Put off the dead stuff…

Imagine having a billion dollar bank account, getting statements each month, but not believing it, so you are working hard to keep afloat financially. If that seems silly, imagine having faith in Christ and being dead to sin, reading what God says and still not sure this is true, particularly each time you disobey God. In both cases, inner thoughts do not line up with facts like this:

If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of God is coming. In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. (Colossians 3:1–10)

Key to both issues is what I am listening to? Is it the statements regarding my wealth? Is it the Word of God stating my status? Or am I looking at something else? The above passage asks, “If you have been raised with Christ” — a question puts those who hear it into a dilemma. How do I measure the answer?

I remember one man who claimed to be sinless. He said that salvation was death to sin and since he was saved, he no longer sinned. Anyone who knew him knew otherwise, but this man measured his answer by what he wanted to be true, and that desire blinded him to reality:

If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. (1 John 1:8)

If I have money in the bank and yet insist I am poor and do not rely on that money, I would be like a person who claims to be saved, but is not relying on the Lord Jesus Christ to redeem him. I might be trying hard to redeem myself, or like the man I knew, denying I needed further work and denying there is any sin left to fight. What is true?

Today’s devotional talks about reckoning or considering. The Bible says that because of faith in God’s Word, I have died and my life is hidden with Christ in God. But it also speaks of earthly things in me, things to put off and not rely on or be involved in. I have to live according to what God says, not according to what I think or want.

The error comes by supposing “to live I must first die” or lose my life and find my life hid with God. However, the Bible says I am already dead. I don’t need to die, but to realize what I already am dead to that old life because of what Jesus has done. Reckoning is thinking the truth, not making it happen. When I think the truth, it shows up in the way I live, not the other way around. In other words, I don’t have to make a large income and deposit it in my account because that account is already full, established, there for me to live. Not ignore as if I didn’t have it and had to work hard to get it.

Putting off the old way is realizing the old way is a lie and no longer alive. Instead, I am not spiritual poor but very rich in the resources of my Redeemer!

I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And 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. (Galatians 2:20)

Losing the old life is key to discovering the new, but key to losing the old life is realizing and believing it is already lost, dead to God and useless. What I have in Christ is life and truth and reality, not a charge to go get it.

PRAY: Feelings, sinful behavior, any kind of selfishness can mess with truth, and Jesus, that is a big reason You tell me to shed that stuff and live in the joy You give. It happens by loving You and loving others and reckoning truth about me — truth that You proclaim and even put in writing for me to read and rejoice — to believe and obey. Sometimes this is difficult to explain, yet knowing the truth sets me free from that deceptive and useless self-effort.

 

Lack of Faith?

A friend told me that she was raised in a religion of rules and although she knows and believes the gospel, she struggles with “being good enough” and with believing that God hears and answers her prayers. Even though there is spiritual fruit in her life and she does trust Jesus for salvation, she is in constant need of affirmation regarding almost everything else that God promises.

 Today’s reading is written with the same attitude. The author says, “We have failed to believe that God is the God of all comfort — It has seemed too good to be true” and uses terms like “our poor suspicious natures” and being frightened about the promise of His comfort“ — all ideas that are foreign to faith. This author even suggests this attitude comes from a tendency to consider God as a “stern, unbending judge, holding us at a distance and demanding our respectful homage as He criticizes our slightest faults.”

At the end, the reading says, ‘But I rejoice to say that that stern judge does not exist.” Which is also not true. He exists. However, He poured out His wrath on His Son that we might be recipients of His amazing comfort.

Of course we are not good enough. Ever, never. Jesus is our righteousness. The gospel is our primary comfort because Jesus died for my sin, all of it…

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. (Romans 8:1–2)

While the Bible is filled with commands to “fear God” these are about awe and worship for those who trust Him, not the terror of being rejected. For Christians, that fear is not from God: “For God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control” (2 Timothy 1:7). Later, it says one reason for such a fear:

There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love. (1 John 4:18)

Fear comes when I forget the power and extent of God’s love, when I stop relying on the cross and put confidence in my own works — which are insufficient and never will do the job. That being true, why then fall into such a trap? The Bible speaks to that problem:

When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with the humble is wisdom. (Proverbs 11:2)

Human pride is at the root of thinking I can save myself or be good enough, and pride is most difficult to detect and even more difficult to confess. Pride does not want to say “I am not able” nor admit it — even to me, never mind God. Yet think of it; if I am not trusting God, why not? Like a petulant child, I’m thinking I can do it all by myself. And for that, the God of all grace is more concerned to deal with my lack of humility than to give me comfort over my fears and foibles.

PRAY: Lord Jesus, pride in me is a number one faith-destroyer, and a total insult to Almighty God. It breaks my heart to see it in others, but even seeing it in someone else can contribute to the same problem in myself. Guard my heart. I know I’m to humble myself before You and even rejoice in my weaknesses, for it is only then do I see the wonder of Your strength.

We cannot even fake it...

The preaching in our church is such that a ‘pretend Christian’ likely would not stay long or at best stay that way. Transparent pastors who readily confess their shortfall from the pulpit as well as preaching grace rather than works puts a stop to Satan’s lie that we need to work hard to get into heaven. He tries to thwart the words of Jesus who said:

“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.” (John 3:3)

This ‘do it yourself’ idea is subtle. It appeals to our pride and to the world’s teaching about striving and about doing your best. It flies in the face of all sports and other competitions and enforces the idea of survival of the fittest. However God says:

Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. (1 Corinthians 1:20–25)

This is verified in that those who consider themselves wise want to rule their own lives. The  Pharisees said they didn’t want Jesus to rule over them. The same is true of many who think they have life figured out and do not need God. This passage goes on to say:

For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.” (1 Corinthians 1:26–31)

This also fits with the Lord’s response to Paul, now considered one of the ‘stars’ in the family of God. However, when he’d been given much understanding along with visions from God, the enemy came at him with an unnamed “thorn in the flesh” and he prayed to have it removed.

But (Jesus ) said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Corinthians 12:9–10)

Being a Christian cannot be faked. Pretense is a pride thing, a desire to look good even when I know I’m not what I should be. Pride is the opposite of being weak, and weakness without pretense is required to being filled with the wisdom and righteousness of God. I cannot fake it. I cannot even fake being weak. Being “in Christ” is about thinking and walking in His way, His truth, His life. I cannot impress the wonder of new life to Him or anyone else by pretending, role-playing, or any form of doing it myself.

PRAY: Jesus, You know what it is like to drop all that You are and become a servant. You know the reality of weakness — Almighty God born in a manger, in a human form, able to control the wind and rain and rise from the dead, yet unable to disobey the heart that was willing to die for sinners. I face the rest of my life not knowing how it will end here, yet like You, there is joy set before me and the wonder of why You died becomes my strength in these days of weakness and not knowing. That You would fill me with Your same Spirit is both a mystery and a great amazement. I give thanks that in all this, I am never alone.

Grace vs. try harder…

True story. It happened before Christ came into my life. My first husband, now deceased, worked near home. We had two small children so supper was at a regular time, but occasionally he and his business partner would go for drinks without telling me. When he got home, his supper was cold and I was hot. One day a radio program said that when people do something wrong and get punished, they feel better because that is what they expected. The suggestion was ‘no punishment’ and then they must face up to their guilt.

I never thought of it as being manipulation so tried it. The next time he was late for supper, I warmed his meal and acted as if he was on time. He was puzzled, but he never was late for supper again.

Today’s devotional is about a Christian’s reaction when we fail. It says that discouragement is never a remedy. Just as a child who is learning to walk might lie down in despair when he has fallen, so a believer who is learning to walk by faith might give up in despair when he has fallen into sin. The author adds, “The only thing to do in both cases is to get right up and try again.”

God never says, “Lie down and be discouraged” yet this is often the temptation. Some might feel it is presumptuous and even impertinent to go at once to the Lord after having sinned against Him. It seems as if we ought to suffer the consequences of sin first for a little while and endure our accusing conscience. We might struggle to believe that the Lord can quickly receive us back into loving fellowship even though He says:

This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:5–9)

This links to the profound truth illustrated by the advice on that old radio show. Grace that God forgives has a far greater effect on repetitive sin than punishment! When I know that He forgives me, I am less liable to do it again. However, when I try to ‘punish myself’ with feeling bad and calling myself an idiot, that has little effect. Not only that, the idea of ‘trying again’ does not work either. If I could succeed that way, I would not need Jesus.

Furthermore, I can see a parallel between those self-directed accusations and my pride. The deeper my pride, the more I tend to punish myself when I fail to be godly in some way. Sin always happens when I listen to such things as “try harder” or “you can do better” or “you are too smart to make mistakes” — blah, blah, blah. Yet when conscious of being helpless and having no power without Jesus, failure is less of a surprise and more of a motivation to rely on Him.

Not only that, the answer is never “get up and try again” but “get on your knees and confess — be forgiven and cleansed.” Regret and self-centered ‘poor dumb and foolish me’ does absolutely nothing.  Jesus is my Savior because I cannot save myself. Far more important to realize…

For I have died, and my life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is my life appears, then I also will appear with Him in glory. (Colossians 3:3–4)

PRAY: I’m thankful for the lessons in living and walking with You, Jesus. Keeping short accounts means a great boost to spiritual growth. I am not only forgiven but recognize that when I confess sin, You do amazing things to wipe clean my sinful desires. Your love and grace to keep me in fellowship with You is far more effective than my disgust with myself or any motivation to get up and try harder.

 

God is Enough

 
This year started with the thought that God is enough. I picked a devotional book with that title thinking it would continually affirm the truth that God indeed is enough. However, like many church services and preachers, this book is beginning to tell me what I must do and sound as if God is not enough. Even when on the topic of faith, the onus is on me to believe rather than affirming that God’s grace comes to me by faith and this is not on me — it is His gift.

For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. (Ephesians 2:8–9)

Then the writer shakes a finger at the reader saying if we don’t receive that gift we cannot be saved, as if salvation is up to the sinner to do something. Yet Jesus says,

You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you. (John 15:16)

At this, some will even say that I must then be fruitful However, even that is a gift from the Holy Spirit. He produces it; I cannot.

Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. (Galatians 5:19–24)

Even that last line telling me to crucify the flesh is His doing:

I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And 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. (Galatians 2:20)

He died and my old life died with Him. He lives and I live in Him because He gave Himself for me.

At the same time, salvation and the Christian life is not about being passive, just enjoying God at work without any response. Because He lives in me, He will have me busy. One vital activity is that I am supposed to keep short accounts with Him…

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9)

Yet it is He who reveals sin to me, motivates confession, forgives it, and cleanses me. Jesus is involved in every action that He wants me to take. The flesh, even in its deadness, will resist and say NO. The world mocks me. The devil tries to stop me. Jesus is behind every YES, from putting the ideas in my head, challenging the flesh, silencing the devil, and making the world’s ideas foolish and sinful. He is enough. 

I am to declare the good news to others yet Jesus gives the words, the opportunities, even the motivation to not back away but to do it. Paul said, “For I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God.“ (Acts 20:27) Yes, some will shrink back and not obey yet even as we do obey, it is God who is making it happen. He is the One who puts the words on our lips and His love for others in our hearts. Without Jesus, none of that happens.

PRAY: Lord, when You are the focus and Your Spirit fills my heart, doing what you say is as natural as breathing. This is what faith looks like — it is living in the total assurance that You take care of everything, from tough times to supplying all my needs. You are enough.

Willing?

 

READ John 5-8

How can anyone sum up who Jesus is and what He has done? He is incredible. I dazzled by Him and zeroing in on one truth is near impossible.

I noted today how He repeats the Gospel at every opportunity, telling people how to have eternal life. When His listeners go back to the human standard of earning it by doing good works, Jesus says: “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.” (John 6:29) How can it be that simple? They want more and ask, “Then what sign do you do, that we may see and believe you? What work do you perform? Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’ ” (John 6:30–31)

And Jesus replies, “Truly, truly, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave you the bread from heaven, but my Father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”

They wanted that bread, but He directed them back to faith in Him and added their helplessness. They could not come to Him without divine help: “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst. But I said to you that you have seen me and yet do not believe. All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out.” (John 6:32–37)

He also told them: “For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.” (John 6:38–40)

He was not telling them to keep the Law, nor to follow the rules of their religion. He was not telling them to merely trust Him but that they needed the Father to make faith happen.

In other words, their salvation and eternal life was of God, not their own doing. The rest of the NT repeats this clearly:

For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. (Ephesians 2:8–9)

No one wants to be told they are unable to do something. A child wants to try, and when they spill the batter, or miss the nail, some have a tantrum rather than hand the task to a parent. Such is the heart of sinners; “I will do this myself.”

Jesus’ words and life fly in the face of that determination. The proud Pharisees and other religious leaders hated Him because of it and because of His identity claims. The crowds loved His ability to feed them, but when He told them they must feed ON Him and live like He did, doing all that the Father asked, they turned away.

As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like the bread the fathers ate, and died. Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever”  . . . . When many of his disciples heard it, they said, “This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?”  . . . . And he said, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.” After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him. (John 6:57–66)

Jesus totally relied on His Father. “I can do nothing on my own. As I hear, I judge, and my judgment is just, because I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent me.” (John 5:30) He wanted us to do the same.

“My teaching is not mine, but his who sent me. If anyone’s will is to do God’s will, he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own authority. The one who speaks on his own authority seeks his own glory; but the one who seeks the glory of him who sent him is true, and in him there is no falsehood.” (John 7:16–18)

I hear this: totally rely on Jesus for every thought, word, action. Seek His will in all plans and decisions. Do not act without His direction or His Spirit giving me the ability. No wonder His hearers found this more than they could handle. Yet as Jesus said, if anyone is willing . . .

Dear Father, only You can grant faith and make me more like Jesus. You are faithful and will do it. With profound gratitude and assurance, I pray in Jesus’ holy name. Amen.