians are those who already know who they are. We are a people who do not have to prove ourselves. We are humbled beyond understanding simply because we are God’s children. We have no need of impressing others. We have no need of making sure we have left indelible impressions on hundreds by our speeches and acts. No, we Christians are more concerned about Jesus than ourselves; we are happy being described by the word mere. If someone wrote a book about most of the incredible followers of Jesus, we might be bored to tears because God looks at the heart not at all the sparkling achievements we're so use to applauding.

To understand that to be enveloped in Christ is what is most important is to understand everything with regard to this legacy making mess. You will be forgotten by the world and your family, it is the law of life. But you will never be forgotten by your Father. The mystery is that His legacy is yours.

I can't stand some people . . .

You know what I can't stand? People who seem like they have no
problems. They are always smiling and laughing and . . . well I want
to go kick them in the shins but I'm afraid they would start laughing,
I would shrivel up into nothing and die! But it is the truth: these
people are messed up in the brain. I mean maybe like some people have
brown eyes God made some people to have a few wires loose upstairs so
that the glass is always full even when there is no glass! You know
the type of people I am talking about don't you? And if you don't, go
look in the mirror and try and frown--bet you can't do it because you
ARE one of them!

I cannot be around these people because I thought this is what it
meant to be a Christian. For one reason or another I thought that you
had to smile and say things like 'it is okay' or 'it could be worse'
when you just got diagnosed with cancer. I thought that you had to be
SO delighted with Jesus that you (not only shouldn't) but COULDN'T
appear to be unhappy lest you ruin your witness! I thought that you
had to act like everything was okay when your entire life looked like
a pile of . . . well something not good.

Boy was I happy when I discovered that Jesus suffered greatly and
wasn't smiling the whole time. I do not know where some people get
this idea that since there is fullness of joy in God we are oblivious
and immune to pain and suffering and the blues. But if I ever did find
out I'd go to that place and knock some heads around.

Listen, if you are a Christian it is okay to mourn--and not just over
your terrible sins! It is okay to feel annoyed when you have the flu;
it is okay to uncontrollably cry for a time when you have a
miscarriage; it is okay to feel really unhappy not eat a few days when your spouse dies;it is okay to feel glum when you just failed your test; it is okay to
feel bad and sad and even mad sometimes. You know why? Because Jesus
lets us. He was, the bible tells us, a man of SORROWS and ACQUAINTED
WITH MUCH GRIEF. You remember what Jesus was doing before he was
betrayed by one of his followers? He was grinding his teeth and
begging God for another way. He was so into it he was sweating drops
of blood instead of salty water. He was in agony. I guarantee you if
someone within a thousand miles of him tried to smile at that moment
they couldn't. He ground his teeth which means the agony within was so
real it made his outsides go yonkers.

If you're one of those whacks who thinks that when you're a Christian
you have to be happy all the time, you need to get your brain checked
or you're not a Christian because Christians are human. Life is hard
and sometimes unbearable Yea, there is
hope. Yes, there is joy. Of course, you can smile if you need to. But
don't go thinking that when you get hurt or harmed you have to 'put on
a happy face!' Go be sad for a little while and soon enough you will
remember that Jesus is there with you, being sad right along side with
you

Monday is for Morons: 10-31-2011

Jesus was just beaten to a bloody and disgusting mess. He was being called names and maligned. After the long nails went through his hands and he was stapled down to the cross. They, without concern of smoothness or being ginger, flopped the cross upright in the hole in the ground. The joking and final flop of the cross into the hole further ripped skin and stretched tendons. There Jesus hung. A picture of poverty portrayed, paradoxically to save.

Then the guy next to him and an 'ahah!' moment. Maybe he saw Jesus earlier in his life; as he was walking around the city heard of Jesus' claims, saw a miracle or two. Or maybe he had never met him before but,picking up on the jeers, discerned who Jesus was. Regardless, here he is suffocating along side the Son of God. 'Jesus,' he whispers out between breaths 'remember me in paradise.' Can you believe it?! I mean this guy was feeling sorry for himself, for at his 'death bed' he realized what an idiot he had been his whole life. I mean people steal because they don't work, right? Sure, live your whole life like you want then at the end whine like a baby and seek repentance, what a moron!

But wait. The disfigured face of Jesus clearly claws out a sentence, 'Today, you will be with me in paradise.' WHAT!?!

The truth of it all is that Jesus' mercy and grace and love and compassion and patience are far greater, far more shocking and scandalous than we could ever have imagined. It does not take a life-time of good deeds and bible reading to enter to bliss of Christ's presence forever. It takes the realization that all your friends already know, you're a rotten to the core sinner. But Heaven is stock full of rotten apples like you! What's one more? There is no sin too large that God, like Gallagher, won't obliterate to bits! Smashing it to that it covers the earth as they life at the sin's triviality.

You have a sack full for God to smash? That's okay, he has both the time and the power for it. 'But these are some really big ones!' you reply. He has it covered, he'll just bring out a bigger hammer. Hurry, find your forgiveness in Jesus' work, go now, before you feel so guilty again that you think he could never forgive you.

Was Jesus Serious?

I was able to attend a thrilling college football game a few years ago. The home team was down all game long. It was now the fourth quarter and the home team was still down by four points with only 3 minutes left. The home team had the ball. They were driving down the field. The suspense was building. The whole stadium was willing a win. The quarterback dropped back and in an instant released the ball. Into the receivers hands the ball fell and into the end zone went the receiver. Touchdown. For a brief moment there was so much unhindered emotion that sound itself disappeared. Everyone had their mouth open; veins were bulging; I had not an atom of oxygen remaining in my body, but no noise. The sound was so loud that for that moment our ears could not handle it. Everyone in the stadium immediately went hoarse. The whole game we were waiting for this!

Could you imagine in this moment that I turned and looked at my friend next to me, one who I know breathes this same team, who lives and dies by the success of this home team, could you imagine if I saw my friend with both arms extended with thumbs pointing down booing the success of his team? Confusing? Shocking? Angering?

In Jesus’ parable of two brothers found in the Gospel of Luke, the 15th chapter, verses 11-32, the young, foolish, sinful, bad, rebellious brother was considered dead; literally gone and done with were the thoughts regarding this young man. As it ends up he is alive and comes home and as any loving father would do, once he found out his boy was alive and well the father kissed him, accepted him back in to the family, made it clear that he loved his son by throwing an over lavish and expensive party. Jesus says that this is the kind of rejoicing that goes on in heaven when a sinner comes home—when one realizes he is never going to make it, that he needs God and the grace and comfort his love brings. The stadium is erupting with joy. The cheering so loud you cannot hear. Everyone is cheering. Everyone one, except . . .

The religious elite in Jesus’ day were not happy with how gracious Jesus was portraying God to be. ‘Of course we are only saved by God’s mercy alone’ they would say—and believe!—‘but you must also be good.’ They are the fan booing when the whole Kingdom of God is beside themselves in happiness. They are booing because they are not satisfied. They think that if God’s grace is for the prostitute, the drunk, the homeless guy who doesn’t take showers, the one who killed another, the single mom, the . . . ugh . . . ordinary; if God’s grace is for THEM than it is not special, they think.

God’s grace is shocking. God chooses to love those who are the social outcasts, the failures in life. He is not just for the rich, not just the blue collared but the bottom of the barrels. Not only does God love those but he loves those who already had their moment of realization, who already spent their first chance . . . and the 17 that came after. He keeps loving them. God’s love is for all. You cannot win it. You cannot outgrow it. You cannot earn it. You cannot lose it. You cannot expand it. You cannot detract it.

The Pharisees did not like what Jesus was saying about the Father’s mercy because they suddenly realized that they had absolutely nothing to do with it. They saw their hierarchy was a farce. They saw that in God’s eyes a king was just the same as a poor, homeless Jew who was called a bastard his whole life. They were booing God.

Bloody Mercy: Leviticus 15.25-30

Imagine: according to the laws of your day you have a physical infirmity that renders you socially outcast. The very chair you sit in, the bed you lie in, the cloths you wear are all deemed unclean and therefore unusable by anyone else. You cannot host friends or family in your home, none the less go visit others, lest you mar them and their home as well. Who would marry someone unclean? No one should or maybe even could. If you had children they might be given to another for care while you were ill. Normally this infirmity only lasts a few days but you have possessed this disgrace for 12 years!

For 12 years you have been this outcast, unclean even to go offer sacrifices to the God of your people. You have no possessions because you have tried every known treatment to heal you, you have done everything humanly possible to make yourself well . . . but to no avail.

With the background of Leviticus 15.25-33 we find this very individual in Mark 5.25. This very woman who has suffered so hears of him who can heal. She, after exhausting all medical resources and probably praying every day to be relieved of her disease, hears that Jesus is in town. In hope she rushes out her door forgetting who she is, but for a moment. She finds a crowd of people surrounds Jesus but 12 years of misery shoves her to him. Forgetting who she is, she reaches out and touches Jesus’ jacket. 12 years of people unclean and suddenly, miraculously she is healed of her now gone bleeding. Immediately she can become clean, presentable in the temple to worship YHWH, the God of her forefathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; immediately she can become normal again.

As Jesus stopped in his tracks, her heart, struck by the realization of what she just did, stopped as well. Jesus looked on her and saw her faith in him; her faith that said, ‘HE can heal me!’ She confessed she had a disease and that is why she touched him. The crowd around them was on edge. Remember how Aaron’s sons approached God wrongly and were killed? Or how Uzzah touched the ark and died? she thought to herself, what have I done? But she did not die. Jesus’ holiness did not divide the woman and he, and his holiness did not kill her; rather, Jesus’ holiness made her holy. Her Jubilee had come.

Now is Always the Best Time...

Now is always the best time for Gospel living. There are many I hear say that they must change before they can go to God; Jesus already changed everything in His death and resurrection, go live it out and it's implications now. There are those who say when they have the right plan or strategy they will change; Jesus already fulfilled the plan conceived by the Father before time even existed, and Jesus says only to follow Him. We often think if only we can change our motives, change our feelings, change our thoughts, change our relationships, change our dreams, change our cloths, change our job, change our friends, change our behavior at that time we can go to God; Jesus willingly took on our sins and botches and screwed up motives and motifs of stupidity and rebellion and was put to death in our place not so we could change everything about us but that we could finally and freely love our Heavenly Father and our fellow man NOT IN PERFECTION but with a love that exists only because of what Jesus accomplished.

Repentance does not always mean cease and desist, rather go, now, and live.

Russell Moore on Recent, Public Adultry

The following is a quote from Russell Moore discussing recent failures of marriage by public figures and how everyone is almost already in their shoes:

I don’t know who you are, reader, but I know you are probably not smarter than Anthony Weiner or Arnold Schwarzenegger or John Edwards. And neither am I. Both of us, you and I, are on the verge of wrecking our lives. We’re probably not on the verge of a situation quite like any of those men, but the gospel tells us we have vulnerabilities just the same, and they all can lead to destruction.

The answer isn’t found in talent or in strategy or in brilliance. It’s found in fear, the fear of the Lord and the vision of his future.

Lord have mercy.

To read the whole thing click here

A Christian is Such Because of Christ, Not Their Own Actions or Inactions

Excellent words from the Lutheran:

Our Heavenly Father attaches no strings to His love. His love for us doesn’t depend on our love for others. Our relationship with the Father was established long ago, in the body and blood of His Son. Jesus Christ erased all our sins and shouldered all our sorrows. Already now we have a solid relationship with our heavenly Father; there’s no need to fret about it. That relationship doesn’t depend on our love for Him, but on His love for us. It hinges on the Gospel of God, not the Law of God…Again, the Old Adam betrays us. Our sinful nature would much rather hear Law than Gospel. The sinful nature is a seasoned do-it-yourselfer. We’d rather know what we should do, yet God insists on telling us who we are. The best way to tell you what to do as a Christian is to tell you who you are in Christ. The sinful nature likes to think it can earn (and keep) God’s favor. Our Old Adam prefers to base security with God the Father on His Law rather than His Gospel.

You can find more excellent quotes in context when you read Harold L. Senkbeil's book Dying to Live: The Power of Forgiveness. But sorry, not on the Kindle.

Impudent Praying: thoughts from Jesus’ words in Luke 11.8

Here is Jesus with his disciples, they ask of him, ‘teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.’ Jesus replies, when you pray say . . .‘ and he gives what history has named The Lord’s Prayer.

In Luke’s book Jesus goes on teaching about prayer: he tells the story of a rude neighbor who comes banging on his friend’s door at 2am going on about how he needs some bread because another rude friend came and wanted to crash at his place. The man who had the neighbor at his door was already in bed wearing his boxers catching some Zzz so he could function the next day; being rightly annoyed he says, ‘hey, I’m sleeping, you schlub; go away, I’m not getting up for your friend who doesn’t know how to plan ahead of time!’ But the man at the door persists: ‘Hey man, I need some bread!’ ‘Get lost you turtle-neck wearer!’ ‘Come on! I need some bread for this guy!’

Jesus goes on to tell his disciples that the man who was sleeping eventually gets up, gets bread, and gives it to his annoying neighbor NOT because they were friends but because the guy was, impudent.

I had no clue what impudent meant so I looked it up: essentially it is not being respectful by following what is the norm based on society or tradition. So the guy is a little unorthodoxed in his approach but he gets his bread. So what is Jesus trying to convey to his guys who are following him? It seems that Jesus is saying, ‘God is your Father and He loves you and nothing is too hard for Him. There may be some traditions and rules about how you should approach Him, but remember to approach Him; you needn’t go to a temple or wear certain clothes or say specific things, but ask HIM!’ This is along the same lines as the writer of Hebrews who says we can go confidently to the ‘throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.’

The Creator of all things, while wild and subservient to no one, is our Father who loves us. When we pray we are banging on His door, we are calling on Him, we are, in a sense, becoming a welcome nuisance to Him. No liturgy, no heartless quotes, no muttering of the same phrase over and over will help, only coming to God because of what Jesus has done will do; because Jesus gave us a voice with God. God does not care for fancy phrases and perfect theology; He wants those broken enough to know they are in need of Him. You’re never too sinful; you’re never too messed up; you don’t need to get things right before going to God; you dont need to have some feeling or sign and you’re never going TO BE good enough to go to God: Jesus fills that place for us.

Competing Sport: Can Sports Bring Peace?

The subject of world peace and setting aside differences seems more prevalent at the Olympic Games and similar events than any Miss (insert anything here) Competitions. One of the key focuses of the Games is solidarity—togetherness, unity. The idea being sports and competition can bring together otherwise distant countries and ways of thinking. Peace, world peace, at least for a few weeks.

The idea of setting aside of differences through sports is pervasive hope; the NBA sported Latino style jerseys during their season; today MLB clubs will be wearing Negro League Jerseys; then there are movies such as Remember the Titans—based on actual events—and myriads of others which hope to unveil that sports are the medicine for aching rivalries. We see in sports the similarities in one another; the desires of our enemy are found in us; sports unmask the façade we have been seeing and expose the humanity in the other . . . well, humans.

But then you have other worldwide competitions: FIFA World Cup of Soccer; World Cup of Rugby, Cricket, etcetera. These events are more of a containment of rivalry attitudes, long enough at least to crown a winner. The on the field controversies are apparent and sometimes volatile between countries that hate each other.

So is sporting the hope for the cause of world peace? Do sports derail persistent and consistent counter ideologies existing now for centuries? Sport itself, it seems, often fumigates peace.

I hope to play sports as long as I can. I think sports are fun and good and can teach a lot, but sports will never bring ultimate peace to humanity. As Rocky Balboa in the movie Rocky IV said after his bout with the Russian: ‘During this fight, I've seen a lot of changing, in the way you feel about me, and in the way I feel about you. In here, there were two guys killing each other, but I guess that's better than twenty million. I guess what I'm trying to say, is that if I can change, and you can change, everybody can change!’ Change we may, but not enough; never enough.

If we look to sports or literature or dialogue or anything for ultimate peace we will always be disappointed with the failing result. The Christian understands this deep issue of unceasing disaster and pain as sin; everyone is contaminated with it, this author, you the reader, the Pope and your grandma. Because of sin hatred, disdain, wars and hard times will always exist on this earth. But the Christian has a hope for ultimate peace and it is found in the person and work Jesus Christ. He is the one who died on behalf of all those who would follow and believe him. Our sin has not only damaging consequences now but has eternal consequences as well, but Jesus died in our place paying for the evil we let seep from us. Now while we seek for peace here on earth and desire to bring good to as many as possible the Christian knows that ultimate peace will never exist on this earth; but the hope of the Christian is that one day there will be a new earth which is void of all sin and therefore hatred and war and rivalry; this is only true because Jesus killed sin forever. The Christian is no great individual or group of people but the Christian follows one, the only one who will bring about true and lasting peace which will never be interrupted by spouts of selfishness, greed, or hate.

Titus 1.8: a companion of good

Paul instructed his fellow-worker Titus to find in Crete some men who could be elders for the churches on the island. Doing so is not a whimsical venture. So Paul lays out some things for Titus to look for to determine and gauge what these guys’ character should display. One trait he highlights is being a ‘lover of good.’

This seems simple enough, but what does it mean to be a lover of good? It is easy for me—and maybe you—to say, ‘Yes, I love good.’ But when I thought more and delved into the devotion of my own intentions, I became worried. For when I initially thought of if I love good I thought of something positive and then looked at the associated feeling or desire. Correct thinking soon followed: just because I like something when I think of it does not mean that I love it. I soon found that I root for good a lot, but it is often like cheering on your stock as it climbs higher and higher: the results are going to positively affect my bank account. But rooting for is nowhere in the vicinity of loving; unless I have some sad affection for money, I do not actually LOVE my stocks in the stock market; I do desire them to do well so I can have a good investment so I can earn more money so I can do more things with money, but I don’t love stocks or money; they are necessary and helpful. (This is when, in my thinking, my tranquil complexion started to grow into a frown.)

What does it mean to LOVE good? If we look at what love entails through the logic of the Bible—a good place to look since that is where the question arose—we have a helpful guide. To love something Biblically means everything. When Jesus talked about loving our enemies he talked about laying aside all our desires of self-promotion and vengeance for the sake of aiding their soul and even at times their ventures. When Jesus talked about the greatest love one could have for another he talked about the laying down of ones life: willingly giving up yourself totally for another. When Jesus talks about a husband and wife he talks about forbearance, patience, seeking the good of the other, humility, sacrifice, actions and inactions that positively promote the character and life of the other, intentions, dipping into every area and aspect of what it means to live.

So, do I, do you have this particular proclivity for good? Does your life wreak of promoting—for goodness’ sake—good?

Jesus Was Sick

I had the flu the week prior to Christmas. Having the flu or being in a sick state is no good. We often say while in a sick state that we are not our normal self; Why do we say that? We say this, obviously, because we cannot reason, think, speak, act with the capacity we regularly are able. But I might argue that we are, in some ways, MORE ourselves when we are sick or incapacitated. When we are ill we are unable to use our normal filters, our societal or self-governed restraints. I found saying things and thinking things that normally would not surface at all. When we are sick we are weakened and more prone to failure and sin. It was a startling thing to observe.

But what about Jesus? Jesus was not somehow free from all normal human sickness. He was born a screaming, slimy baby just like all of us; AND like all of us he got the sniffles, a headache, stubbed his toe, and, it was even possible, that Jesus Christ got the flu! Philippians 2 tells us that Jesus came to earth and when he did so he set aside his Godness, he willfully subjected himself to all the aspects of being human, this includes sickness. So Jesus must have felt like crap physically at times, but when his societal filters were dropped sin did not come out of him. When Jesus was sick he did not sin against his mom or sibling who bugged him or his friends who were being jerks. When Jesus was sick he was not self-fish. Jesus did not sin when he was sick because he wanted to do the will of the Father ALL the time; he was governed by the will of the Father not his own will.

So this is a small reflection from one being sick reflecting on Jesus' perfection even in his weakness. I have no proof Jesus was ever sick, but I know he may have been. I do have historical evidence that he was tortured, betrayed, went without sleep, and gruesomely murdered and he still NEVER, not once, sinned.

Patience, You Must Have: Jesus in the OT

There are multiple trucks literally filled with people who are laughably more qualified than myself to speak on the subject of Jesus in the OT . . . but I think that was understood long ago. Some I have been most helped by: The Ancient Love Song, The Unfolding Mystery: Discovering Christ in the Old Testament, Inspiration and Incarnation: Evangelicals and the Problem of the Old Testament, The Meaning of the Pentateuch.

Are we supposed to play hide and go seek with Jesus as we read the OT? Is He everywhere and we just have to find Him? After all it is HE who said the Law and prophets spoke of Himself. In thinking about this we will look at some other general OT issues in passing.

Is our sequence of OT books the best? Most have never thought about the question and with good reason, its order has been the way it currently is for quite some time. What if there was a way to read the OT that might benefit us a little more, might give just a smidge more clarity or aide to our understanding. Currently we break the OT into the Law, History, Poetry, Major then Minor Prophets and, for the most part, they are lumped together categorically. This is very minor but in one way the OT is organized (Tanakh) Chronicles does not come right after Samuel and Kings--as we noted last time it was written well after the two; the love story of Ruth, making a more logical and manifested form, follows the intimate love of Song of Songs; Ecclesiastes, the existential, candid look at the sadness and core of life precedes the book of Lamentations which woefully recalls terrifying historical events with little hope, save for chapter 3—what’s the purpose of life; and this way ends with Ezra, Nehemiah, and then Chronicles, the point at which Israel is gathered back together and growing again. The final books build anticipation, desire, longing for a good king who will finally right the Nation. What does this have to do with our topic: the OT, by presenting human failure and incompleteness time after time over hundreds of years builds a groaning for the Messiah, for Christ Jesus to tear on the scene and make all things right. *

A big question when looking at the OT and Jesus must boil down to, what were the intentions of the people writing the OT at the time they were writing it? Thousands of years ago the stories of God’s interaction with people were told orally, by mouth. These were written down at some point. This means that these things are very old and the audience, then, was just as old. When we tell a story to a child we should emphasize certain things because stories convey, stories teach. Just the same with stories way back in days prior to almost everything we would recognize as culture: they told stories to relay history and ideas in a certain way, with intention.
For one, they were not a scientific based society; what I mean by this is that precision was not such a big deal as it is nowadays. So when you read Numbers or stories about how one army came out to fight another and it was like 10,000 million on one side and 1,000,000 on another we should not go, ah, someone was there counting, rather we should think, man, one army had a huge personnel advantage over the other army. It is simply saying there was a definite underdog. So we cannot get hung up on the numbers, take yourself out of the Western Scientific precision mode and throw a bone; different cultures speak in differing ways, they convey ideas differently from how we do and that is okay. It is not dishonesty, just different. (though some numbers obviously have symbolic meaning, we’re not talking about those here)
Secondly, as was mentioned last time, they and we write with certain bents and emphases (remember how Samuel and Chronicles differed?). Galileo is quoted as saying, “The Bible shows the way to get to Heaven, not the way the heavens go.” What he is saying is precisely my point: we should not look at Genesis, the first book in the OT, as some kind of proof or in depth description of what all took place at creation, instead we should draw that God spoke it all into existence and made it good. So we have to be careful in how we read the Bible because it is easy to interject our ideas based on our conclusions and understandings literally thousands of years after things were written. It is arrogant to conclude so and so must have been saying this BECAUSE we now know x and y. We must be careful because we know the OT was inspired by God but it does not mean it has to be neat and nice and always conform nicely to our present way of understanding.
Third, for the most part, the audience of the OT writers were people living at the time it was spoken. Peter Enns makes an intriguing point that in Deuteronomy 5.7 it reads “You shall have no other god’s before me.” He compares this to later writings such as Isaiah 45.5 that says, “I am the LORD, and there are no other, besides me there is no God . . .” Did you catch that? In the first part God seems to be acknowledging there are other gods and in Isaiah He does not. Dr. Enns suggests that in a way of speaking to the people so they understand he changes over time, not the reality of what He is saying to Israel but in the way they’ll best understand. He argues that at the time of Deuteronomy the wandering Israelites were very much poly-theistic—they believed in many gods—so god spoke to them in that way: “there are others but I’m supreme.” But over time, through circumstance God showed them that there were no other gods besides Him and thus He spoke more candidly to Israel in Isaiah about His supremacy: “categorically I am alone, none even comes close!” We see then that we cannot wear, entirely, our same thinking caps when reading the OT, it is very different.
Fourth, the Bible is incarnational, just like Jesus. I often forget that God did not have to do all this. He could have made the world and observed like the Greek gods, interjecting into events on a whim. God did not have to speak to us. Get a good image of a snooty person in your mind, this individual is high-browed, wears only the finest of cloths, is a billionaire who speaks to no one but his butler. Sadly the limo had a flat tire and for some reason this person decided to get out of the car, a smelly, dingy, and maybe dying hobo comes up asking for money. Nothing. Our nose-upper does not even acknowledge our hobo’s existence. In a sense, God could do that and it would be okay. But thankfully He decided to interject and speak to His people and not in some heavenly language but our own, our own full of bad grammar like this blog bountifully contains, language that could and would be twisted, language that is ordinary, not pompous but understandable; God spoke so that we could begin to understand who He is and who we are. This is amazing! So in this way we can compare the OT to Jesus and find the similarities: God interjected into the mess to bring mercy and grace.

Okay, so what about Jesus? Jesus is not playing hide-and-go-seek in the OT. And we should not stretch ideas and similarities and think we have found Him. He is spoken of prophetically—in the Psalms and Isaiah most abundantly but in many other books—or, as many believe, in the form of the Angel of the Lord—Jacob wrestled with him, he stood with the 3 in the furnace, he stood in the way of Balaam’s donkey, etc. So in this way we should not look to find Jesus because He is not there, He will not be until hundreds of years later.
But did Jesus not say that the Law and Prophets spoke of Him? I can tell a story about the attribute of courage without mentioning the word courage; we do not need to see Jesus to long for him. We can think simply but never simplistically about the things Jesus says. What some think of when they say that Jesus is in the OT is that there are people and events push us towards the expected Jesus, the Messiah to come. As Jesus Himself does at numerous points, he takes something from the past and compares it to Himself: Like Jonah descending for three days then being raised up so I will be buried and rise. Also, Jesus is called the second Adam, this compares Jesus to Adam in Genesis and it conveys that humanity, in Jesus Christ, has a second chance for fellowship with God. But even with the comparisons or types—those who have some attribute or action which Jesus will perfect in His existence—we can get too wrapped up in the Jesus part and fast-forward too quickly so that we lose what the point of the passage in the OT is getting at. The OT is doing a lot of things but a big thing it is doing is making us itch more and more for Jesus, it is creating the desire for the perfect One. Charles Drew, author of the helpful book The Ancient Love Song: Finding Jesus in the Old Testament, says, “Jesus Christ has to have context if he is to mean anything . . . Our God has [convinced us that we need His love] for us in the Old Testament. To be ignorant of those Scriptures is to be like the complacent husband, bored with his wife because he has never realized what life would be like without her.”

We want to get what is to be gotten from the OT but nothing more. If we can learn to approach the OT in a humble way in which we want to be informed by God’s word, patiently seeing what it is trying to do we will gain much. Is it hard? Yes. Is it boring at times? Yes. But it is also a gracious gift granted to us and there is a wonderful, joy-filled purpose in it. We see more and more WHAT Jesus’ reign would mean and imply on a sick and decadently destructive people as all humans are. In many parts of the OT it is Jesus’ absence that is to be felt, not His presence.

The Apostle Paul wanting to encourage his fellow believers in the city of Rome told them the following of the OT: “whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.” The Bible, the Christian life is an ongoing wrestling match, it is a struggle; but as the Christian struggles he hopes.





* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Books_of_the_Bible