All That Is New

Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. - Philippians 3:13b-14

Our past can be a hindrance or a help in moving toward God's purposes for each of us. For some, the past has meant pain and heartache, and grace is required so that we do not let that which shaped us dictate our responses and the outcomes of those responses in our future. If we allow our past to make us a victim, then we have not entered into the grace that God has for us. To be sure it is a decision we make. God's grace saves us and changes us or it does not. If we live on memories of past successes and fail to raise our vision for new things, we again are victims of our past. Our past becomes our highlight reel.

That is not God's vision for your life

See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland - Isaiah 43:19.

Our past should only be viewed for what we can learn from it. We should understand it so we can trace the finger of God, even when we were in rebellion, in our lives. We must move forward and avoid viewing the negative or the positive for more than what we can learn; for how our Heavenly Father can take that information and build our future from and with it. Are you going to allow your past dictate your future.? God is always about doing new things in our lives. New things means He is doing something unique today and will again do something unique to you and I in our tomorrow's. He gives fresh insight of His purposes in our lives. At the very least these new adventures provide us with new clues to His calling and His election of us into the offices to which only He can call us.
Do not live in the past. Do not hold onto bitterness that may hinder God from doing new and exciting things in your life.

Our eternal Father turns our wastelands into streams of water to give life, not death. He means for each event and memory to lead to the glory of His name. Your quest, your adventure is to figure out how.

How are we viewing our past? How much time are we giving to it? Are we glorying in it? Has it hindered us to become more of Jesus Christ? Have you relied on past successes to dictate what you will do in the future or stymy you from moving forward toward new goals? Put your memories in their proper place. Allow God to do a new things in your life. Seek His guidance to assist you to see the new things He wants to do in and through you today.

"When your memories are bigger than your dreams, you're headed for the grave" [Author unknown]...I remain...

InHISgrip,
~J~

The Greatest Light in Our Personal World Is...?

Do you suppose, O man—you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—that you will escape the judgment of God? Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance? But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed. - Romans 3:3-5

As I grow older, ya know, just plain older; but also as I mature in faith I have become more concerned with what separates those who have a false sense of security in Jesus than I am worried about those who rightly and properly understand why it is they are bound for eternity with God. I hadn't thought about this much until I began, once more, reading John Piper's book Desiring God. In the book Piper makes a strong case for the joy of salvation that Christians properly feel emanating out of them from a shift in the primary focus on their love and affection. Who do you love most? Piper scripturally argues that if your foundational love; from which all other affection is drawn from; the source of all your love or happiness is your love of God then you can wrap your heart, mind and soul around your correct assumption that you know Jesus Christ as your personal Savior.

So what then is the wrong love focus? How might you wrongly assume the happiness you get from being saved is false hope? What then might it be that gives us a counterfeit sense of, "I am saved?"

In a recent message to his church John Piper spoke these words,

Millions of nominal Christians have never experienced a fundamental alteration of that foundation of happiness. Instead they have absorbed the notion that becoming Christian means turning to Jesus to get what you always wanted before you were born again. So, if you wanted wealth, you stop depending on yourself for it, and by prayer and faith and obedience you depend on Jesus for wealth. If you wanted to be healthy, you turn from mere human cures to Jesus as the source of your health. If you wanted to escape the pain of hell, you turn to Jesus for the escape. If you wanted to have a happy marriage, you come to Jesus for help. If you wanted peace of conscience and freedom from guilt feelings, you turn to Jesus for these things.

In other words, to become a Christian, in this way of seeing things, is to have all the same desires you had as an unregenerate person—only you get them from a new source, Jesus. And He feels so loving when you do. But there’s no change at the bottom of your heart and your cravings. No change in what makes you happy. There’s no change in the decisive foundation of your joy. You just shop at a new store. The dinner is still the same; you just have a new butler. The bags in the hotel room are still the same; you just have a new bellhop.

I believe Dr. Piper is right.

Genuinely being born again, saved, and a part of the new birth in Jesus Christ has the affect of changing our fundamental desires. Where I once desired my own selfish wants and needs primarily, I now simply wish, regardless at the cost to me to glorify my great God.

For each of us the question becomes this, "Am I loving God because He made me a big deal and did a lot for me, and in my future even more if or am I loving Him because I realize the magnitude of what He has done for me though I deserve not one bit of it?" Perhaps another way of saying it would be, "is my love of God founded in Him or founded, in some manner, in me?"

Those who desire to honor God might say it better than I and I am trying to get my arms around it but the core of this seems to be that I need to understand God did all He did for me so that His glory would shine forever. I need to get that into my heart. This is not about me primarily. It is about Him fully. There is verse after verse that point out the ways in which God reveals His great love to us for His Glory and His Own sake!

Check these verses out:

• Luke 2:10-14 is the manger story and ends this way, "... glory to God in the highest!" (We get a savior and God gets the glory!)
• Isaiah 43:6,7 commands God's prophets to bring forth his children with the end reason, "...whom i created for my glory."
• Ephesians 1:5, 6 tells us through the giving of His Son God adopted us back into his family. Why? "...to the praise of His glorious grace."
• Psalm 79 essentially says that God pursues us for His Glory. Verse 9 resounds, "Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of Your name; deliver us, and atone for our sins, for Your name’s sake!" I might get a benefit but my God ultimately gets something far superior-GLORY. This is how the truly saved might pray.
• John 17:24 and this is how Jesus prays when speaking about this very subject of our right standing and salvation with God. Check this out: Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world.

Jesus wants us with Him. To be sure He has and will yet do many things for us (Check out the book of Revelation sometime to see what is, in small part, yet to be done for us...HUGE!) but what is our joy and our happiness? ... to see His glory!

This could go on and on but I point these out to express that the love of God is meant to lead us back to His glory and His honor and our praising Him and it is an end in itself and that is how the born again, he saved, the truly blood washed see their salvation. Where once I had no desire to love on God now I cannot help but see how everything points back to Him that is good, right, pure, peaceful, loving and full of His glory.

So what's in it for you and I? Well I think you can probably answer these questions yourself; at least partially. I've already made this way too long but here is a short list and you look up the scriptures to validate it:

• I receive eternal life because He receives the glory
• I receive riches beyond this worlds count because He receives the glory
• I receive His purpose for me in this life because He receives the glory
• I receive His personal direction and instruction because He receives the glory
• I received and continue to live in His great love through Jesus Christ because in His having given that to me He receives the glory

This is truly the short list...judge angels, joint heirs, ruling and reigning, it goes on and on doesn't it...and for it I weep for joy and bow down and worship the great God of all because He deserves all honor and power and glory for ever! God gives us so much and loves us so much and makes so much of us because in doing so, in the way that only He can do it true and fulfilling love, God's love and loving God is regenerated.

Don't let all God has done and will be done for you become the reason for your love of God. Don't make some aspect (love, wisdom, freedom, power, healing, gifts, etc.) become the reason for your love of God or others.  We can love Him because He first loved us, gave His Son for us and now, by opening up our eyes of understanding, allows us to glory in the unfathomable love that is our God.

I remain...

InHISgrip,
~J~

The Fullness of Salvation - Just What Is Full to You?

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade-kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that your faith-of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire-may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. Though you have not seen Him, you love Him; and even though you do not see Him now, you believe in Him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls. I Peter 1:3-8

Last year the Church on Rogers did a big study on the Book of Peter. Peter’s epistles are stunning in their clarity, forcefulness and their last days focus. I would actually suggest in their focus on eternity and the idea of eternal life. And, my loved ones, those things are very different from one another. I love Peter! I am not sure I am a "Peter was the first Pope" adherent (some historical facts mess it up for me) but I am of the school of thought that indicated that Peter was one of the two or three most significant of the apostles; a true leader of the movement to which I am a follower.

Lately, since it has been such a big part of my thinking as I have had dialogues to many who were on the fringes of faith I have been studying the idea of belief and salvation. Within first and second Peter we, as the current Church can learn well from his words recorded in Scripture on this topic.

In the passage above Peter is declaring the glory of our new birth, what we would call our “salvation experience”. “In (God’s) great mercy, He has given us new birth into a living hope . . . into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade” (v.3-4). In recounting to us the experience of our rebirth through Jesus’ resurrection, Peter connects it immediately with eternity. And, in doing this for us Peter enlightens us to several things:

1. The fullness of our salvation is not just in being saved from sin and hell, and being viewed by God the Father as a new creation, though these are all true and wonderful. A "more" complete understanding has the regenerated/saved man or woman with our ETERNITY beginning when we are reborn. The magnitude of this is not shown in time. It is shown by emphasizing that the riches we receive will always contain their full value..."never fade" is not a term we consider when we count the cost in buying good and services and products here on earth. To be sure we value solid, long-lasting, great warrantied products (Yugo or Mercedes?) but the inheritance a newly birthed believer receives has unending, never fading and always "worth everything" value!

2. Salvation is not just the moment we surrender to the calling of Jesus, and receive Him as Lord and Savior. That is the moment of decision. We have that as a beginning, but the fullness of our salvation comes “in the last time” (v. 5). In other words, what we enter into reaches it’s completion when Jesus returns to reign on the earth and create a new heaven and earth; a paradise that will be similar to the original but that will never fade or tarnish. In this last time God and man dwell together in face to face intimacy free from the curse of sin and free from intermediary things; we no longer will talk in metaphors, analogies, similitudes and parables about what that will be like. We will simply live within the Glory of God.

What Peter describes is the transformation of your citizenship. Our salvation changes our citizenship from earth to Heaven, setting us on a course of Life that is Eternal! This Eternal Life is God's quality of living, being, moving and seeing. As such, it sets our vision on a life that is WAY beyond a one year plan; a 3 year plan; a 5 year plan or ever a few decades, but one that stretches on forever and that has significance, adequacy, importance, passion and meaning! It should cause us to long for and love the day of Christ’s return, so that we can receive the fullness of what He paid for with His shed blood.

I have to tell you guys that what I just described is much different than the common Christian mindset that views salvation as a “get out of Hell free” card; some plastic-coated, round edged, business card sized paper that we place in our wallet or purse and go ahead with our lives as “usual”. Salvation, Eternal Life, began at a moment in time when it was obvious to us of our need and that only in Christ could we fulfill it. It is an ongoing process of change and maturity. It does not leave room for a, "life as usual" mindset. No! It calls us to rethink and "re-heart" EVERYTHING about the way we live as we focus on a life with and in Jesus Christ.

So, what happens now?

1. Regenerated & Revitalized Worship! “In this you greatly rejoice” (v.6). We THANK Him for saving our souls and we worship Him for inviting us into His Eternal Kingdom. We worship Him NOW because it is a precious gift of faith that we give to Him. We worship now because it recognizes His leading and calling and daily work in us. For, when He appears, our faith will become “sight”, and worship will be automatic!! Today, we make a CHOICE and it is this: I WILL WORSHIP WITH ALL OF MY BEING & WITH ALL OF WHO YOU ARE MAKING ME — and this blesses Him even more. Our short lives in this “tent” (our natural body) giving Him our daily praise and honor fulfills what is working in us namely our salvation.

2. Trials (v.6-7). I call this the "hassles of faith”. Paul called it “fighting the good fight of faith”. Peter tells us we WILL “suffer grief, in ALL KINDS of trials”. These are NECESSARY components to purify and strengthen our faith. Our natural inclination in trials is to doubt everything we believe. But, as we stand firm, with our eyes on eternity and worship Him in the midst of trouble, frustration, etc. — our faith becomes real. Faith that isn’t tested isn’t really true or trustworthy. Trials are a gift to strengthen us so that the faith we have has true SUBSTANCE.

3. We Love Him, NOW. We love Him now, knowing that we will see Him, soon. And, as we look forward to our Eternity with Him present, and give Him the gift of our voluntary love today, we're filled with joy that has no fully expressible measure in this earthly dimension (V.8). Why? Because as we set our heart and mind on the things that are Eternal; as we grow to realize Eternal is more than just a "long time", we actually begin to taste of the eternal pleasures of God and it happens in the sweet now and now for it is this realized joy, evoked from our current love and relationship with Jesus Christ and through Him with our Heavenly Father that gets us to a life well worth living!

I remain...

InHISgrip,
~J~

A Freedom All Can Confidently Choose

I call Heaven and Earth to witness against you today: I place before you Life and Death, Blessing and Curse. Choose life so that you and your children will live. And love God, your God, listening obediently to him, firmly embracing him. Oh yes, he is life itself, a long life settled on the soil that God, your God, promised to give your ancestors, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob - Deuteronomy 30:19,20 (The Message)

I was thinking this morning on an early mentor to my Christian life. His name was James Singleton. He was a man of character, and an unwavering single-minded focus on his faith and button-downed in terms of what he believed. One thing he believed was that the concept of sin was being swept away by the psycho-elements of Christianity. Personal responsibility for how we acted and displeased God was being lost under a barrage of pseudo-scientific explanations where each of us was now fully NOT responsible for the way we acted.

The concept of sin was being lost to the church. This was back in 1976. The "modern" world had no place for the archaic concept of sin.

Ya, right.

But my friends and family it is now 34 years later since I had those discussions with this man of faith and power. Sin, the ability for a person to, independently and willfully displease God, is very much alive. No number of books, symposiums, classes, advanced courses or experts opinions to the contrary can change the simple, oft-repeated experience billions of times a day where humans separate themselves in deed, thought and attitude from the God who provides them life. The Greek word, in our New Testament that is translated sin is roughly the word hamartia (ham arr tee ah) and in Greek means to miss the mark. God the Father has a target in mind, His Son actually, and we fall short or miss that ideal in the way we act and/or think daily.

It is a source of heartache, feelings of guilt, aggravation and personal disappointment for most who call themselves Christians.

I wish I could guarantee all of us full freedom from sin 365 days a year, but that is not possible. As long as we roam the earth we will fight a battle, a personal battle with personal sin. I have given great study and thought to the idea of perpetual sinlessness (theologians call it "sinless perfection"). It will not be ours to enjoy until we are given glorified bodies and we are at home in heaven.

But their is good news. The relationship that Jesus re-established for us with His life, suffering, death and resurrection has provided us the leadership we need; the continual presence of our God in our lives and His direction as we both speak with and listen to Him. We don't have to sin on a constant, day-after-day basis. The actions of the Savior has freed us to accept counsel and get direction from a personal relationship with God.


But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed, and having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness. - Romans 6:17--18

Wonderful, wonderful truth! Choosing righteousness, we enjoy a lifestyle marked by God's blessings, stability, and strength. God's goodness, His Grace frees us to choose, yes more than choose, make ourselves slaves to eternal life concepts, principles and actions. We can decide to walk with God and draw strength from Him to face whatever life throws at us. However, we can decide to walk away from God and face the inescapable consequences of sin.

The next time you are tempted to yield to your old master, Master Sin, remember this: Grace invites you to return and find forgiveness, but it doesn't automatically erase the scars that accompany missing the mark of the high-calling of being God's child; some scars could stay with you for life.

In spite of the terrible consequences sins may bring, grace also means we allow others the freedom to choose, regardless. To do otherwise abuses as much as those who use their freedom as a license to sin. I am a firm believer in mutual accountability, but grace means I will not force or manipulate or judge or attempt to control you, nor should you do those things to me. It means we will keep on helping others to freedom by providing moments of hope. In naval speak we might call it providing "breathing holes." It means we deliberately let go so each of us can grow and learn on our own; otherwise, we shall never enjoy the liberty of an open sea.

So, this little snippet goes out to parents, brothers and sisters and great friends: For most of us, letting others go is neither natural nor easy. Because we care, it is more our tendency to give people hints or advice. The thought of letting them fail or fall is extremely painful to us, but God treats us like that virtually every day of our lives. We tend to clutch, not release . . . to put people in our frame and not allow them any breathing holes unless and until they accept the shape of our molds.

Let us be carriers of love, patience, grace and space. God is still on the throne and is still the greatest weapon in a battle against missing His very best...

I remain...

InHISgrip,
~J~

When God Kicked the Dog

I was listening this morning to a radio host who came dangerously close to letting the world off the hook. You may ask what I mean by that...

He was quoting a leading voice in the Emergent Church movement who was talking about the concept of Hell. Essentially, this leader, Brian McLaren, was saying that there was a "problem" with traditional theology it's teaching on Hell and on the idea of the centrality of the Cross of Jesus Christ. I've embedded a YouTube video. Listen to what this sweet and gentle voice of reason says and then get back to me on the other side of listening.



Oh Lord! May it never be said that you can't do something you ask of others! How insidious is that!

Guys, this may all sound very clever, but it does not match up with Scripture. Hell is not antithetical to the cross! Hell exists because of one very important aspect of the person of our God. He is a holy and perfectly just God. He takes rebellion against Him, His person, His truth, His leadership and yes, His rule ...He is a God that takes sin seriously. He is not a god who values personal lawlessness (don't call it freedom - God has a definition of freedom and that for another teaching) or that could care less regarding the way you live out your days on earth.

And what of Jesus? Jesus died on the cross because God is both perfectly just AND infinitely gracious. A God who could in fact take the hit of having His most precious relationship, His most precious and fully perfect Son humiliated in the site of the "piss ants of the Milky Way," human beings. Jesus actions represented how God made a way in which He could extend His grace to us without compromising His justice.

But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood. He did this to demonstrate his justice, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— he did it to demonstrate his justice at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus ~ Romans 3:21-26

That is the gospel! If God were not just, Jesus’ sacrifice inclusive of the cross would not have been necessary. God, said it was required. And if God were not gracious, He would have left you and I separated in our sins rather than sending His Son to a wretch like me. We can be forgiven because grace and justice met at the cross. Praise God that He is both Just AND the Justifier!

Let’s proclaim the Biblical Gospel faithfully! It is the only Gospel that saves. We have to take a stand. Dr. McLaren may not wish to stymie a "conversation" but the fact is Paul, Peter, John, Eusibius, Luther, Calvin, Wesley, Finney, Moody, Ironside, Graham, Swindoll, MacArthur, Beth Moore, and Joyce Meyer and 10,000,000 more some who just preached it and others who interpreted it had it right. There is a hell to shun and a heaven to gain! And, while we are at it, let us make sure that when we are hit with these kinds of thought processes, from these kinds of heretical corners of unacceptable liberalism, thoughts that elevate the idea of love at any cost, including the Bible account, that we have a standard and know where we stand.

I remain...in the arms of my loving Savior and grateful from all He has saved me from, including an actual Hell.

InHISgrip,
~J~