Reliable Promise-Keeper!

Numbers 23; Psalms 64–65; Isaiah 13; 1 Peter 1

My computer has a file of photos with a promise from God added. I use it as a slideshow to remind me of what God says about future events and present issues. This morning, I added this one: “O you who hear prayer, to you shall all flesh come.” (Psalm 65:2) This connects prayer to people coming to God through faith in Christ. It is a promise!

In Numbers, Balaam was charged to curse God’s people, but God would not allow it. Balaam knew the Lord made and kept His promises. He said, “God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind. Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?” (Numbers 23:19)

The psalmist knew it too. His poetic description of the power of God puts joy in my heart and confidence that every promise God makes, He will keep . . .  

By awesome deeds you answer us with righteousness, O God of our salvation, the hope of all the ends of the earth and of the farthest seas; the one who by his strength established the mountains, being girded with might; who stills the roaring of the seas, the roaring of their waves, the tumult of the peoples, so that those who dwell at the ends of the earth are in awe at your signs. You make the going out of the morning and the evening to shout for joy. (Psalm 65:5–8)

Isaiah also writes of a promise that God gave him; He would judge Babylon for their ruthless treatment of His people. He recorded this promise when Assyria was about to attack that area and the coming devastation would have a tremendous impact on Israel and other nations of the Near East. The culmination came when Sennacherib, king of Assyria, sacked the city of Babylon in 689 B.C., thus showing that Babylon, the greatest city in its day, was not immune to the advancing Assyrians, all in the plan of God.

This prophecy came true yet as I read it, I thought of the modern Jewish man who believes in Jesus as his Messiah and who said that God works in patterns. Will this be a pattern for judgment on Babylon again? It is in modern day Iraq.

Wail, for the day of the Lord is near; as destruction from the Almighty it will come! Therefore all hands will be feeble, and every human heart will melt. They will be dismayed: pangs and agony will seize them; they will be in anguish like a woman in labor. They will look aghast at one another; their faces will be aflame. Behold, the day of the Lord comes, cruel, with wrath and fierce anger, to make the land a desolation and to destroy its sinners from it. For the stars of the heavens and their constellations will not give their light; the sun will be dark at its rising, and the moon will not shed its light. I will punish the world for its evil, and the wicked for their iniquity; I will put an end to the pomp of the arrogant and lay low the pompous pride of the ruthless. I will make people more rare than fine gold, and mankind than the gold of Ophir. Therefore I will make the heavens tremble, and the earth will be shaken out of its place, at the wrath of the Lord of hosts in the day of his fierce anger. (Isaiah 13:6–13)

The New Testament tells how those OT prophets were given the task of telling God’s people of His will, often revealing the immediate or distant future. Most important, they knew the Messiah would come . . .

Concerning this salvation, the prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully, inquiring what person or time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories. It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you, in the things that have now been announced to you through those who preached the good news to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look. (1 Peter 1:10–12)

These men of God did not fully understand all that the Holy Spirit authored through them. It was the Spirit who predicted the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow, encouraging readers that Christ’s suffering would be followed by glory just as they also would experience glory after their suffering. Isn’t part of that glory seeing all flesh coming to Him! Those prophets did understand they were not writing for themselves but for those who would live later and who would hear and believe the gospel.

APPLY: Simply worship God! He always has kept His promises and He will never change His plans.

Better than a priest . . .

Every now and then it is important to talk to someone about matters of the heart, about my relationship with Jesus Christ, about my understanding of God, about deeper thoughts and ideas, and about what works and does not work in human relationships. I suppose this is the realm of a counselor, mentor, priest, or some other person who is wise and able to listen and communicate, to fill in the blanks in my thoughts.

I didn’t live as a Jew in the land of the Hebrews when they struggled to hear and obey God, nor was I there when Jesus came and upset everything they knew about God and their relationship with Him. Those who believed in Jesus suddenly found themselves in a new way of life. One aspect of the old life they had was having a priest to intercede for them, to make the necessary sacrifices and assure them of God’s forgiveness. This new life was a challenge and in those early days many of the Jewish converts may have missed their peers who served as priests.

The writer of Hebrews tells these believers that Jesus is better in every way than that former system of ritual and the priesthood that had been their practice. He describes two ways that Jesus excels over the priests and that priestly system.

Jesus lives forever . . .

The former priests were many in number, because they were prevented by death from continuing in office, but (Jesus) holds his priesthood permanently, because he continues forever. Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them. (Hebrews 7:23–25)

Every time I read this my heart feels joy. Jesus is here, always alive, always praying for me, always ready to meet my spiritual needs as well as every other need. He does not need to be replaced because He does not grow old and retire or pass on. He lives forever and He saves me forever.

Jesus has no imperfections . . .

For it was indeed fitting that we should have such a high priest, holy, innocent, unstained, separated from sinners, and exalted above the heavens. (Jesus) has no need, like those high priests, to offer sacrifices daily, first for his own sins and then for those of the people, since he did this once for all when he offered up himself. For the law appoints men in their weakness as high priests, but the word of the oath, which came later than the law, appoints a Son who has been made perfect forever. (Hebrews 7:26–28)

Jesus is sinless, holy, without flaws and without those blank places that require filling in by others who have more knowledge. He does not have to make a sacrifice for Himself because He is perfect, pleasing His Father in every way. He never misunderstands me, never makes assumptions about me, or writes me off as a total waste of His time. He will listen, understand, direct and pray — always, forever.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Jesus, You are my Lord and Savior for good reason. You can do it, all of it. For this reason I love and worship You!

Today’s thankful list . . .

- for all of the above, for Jesus.

- for another lovely fall day.

- for a long conversation with our far-away granddaughter.

- for Skype so we can see her face.

- for laughter.

- for the work of many Christians seeking to find justice for those who are used and abused.

- hot chocolate and naps.

Thinking God’s thoughts

In the course I’m taking, one assignment was to write a response to someone who interpreted a verse out of context in order to ‘prove’ a personal viewpoint. This happens often, but it wasn’t the only issue. This imaginary person also came from a tradition that does not believe God inspired Scripture, but that the Bible is only the words of the authors. If this were true, how can anyone know anything about God? All of us would flounder with our own pet ideas.

In the assignment, I tried to address the second problem by appealing to what hopefully would be an open mind that would reconsider the verse in question from a different perspective. Today’s passage should have been included in my response . . .

“And we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts, knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture comes from someone’s own interpretation. For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.” (2 Peter 1:19–21)

This short passage points to several important elements when it comes to figuring out what any passage of the Bible is saying, but there is one that is “first of all” — no one wrote it and no one can figure it out apart from the activity of the Holy Spirit. God is the co-author and the co-interpreter.

This has to be the way it works because those who are without a relationship with God say things like, “The Bible makes no sense to me.” If they try to understand it using their own reasoning, they come up with ideas and doctrine that is foreign to what the church of Christ has understood for centuries.

Yet it isn’t just being without a relationship with God that blocks understanding; sin blocks illumination from the Holy Spirit too. We need to be walking in the light of Christ, not the darkness of sin. If Christians have sin in our lives, we don’t get it either.

There is another barricade, that of human finiteness. God is God and His mind is out of my reach. These reasons are why the Scriptures say, “Seek the Lord while he may be found; call upon him while he is near; let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.” (Isaiah 55:6–9)

God knows our thoughts. The New Testament many times says of Jesus that He, “knew their thoughts” but clearly points out that “no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God” (1 Corinthians 2:11) and “Who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” (1 Corinthians 2:16)

However, and this is so amazing that I tremble in the writing of it, the rest of 1 Corinthians 2:16 says, “But we have the mind of Christ.”

Because of God’s grace through faith, Jesus gives us His life. Yes He gave it on the cross to die for our sins, but also yes He gives it in a saving relationship. In entering into those who believe, He makes us new creatures, people who can actually think the thoughts of God.

We are not perfect at it, and many times need those thoughts clarified by His written expression of them, but this explains the ‘how’ of interpreting the Bible. As our human mind figures out the words of the text, considers the culture and the context and so forth, the Holy Spirit uses the mind of Christ to illuminate God’s meaning to our hearts and minds. He even helps us apply it, again by the aid of the Holy Spirit.

This astonishing truth puts me on my knees in tears. My ideas can be so crappy, so dense, so illiterate and without shape or form, but the mind of Christ? Especially at times when I need it the most, the pure, clear and omniscient Son of God actually gives me His thoughts.