Who Am I

 No Longer a Slave to Fear

As I was reading this morning I was struck by several things. I want to first share with you what I was reading and then encourage you to read these passages yourself. They are Rom 4:6-10, Luke 20 and Ps 32. Each one of these passages had some profound insights for me. The song above was what the Lord brough to mind as I pondered the verses I was reading.

Rom 4:6-10 is Paul talking about how Abraham was justified by faith. Abraham didn't just believe what God said to and about him, but he walked towards it. He didn't let what his eyes saw, and the doubts his mind whispered turn him away from what God had promised him. My friend George Sisneros did an excellent job covering this yesterday in his blog Covered In His Dust. Follow the link to read it. The verses I read were just a few verses before what he wrote.

I realized that far too often, I place my identity in what I do and what I believe about myself. These verses point us to an active, involved, obedient faith that makes us righteous. Our faith is not a passive thing. We don't just acquiesce to a vague thing. We give ourselves fully to what God says is true about us. As we trust Him to bring our identity in line with His truth, He changes us and fulfills His purpose for us at the same time.  Abraham had to live many yeas with the name, Father of Many and then 25 more years with the name Father of Many Nations all while he remained childless. He tried to take matters into His own hands and make it happened, but that took him outside of the Lord's will. It didn't change his identity or his name. Even after he messed up, he kept believing God would fulfill his purposes. Abraham was 100 years old and Sarah 90 when God answered his prayers and began to fulfill his destiny. But, His identity had been fixed since birth, when he was born to pagan parents. Abraham was righteous because He believed God, even when believing was difficult, nearly impossible.

Then I move into Luke 20. Jesus was teaching in the synagogue on the Sabbath and He was challenged by all the religious leaders. They hated that they were losing their place in the Kingdom to a carpenter, a tax collector and some fishermen. They challenged Jesus' authority but we know that Jesus also taught with wisdom beyond His years. 46 After three days they found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. 47 And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers. - Luk 2:46-47 ESV Jesus was hated by those who were being displaced as a new Kingdom was beginning to rub up against the one they thought they were in control of. As you read the chapter, you see that Jesus did not back down from the Pharisees or after from the Sadducees. He exposed both groups of religious leaders for the frauds they had become, while He was seen by many for who He was. Jesus did not let those who didn't know Him become the ones who defined Him. Jesus was secure in the identity the Father had given Him before the foundation of the world.

As I continued on into Ps 32, I see David clinging to the Lord's identity for him. David was well aware of his failures and suffered greatly with them. What kept him was that he also knew that the Lord had not rejected him or left him to rot in shame with the wicked. To David, the Lord was his rescuer, the one who set him apart from the sinful men. Just like Abraham, he had a sense of identity that superseded his failures. David would regularly throw himself onto the merch of the Lord and trust Him to deliver.

For me, all these thing spoke a new sense of identity this morning. Far too often, I let people that don't know me speak a false identity into me. I let my failures drive me into hiding and shame. I have spent way too much time deriving my identity from accomplishments or knowledge. I have let me failures plunge me into a defeatist mindset rather than run to Jesus, our rock and refuge. When I fall into these mindset traps, I see other people's successes much easier and begin to compare my failures with their success. This just reinforces the defeatist mindset. As I let myself be victimized by my own mindset, I feel distant from the Lord.

Jesus never had a failure, but He perfectly know how to shut down the enemy when His identity came under attack. We are more like David. We have hole in our armor. We have real weaknesses to attack, but we need to know how to sit in the promises God has spoken over our lives. We need to let His spoken identity in our lives become the one we embrace. We need to hide in the strong tower that is Jesus until the enemies fiery darts are quenched. Jesus has spoken and identity over us. He set it in motion before the foundation of the world. He knew us before we even formed.

13 For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother's womb. 14 I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. 15 My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. 16 Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them. 17 How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! 18 If I would count them, they are more than the sand. I awake, and I am still with you. - Psa 139:13-18 ESV

As  was reading this morning, I was convicted of how often I let my identity rest in what other people have said, in lies I have internalized and in emotions that have felt true but contradicted what the Lord has said. I am praying today to hear the Lord clearly, to let His promises and spoken identity purify and cleans the identities that I have held on to. I am asking Him to replace the lies with His truth. I know I can run to Him but have so often run away from Him in fear of His holiness until I can feel like I have gotten things right. I have let performance and failure shape my identity. This is the time to get real with the Lord. I know that I can never live up to His standards on my own. Now I have to hold fast to this verse from Rom 5.

6 For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For one will scarcely die for a righteous person--though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die-- 8 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 9 Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. - Rom 5:6-9 ESV

When I feel weak, when I feel defeated, when I have fallen hard and feel hopeless, no matter how low I feel, I am right there in the place where I can claim that Christ died for the ungodly. The worst case scenario is that I have to humble myself and run to Jesus, because He died for the ungodly. I can't be much worse than that. In times of defeat, I call out to Jesus as the ungodly man that Jesus died for and I repent. That is the plan. That is the purpose of the cross because every time we run back to him in our sin and failure and repent, we find that who we are is no longer who He calls us. We recognize and acknowledge our ungodly behavior, feelings, emotions and reactions and that is where He picks us up and speaks His new identity into us and begins to sanctify us and our identity. He renews and restores all that the enemy has stolen from us. He makes us new. He cleanses our desires and purifies us. He moves us back into alignment with His will.

When I am feeling defeated and under shame, it is the perfect time to run back to the Father and let Him renew our minds and speak identity into us again, even if we have had to run back to Him numerous times.

A Good Cleaning

 I have been writing about who we come into bondage and get trapped in strongholds. Today, I want to look at something else. This will be a much shorter read and is just something for you to ponder and pray about.

When I know that I have really messed up, I have done something that is so wrong that there is no explanation, I tend to hide. That is the normal response. Shame will always first drive us away from the places that real help and freedom is. We become like Adam and Eve. We know. We are naked and we run to hide and cover ourselves. The reality is that our sin is shameful. Our heavenly Father would be fully justified in piling it on for some of our behavior. He is holy and we fall far short of His standard of righteousness. Most of the time, our sin is even a conscious choice or a practiced habit that we fall into easily. We deserve to be called out and shamed in front of everyone. For most of us, it is that knowledge and fear that hold us in bondage.

Today I began the yearly task of cleaning the dirt and mildew off the vinyl siding. Is is a huge undertaking, especially when I decide that the scrub brush and bucket do a better job than the power washer. It takes a lot of time and effort to scrub all the dirt and green growth away. I began just like I always do. I got my bucket out and filled it with soapy water and got out my extra stiff long handled scrub brush. The hard nylon bristles seemed to skim right over the dirt and mildew stains without taking much of anything off. After about a 10x15’ section, I was ready to quit. It seemed like I was not accomplishing anything but making the ground wet and having a streaked, dirty wall instead of a splotchy green and tan one.

I decided to get the soft scrub brush out of the garage. It has an even longer handle but very soft bristles. As I started scrubbing with the soft brush, I realized that everything was coming off much quicker and with less scrubbing. The softness of the brush allowed it to get into the cracks and grooves in the siding and the dirt and the green growth came right off. I hosed it after a brief scrub and it was clean. As I was celebrating this turn of events, the painfully slow job becoming faster and easier with the right tool for the job, the Lord said to me that is how I am.

When we see a problem, we tend to want to tackle it with everything we have. I was going to scrub that siding clean, even if it meant there would be holes where the dirt had been. That may seem like giving it our all, but in reality it just makes a mess and leaves a destructive trail. Jesus is like the soft scrub brush. He knows where the dirt is hiding and he starts removing it with a soft, fine brush. He does not try to take our skin off to get us clean. He gently uses just enough force and pressure to do the job without harming us in the process. He comes to us in our shame and brokenness. He wraps His arms around us tight just enough pressure to expose the dirt and the wounds and He gently begins to clean it away.

It took a lot of effort and force on His part to be able to clean us up, but He took the physical pain that our cleaning process required upon Himself. He stood between us and our sin. He suffered the blows that were required to make us whole and deliver us from our self imposed prison of shame. Jesus in great love and kindness made us clean. he didn’t let us feel the stiff scrub brush of the cleansing process. he came to us and cleaned us. The stiff brush was reserved for His skin. The chastisement that brought us peace was upon Him. He carried our sorrows and endured our shame. We get to sit back and look at clean, healthy skin without the marks of the scrubbing we needed. Jesus has paid it all.

I tell you this because we all need to know that Jesus is not looking for our penance. He does not desire that we would suffer for our sins and failures. His goal is not our humiliation, but our liberation from sin and He has already done the hard work. We receive His  freedom and goodness by faith. We receive it b surrendering to His love and then He comes in with the soft scrub brush and cleans all the nooks and crannies, the crevices where we buried our hidden sins. He thoroughly cleans it and makes us new.

We are covered in the world’s filth. We have even participated in getting ourselves that way. Jesus is nt looking to assign blame. He is looking to bring freedom and transformation. he is coming for you and me and He has the soft scrub brush to clean us, He uses the gentlest means needed for the job. He used the violence of His death at the cross to defeat the enemy, but now He is using the s light pressure of His leading if we will just submit to Him.If not, He has a stiff brush and we deserve to feel the pain of His cleansing, but He is asking us to agree with Him today that we need a good and thorough cleansing and He will do it.

Take my yoke upon you and learn from Me for I am gentle and lowly in heart.

                A Strong Tower or a Stronghold?

I love the Lord of the Rings books and the movies too. I think Tolkien learned a lot

about the nature of the battle we are in for our eternities as he wrote such deep, meaningful

books based on his WWI experiences. He lost friends along the way. He saw victories and

defeats and all these things helped shape how he saw the nature of the spiritual battle we

are in. In the second book, the Two Towers, there is a huge battle that takes place and it

almost has a catastrophic ending, The armies have retreated to Helms Deep, a place

Theoden tells them has never been breached or defeated. As they retreat there and await

the arrival of Sauron’s forces, there is tension in the air for the coming battle.

The truth is that many of us have retreated into a stronghold. We have withdrawn to

a place where we feel untouchable by the forces of the world and our enemies. These

strongholds feel like safety and security to us. They seem to be impenetrable. For the most

part, we feel that they have kept us safe and so we retreat to them often. As you read, or

watch the movies, you find out that the stronghold held for a while but that they were

breached at just the time the armies were feeling tired and ready to give in to despair. It was

at this point that Gandolf showed up with reinforcements and an army of Huorns, walking

trees, who herded the Ents, also showed up. It was only at this point that the Orcs and

Uruk- Hai were overwhelmed and defeated. Helms deep alone was not enough of a fortress

to keep them safe against overwhelming odds. They needed rescue and it came just in

time.

We are the Rohirrim. We have our stronghold that we retreat to because we have

always felt safe and secure there. That is the thing about a stronghold. We build them to

keep ourselves from feeling past pain again. They are not built to ensnare us but as our

attempt to protect ourselves. They are a place we run to for comfort and tranquility, but

they are built around us with our limited understanding of the nature of the battle and they

have weaknesses. Our attempt to preserve them involves just making the walls thicker.

Unfortunately, even the most impenetrable walls are not thick enough to protect us when

we invite the enemy inside with us. We do this because we have not properly identified who

the enemy is. The enemy is the one who tricked us into thinking that we needed a

stronghold to run to in the first place. He seemed like a friend, but he has ulterior motives

for our destruction because we represent something he can never be.

14 "And to the angel of the church in Laodicea write: 'The words of the Amen, the

faithful and true witness, the beginning of God's creation. 15 "'I know your works: you are

neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot! 16 So, because you are

lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth. 17 For you say, "I am

rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing," not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable,

poor, blind, and naked. - Rev 3:14-17 ESV

A Strong Tower Instead of a Stronghold

It is the times we think we are good, we are strongly tucked inside our stronghold

that we are most exposed. We begin to get comfortable within and we are exposed for who

we are. The Church at Laodicea seemed to have it all together on the outside. They seemed

secure and confident until they were shown to have nothing of value. They had

compromised and let themselves be polluted, corrupted by the world around them. While

they had pursued the worldly pleasures of wealth and comfort, they lost the edge that once

marked them as Children of the Father. They traded their inheritance for something that

would soon be burned. They were trapped within the prison of worldliness they built to

protect themselves. They needed a rescuer.

It is at this point that Jesus gives them an amazing invitation.

18 I counsel you to buy from me gold refined by fire, so that you may be rich, and

white garments so that you may clothe yourself and the shame of your nakedness may not

be seen, and salve to anoint your eyes, so that you may see. 19 Those whom I love, I reprove

and discipline, so be zealous and repent. 20 Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If

anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he

with me. - Rev 3:18-20 ESV

Jesus has seen them. He knows where they are and how they got there. He offers

them true riches, clean clothes to cover their shame and salve so they can see things

clearly. He wants to show them how they have fallen so far and invites them into

restoration. When Jesus says the He is standing at the door and knocking, this is not just an

invitation to salvation as many would suppose. It is an invitation to these who know Jesus

and have compromised their identity and integrity for worldly wealth, comfort, or

satisfaction. I suspect that most of us can identify with that description at times. We live

surrounded by many strong draws to become worldly. We live in a time where they are put

in front of us constantly. The pull is real. Often it is based on real needs but is offered with

shortcuts to the Lord’s plans for us.

1 Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.

2 And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. 3 And the tempter came and

said to him, "If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread."

4 But he answered, "It is written, "'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that

comes from the mouth of God.'" - Mat 4:1-4 ESV

Our greatest temptations come in the ways that feel the most necessary to

surrender to. This is how strongholds are built. They offer security, provision, peace,

comfort, love or one hundred other things that feel like we will die without. Strongholds are

not built to provide inconsequential things. They are built to guard what we treasure.

A Strong Tower Instead of a Stronghold

Unfortunately, they are prisons of our own making and in the end steal the very things we

thought that they guarded.

It is not until we realize we are in bondage that we can hear the knock and the call

that offer us true freedom. It comes as an invitation to friendship with the One we feel has

let us down, who we have been told has forgotten us. The difference is that He is the only

one who has ever been our real source of security. He does not reside in a cave, hidden

away. He lives in a tower, and when we open ourselves to His offer, He raises us up to sit

with Him in the only secure 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. -

Mat 6:21 ESV

34 For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. - Luk 12:34 ESVplace that

exists.

10 The name of the LORD is a strong tower; the righteous man runs into it and is

safe. - Pro 18:10 ESV

As you read Proverbs 18, there is much wisdom. This verse points us to our true safe

place, but much of the rest of the chapter points out the strongholds we are used to

running to. It shows us how we can build our lives around things that disappoint and bring

destruction. This verse is the place we are invited into the Lord to sit with Him on His

throne. Rev 3 closes with the same invitation for those who have blown it and chased after

the wrong treasures.

21 The one who conquers, I will grant him to sit with me on my throne, as I also

conquered and sat down with my Father on his throne. 22 He who has an ear, let him hear

what the Spirit says to the churches.'" - Rev 3:21-22 ESV

21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. - Mat 6:21 ESV

34 For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. - Luk 12:34 ESV

We have been invited to the Strong Tower. Minas Tirith was the place that the King

was going to be enthroned. It was the Tower that he would rule Gondor from. We have been

invited to sit with the King on His throne. To get there we must walk out of our stronghold.

We may even have to tear down walls to get out. We have built them to keep our enemies

out, but they have become a cage around us. They need to come down so they cannot

easily be rebuilt. Once out, we need to run to the strong tower. We will find that there may

be sieges there too, but we are safe within. The King is there with us and He is guarding us.

I have come to believe that most of us return to our sinful patterns out of a desire for

comfort or a sense of need. We do not believe that Jesus is as good, kind and loving toward

us. I also believe that we often see how this plays out in our relationship with authority. If

A Strong Tower Instead of a Stronghold

we struggle with being close to authority figures, I will bet that we are used to living in our

own stronghold. In this place we are cut off from all the things we truly need. It is time to

stop and listen for the knock at the door, the knock of the one who genuinely loves us and

wants to sit and enjoy an intimate moment of fellowship with us. But, even more than a

moment, He wants to invite us into His strong tower and sit with Him on His throne.

There are battles on the way, the challenge is to keep moving forward with Jesus

until we are in the place He is inviting us to. Even Minas Tirith came under siege and there

was a huge battle before it once again became the royal city of Gondor. It became the place

when Strider was revealed as Aragorn II, son of Arathorn II, and Gilraen, who was the 16th

Chieftain of the Dunedain, descendant of Isildur, and rightful heir to the thrones of Arnor

and Gondor. What a title. It has history and a future. It conveys something old onto

someone young. Can you feel the weight of it? In the movie, right after his coronation,

Aragorn comes over to Sam, Frodo, Merry and Pippen. They bow down to the new king, and

he tells them they do not bow to anyone.

The King has conveyed the weight of his authority and his majesty onto those who

have stood by his side in the battle. He recognized their sacrifices for His kingdom. While

they are still subjected to the king, he honored them. He recognized them and held them

up before all the other attendants at his coronation. This is the same invitation that Jesus

gives at the end of the letters to the seven Churches. He desires that we overcome because

He wants us seated with Him throughout eternity. He is calling us to overcome and to live in

a place of intimacy and honor, by His side. To do this, we must tear down our strongholds

and follow Him where it may not necessarily feel safe. We must enter the fray, by His side.

Are you ready to move out of the stronghold so you can live in the Strong Tower?

Staying Free from the Pollution of the World.

https://www.blueletterbible.org/esv/jer/2/1/p1/ss0/rl1/s_747001 

    Well, I am back to using the old Blog. Enough people have signed up now that sending an email got to take as long as writing it seemed. I am praying that this speaks to you. I will say that not all the thoughts are mine and all of them came while I was sitting in Church yesterday listening to Steve Larson and Steve Mahnke preach two completely different messages that perfectly complimented each other.

    The original thought for today was that most of us do not know the goodness of God toward us very well. If we did, we would never run and hide from Him in shame. We would run to Him in repentance as quick as we could. I will be writing about that soon but not today. However, this message will tie in.

    As you see, there is a link to Jeremiah 2 at the top of the page. I would ask you to go back and read the chapter before you go beyond this point. It is the foundation of everything else I will be writing. I am writing this because there is freedom in the Lord that we are called to walk in, freedom to live Godly lives, not freedom to submit ourselves to the bondage of sin again. It seems that the message these days from so many places is just freedom, forgiveness and love. There is a complete lack of understanding that God also has wrath and judgment. He will judge all sin. When we don't warn people of the coming judgment, we fall into judgment for their destruction.

1 "To the angel of the church in Ephesus write: 'The words of him who holds the seven stars in his right hand, who walks among the seven golden lampstands. ... 4 But I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first. 5 Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first. If not, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place, unless you repent. ... 14 But I have a few things against you: you have some there who hold the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to put a stumbling block before the sons of Israel, so that they might eat food sacrificed to idols and practice sexual immorality. 15 So also you have some who hold the teaching of the Nicolaitans. 16 Therefore repent. If not, I will come to you soon and war against them with the sword of my mouth. ... 20 But I have this against you, that you tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess and is teaching and seducing my servants to practice sexual immorality and to eat food sacrificed to idols. 21 I gave her time to repent, but she refuses to repent of her sexual immorality. 22 Behold, I will throw her onto a sickbed, and those who commit adultery with her I will throw into great tribulation, unless they repent of her works, 23 and I will strike her children dead. And all the churches will know that I am he who searches mind and heart, and I will give to each of you according to your works. - Rev 2:1, 4-5, 14-16, 20-23 ESV

3 Remember, then, what you received and heard. Keep it, and repent. If you will not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what hour I will come against you. ... 19 Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent. - Rev 3:3, 19 ESV    

    As I read the words above, I was struck by a couple of things. The Churches these letters were sent to seemed to be on the right track. They often lived in places that were said to be the throne of Satan. They were encouraged for many good things and for being faithful in several ways. Then the word was a word of rebuke and reproof. The angel acknowledged the good things that they were doing and even continued to do. And yet, there was something about them that was not right, something that would lead to their downfall and the Lord was giving them the opportunity to repent while there was time. This rebuke was not because He did not love them. It is because Jesus wanted them to receive all that He died to give them and these things would keep them from their inheritance, and even worse, it would keep others from the truth of who they were in the new creation.

I have read these words many times but they hit different this time. I really saw how there were several  good and commendable things going on in these Churches before they were rebuked. They got a lot of things right. There was no doubt that many of them loved Jesus and served faithfully, yet there was something that was really wrong. For two Churches, it was an issue that is prevalent today in today's Church. I believe it is a major reason that so many are leaving and the Church seems to be powerless.

    Look at the letters to Pergamum and Thyatira. These Churches that had it all together did not call out the lies that the world promoted. The allowed the teaching of Balaam and Jezebel to pollute them. The two sins that were prominent in these teachings were to eat food offered to idols and sexual immorality. Now there is not a lot of food offered to idols today but the rise of sexual immorality since the 1960's has been astronomical. It has grown exponentially since the start of the sexual revolution. For a few years the Church took a hard stance against the growing movement in society but in the last 40 years something has changed. 

Key Early Milestones in LGBTQ+ Church Inclusion:

• 1968: The Metropolitan Community Church (MCC) was founded as the first church with a specific ministry to the LGBTQ+ community.
• 1972: The United Church of Christ (UCC) became the first mainline Protestant denomination to ordain an openly gay clergy person.
• 1974–1976: The Episcopal Church saw the formation of advocacy group IntegrityUSA (1974) and passed resolutions recognizing gay persons as children of God entitled to equal protection (1976).
• Late 1970s–1980s: Specialized movements grew, such as the Presbyterians for Lesbians and Gay Concerns (now More Light Presbyterians) in 1978 and the Reconciling Congregations program for Methodists in the early 1980s. 

Key Developments by Denomination/Region:

• United Church of Christ (UCC): In 1985, the General Synod encouraged congregations to become "Open and Affirming".
• Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA): Began welcoming LGBTQ+ individuals in the early 1990s, allowing same-sex union blessings in 2009 and electing the first openly transgender bishop in 2021.
• Episcopal Church: In 1994, it amended its canons to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation.
• Methodist Churches: The United Methodist Church officially removed bans on LGBTQ+ clergy and same-sex marriage in 2024, following decades of debate, with some traditionalist groups leaving in 2022 to form the Global Methodist Church. 

        As you see, Churches started moving towards the sexual malfunction of society and embracing it. They began to call it love to embrace the identity of lost people. It became common to practice welcoming everybody rather than to call sin for what it was. Churches want to be known as loving to the point that they no longer acknowledge that some people are lost and living in rebellion to God's purpose for their lives. They no longer talked about the coming judgment that is taught by Jesus, Paul, Peter, and John. We stopped calling dead men to life. We stopped pointing out that sin always separates us from God. We have allowed people to remain lost rather than to offend them and risk driving them away. The Church is in danger today because the preaching of repentance must always the forerunner of the Gospel. People don't get saved by repentance alone, but it opens the door for salvation, just as John was a forerunner of Jesus who prepared the way for His coming with the preaching of repentance.

3 No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. - Luk 13:3 ESV

46 and said to them, "Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, 47 and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. - Luk 24:46-47 ESV

36 Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified." 37 Now when they heard this they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, "Brothers, what shall we do?" 38 And Peter said to them, "Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39 For the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself." - Act 2:36-39 ESV

5 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. 6 If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. 7 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. 8 If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. - 1Jo 1:5-10 ESV

    Wow, do you see it? Jesus and the Apostles did not shy away from calling out sin and pointing people to repentance in order to be saved. They point out that we can only be saved when we acknowledge that we are lost and have lived in rebellion to Jesus. The cross was not to make us more likeable people. It was to separate us from our rebellion against a holy God. The cross is the only door to salvation and repentance is the key that opens that door for us. When we allow sin to propagate in the Church and do not call it out, when we allow society to be overrun with immorality and say nothing, we are condemning whole generations to a Christless future

    The two Churches that I mentioned specifically above were told that the Lord would come and make war with them with the sword of His mouth and He would throw those who refused to repent into a great tribulation. To me it seems that the world is on a train speeding to the edge of a precipice. The bridge has been knocked out and they are about to plunge over. We are not warning them. We are not even warning those who come into our doors often times. They are going to certain death and we want to affirm them rather than call them out of their peril. 

    The Church has lost its moral compass and been guilty of shielding the ones lost in their sin with our misguided love and compassion. We think that is it more important to affirm a wrong identity than to call people into the identity Jesus died for them to have. In doing this, we condemn them to the worst imaginable fate. We "love" them right into hell. At the same time, they call us bigots and hypocrites. Our attempts to win them with a false kindness has been our undoing and theirs too. We have lost the moral authority to have any spiritual power over the works of the devil. He is running rampant and decimating our Churches because we have given up the only message that saves and transforms.

    The message of the Gospel is clear. All men are trapped in sin and live lives in rebellion to God. It plays out differently in every person's life, We are all unique but all have a common need. We need a Savior to rescue us from our sin and transform us into new a new creation who can live in harmony with the Father through the sacrifice of Jesus. This requires us to acknowledge our sinfulness and seek His forgiveness. He empowers us to come to Him. We cannot come on our own volition because our spirits are dead. When we come to Him in repentance, He immediately justifies us before the Father. We are not home yet, but we re on the road. He has given us a new identity that we still don't know how to live out. H begins to walk us through the process of sanctification, This is a lifelong process that helps us unlearn all the wrong ways we have been taught to live and teaches us to live like Jesus. It is a process of revealing the life of God that has now become resident in us.

    I fear that too often we have interrupted the process for many people these days. The Lord has put people in our lives that are obviously hurting and in need of a healer, Savior and Lord, but we have affirmed their broken identity. They need us to speak up in love. They need to hear that Jesus is calling and has prepared an amazing life for them, but they cannot carry their old, broken identity into it. They have to be willing to let Jesus have it all and be Lord of their lives. Now none of us knows exactly what that means "Lord." Lord is kind of an outdated term that with the end of slavery kind of fell out of common use. It is kind of like Master. We do not call people master anymore. They are the same basic term. Jesus is in Charge. He sets the terms of our salvation. We come to Him as a bondservant, one who has entered into an agreement for our past  in exchange for His protection and care in our future. Jesus has the lead and we are bit players in His story. At the same time, He elevates us to sonship with the Father.

    How about it. Do we love broken people enough to tell them that they are separated from Jesus by their own choices. Yes, they were born into a sinful life, but every single one has chosen sin over Jesus too. It is not until we repent and open the door to Jesus that we can begin to experience the life He has for us. 

5 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. 6 If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. 7 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. 8 If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. - 1Jo 1:5-10 ESV

    The good news really is good news. The Gospel is that God is delaying judgment so that all might have every opportunity to repent. But, a day is coming when this will all burn, including those who have not turned to Him as Lord and Savior. This world is temporary and we do not know the day judgment will begin to come upon it. All we can do is prepare everyone we meet to see Jesus face to face.

29 Being then God's offspring, we ought not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of man. 30 The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, 31 because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead." - Act 17:29-31 ESV

    Calling all people to repentance and life is the work Jesus has called us to join Him in. Anything less is rebellion on our part and certain judgment for those we fail to warn. The good new is that those who respond to the call of repentance, find life and the Holy Spirit waiting to make them new. This is the challenge Jesus has left us to fulfill as His hands, feet and voice. The call to repent is the call to love broken people.

I am Wrong! How About You?

 "I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me. [Jhn 17:20-23 ESV]

These words from the prayer of Jesus have been ripping through me lately. When I read Francis Chan's book "Until Unity" a few months ago, it reinforced everything I felt like God was speaking to me about. I am praying that I can share my thoughts clearly. My goal is not to offend, though some may be offended. My heart here is to point out that Jesus desires a Church, a Bride, unified around a few simple truths, empowered by His Spirit, that has learned to encourage and support one another in our differences.

First, let us start with what is of vital importance. The basis of our unity is is found in the work and person of Jesus. Because man has been born into a sinful, fallen world and we have willfully chosen to walk in sin. We are hopelessly separate from God on our own. Jesus, eternally the Son of God, left the glory of Heaven to live as man to show an example of Godly living. He then, a sinless man, laid His life down willingly to redeem fallen man from His sinful state. He was buried and on the 3rd day, He rose from the dead and ascended to His Father. He then sent His Holy Spirit to lead us into relationship with Him. He left His written word to reaffirm all the work He has done on our behalf. His Holy Spirit and the written word are calling men to repent and to live with Jesus as the Lord of their lives. Jesus is the only way to the Father and to life. He has brought salvation to mankind through His finished work on the cross. We can now walk in right relationship with God and be part of His eternal family.

Like many of you, I have read the Scriptures through many times. Each time, I see something that I had missed before or a different passage stood out. Every time we read the Bible, if we are listening to God, it brings a new revelation. Just like for Israel in the wilderness, God brings the manna we need for the moment. Over the years, we tend to build a theological system from this manna. We believe everything in that system was truth from God. It mostly is. We have read authors and listened to sermons that confirm it. Eventually we wind up in a Church that affirms what we have learned. This is all good and right. God would have us hold fast to the truth that He shows us by the Spirit, in His word.

This does not pose a problem until we start limiting what we accept as truth our understanding, to what we have believed, or what our Churches or favorite ministries have taught. We need to guard the truth we have been given and it is right to do so. Where we are breaking down is when we start badmouthing everyone that is not in lockstep with our understanding of truth. How do we protect what we know to be true without bashing people that understand things differently?

We need to go back to the second paragraph. We must always ask if we have agreement in these fundamental truths. If we agree on these truths, we need to receive one another as brothers and sisters in Christ. We may have disagreement. We may understand things differently. That is okay. There are countless reasons why this is true. God has shown different people different aspects of Himself because they have different calls, live among different people and have different ways of thinking. This does not mean we can call them heretics or wolves. There are real heretics and wolves in the world. Paul gave us several good ways to identify them starting with who they understand Jesus to be.1 Cor 12 is a good starting place to understand the variety of ways we understand things. Vs 3 tells us that "nobody can proclaim Jesus is Lord except by the power of the Spirit" or that "Jesus is accursed while speaking by the Spirit." I encourage you to dig into this chapter and pray about it.

The world is suffering. It is trapped in a hopeless situation and people everywhere are fearful. Every single aspect of life seems to be spinning out of control right now. As the Church of Jesus, we are called to bring His truth and love to hurting people, to proclaim hope to hopeless situations and to proclaim the Gospel into the darkness. Jesus said that His word wouldn't return void. Unfortunately, we have been destroying our witness by openly bickering over nuances of the faith, over secondary issues. If it isn't in the second paragraph, it is a secondary issue. We are called to love one another and to live in harmony, not to bicker over our secondary issues.

We must stop name calling. It is vitally important to the future generations that we start discussing our differences and look for areas of agreement so we can work together. We must lay down our right to be right and learn to communicate in healthy ways. We are the hope Jesus left in the world. We are the ones He called to evangelize and to make disciples. Our disagreements with one another are causing that to come to a screeching halt in some places and are keeping us from coordinating our efforts and allowing them to multiply their effectiveness. When we encourage and affirm the ministry of others, God will promote and prosper what He calls us to. When continually rebuke those who He calls to something different, we hinder what He wants to do through us.

We can learn from Paul. He was the foremost of apostles. He could have held himself up and renounced everyone that was not just like him. He did call out some that were perverting the Gospel for different reasons but he also affirmed the ministry of others that he may not have agreed with. He called himself nothing but a servant and refused to call Apollos anything less than himself. He pointed out that they were both merely servants and that Jesus was the one that was brining men to salvation. When he called out people, it was for clearly heretical teaching, that corrupted the Gospel and limited men's access to it.

In Isaiah 58, we see people trying to manipulate God and one another so they can be seen as right. To them, the most important thing is to be recognized and lauded for their rightness. God rejects them but He goes on to show who He will not reject. He even says He will cause people to come to them and see the light in them. It is those that love others and sacrifice themselves to meet the needs around them. They have come to God in humility and allowed Him to use them as He desires.  God promotes and prospers the work of those that are surrendered and their right to be right is submitted to the love of God and man. He makes them the centerpiece of what He is doing. They become the example to follow.

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us. [1Jo 4:7-12 ESV]

It is okay to have differences. It is okay to discuss our differences. It is not okay to attack those in the body we do not understand because they have a differing viewpoint. The world is calling out for hope and the Church is the one called to deliver that hope. Paul said to the Corinthians that he determined to know nothing among them except for Jesus and Him crucified. He certainly had a lot more to teach and say but he limited himself to what they needed, what was of primary importance and that was enough. He did not condemn Apollos for his teaching or focus. He just avoided arguing over differences or telling everyone why he was the superior apostle. It is time for us to lay aside our differences over secondary issues and focus on the simple truth of the Gospel.

God is bigger than me or you. His truth is bigger than our understanding. It is time for us to stop trying to build our kingdoms with our intellect and knowledge and to start recognizing that others have a part of the picture that we may not even understand. The kingdom belongs to God. he has revealed enough of His truth to me that I can follow Him fully but He has not revealed everything to me that you may need to follow Him as He is leading you. The Kingdom and its King are multifaceted. We are limited in our understanding. Let's ask Holy Spirit to reveal God in people and then ask Him how we can bless what He is doing in and through them. Unity is in Jesus but some of the hard work of walking it out falls on us.

The Nerve Center

 

Four years ago, the Lord started speaking to me about a ministry of encouragement to missionaries. Since that day in April 2018, the thought has never been far from my mind. I have had lots of ideas and considered several different ways to do that. As I pursued them, each time, they came up short of what I was pushing for. Just this week, in the middle of feeling sorry for myself because I couldn’t seem to put it all together, the Lord spoke again. He said He had showed me an end and I tried to start at the end. The steps I have been pursuing were in the wrong order. Hopefully, in the next few paragraphs I will be able to explain the journey I have been pursuing. I am praying that a few of you are finding yourself on this same road I am travelling.

While I was in mission’s school in Reynosa, I had a vision of providing missionary retreats so missionaries could come together, share their stories, and encourage one another. The idea was not to do a conference or a provide hours of teaching crammed into each day, but rather to provide a forum where they could come together, and talk about the work they were doing, look for areas of commonality and for ways they could support and encourage one another. This would all take place in a nice setting, a beach resort, or a mountain retreat so they could bring their families and have a time of fellowship, relationship building and rest.

As I prayed about how to make this all work, the Lord directed me to a step that needed to happen before any of this could work. Churches needed to catch the vision for supporting missionaries in a new way. In this day of instant communication and easy travel to almost anywhere in the world, missionaries often feel isolated. They have traded the known for the unknown. They have left family, friends, and careers to pursue God’s purposes for people they may have never even met. On the occasion that they are able to talk with the people from their old life, they often feel that the world is leaving them behind. They have missed out on big family events. They have lost contact with most of their Church family, and they are usually living on a substantially diminished income. They need an advocate to encourage the Church to pursue them and encourage them.

From this, I came up with a plan to speak to Churches and to their missions’ committees and help them formulate a plan to intentionally involve themselves regularly in the lives of the missionaries they have sent or are financially supporting. It is a must for a missions’ success that the Churches that sent missionaries stay involved in their lives. I equate it with when a child leaves the nest. They may no longer live at home, but they still need to know that they have a family behind them to encourage and support them as they pursue their dreams. The Church needs to do this for missionaries.

I talked to a friend in Guatemala about this and he gave me some good advice on how to pursue this idea. As I went back to the U.S. and started doing what he suggested, I realized that I was premature. I have a desire, a goal that I believe God planted in me, but it is easy to jump the gun. I have continually wanted to jump to the finished product but there are in between steps that I need to take if I am going to be faithful to what God is calling me to, which is to build a network of missionary support, not to replace their missions’ organizations, but to supplement them. The missionary needs their home Church family to be involved and to encourage them as they pursue God’s call on their lives and the Church needs to be involved in outreach on a local level as well as in missions.

I have been sensing God say that the first step is to gather information to support what I am seeing and hearing from many of my friends in the mission field. It is time to collect their stories and share them. The last 2+ years of Covid have created a challenging environment for many of them. Several have even left the field to go back home and work. Many have seen their income dry up and lots of projects put on hold. The teams that used to come and support them have slowed to a trickle. For many, everything they knew pre-pandemic has changed. At the same time, they have continued to adapt and change so they can be faithful to the call God has placed on them.

Over the next few weeks, I would like to solicit stories from missionaries. I am praying for the best way to disseminate them, but I know the Church, as a whole, and not just the local Church that sent them, needs to know what missionaries are doing around the world. There are many people that would help and support ministries because they are doing something close to their heart, but they do not even know they exist. They would love to encourage, support and even work with them but first they have to be made aware of the work and the need.

God often speaks to me through pictures. The most recent picture He gave me was for the body and the role of missions in it. Jesus is the head. We are all parts of the body with our own roles to play. Every role is important but none of them work well if we do not communicate. If the body does not know the needs of one part, not only will that one part suffer, but soon, all the parts around it will suffer too. The central nervous system connects all our body and tells other parts to slow down when one part is suffering. It communicates the need of the foot to the head and every part in between.

I feel God is building a network to build, support and encourage the body. It begins with the various parts sharing their story, their call, and their needs. As one shares, another can offer up the needed support and encouragement to lighten the load of the call and to help carry the burden. Not only has Jesus sent Holy Spirit to encourage, guide and comfort us. He has called us to come together and support one another. Networking is a key part of Kingdom life. I feel He is saying that now is time to develop the network, the nervous system of the body so every part can be well supplied and strengthened.

Stay tuned for stories from missionaries in the near future.

A Relentless Pursuit

 For many years I have seen everything God created in the natural as merely a metaphor for the spiritual truth that is just beyond our grasp. He did not just create man for relationship but also to write the story of truth. Within the Trinity there exists a oneness that wanted to find expression and we are the result of that desire. In man, God created a bride for the Son. The Father created Adam and then Eve to give a picture of His desire for the Son. When He created Eve He said that it is not good for man to be alone. That is an expression of a Father's heart for the Son He loves. Marriage was created to reveal eternal spiritual truths.

The last few days I have been feeling like I had missed a big truth about this. Song of Solomon is an early expression of the Gospel. There is a woman, She longs for a man that she sees as perfect and unattainable because she sees herself as lowly and broken. Her family does not value her and her friends often seem to mock her.

One day she catches the eye of the man and He is smitten by her. He pursues her relentlessly. She will let him come close only to run away and hide. She can't see how she possibly has value enough to attract the attention of such a prefect suitor. She even dreams that she has him and then he leaves and hides from her. In her dream she searches everywhere only to come up empty.

The man continually speaks to her of her beauty and worth. He reminds her of his desire for her and all of the things he loves about her. While some of the encouragements seem strange to us today, there is no mistaking that they are words of passion for a bride. The man will not stop until he secures the love of the one he loves. He will do anything to have her.

This is the Gospel in 8 chapters. Jesus came to earth and paid a great price to have a bride for himself. He lifted us from our pit. He spoke a new identity over us and then He sacrificed His own life to redeem His beloved. He promised to never leave or forsake His bride and then He went to prepare a place for her to live and a wedding feast to celebrate love.

We are to quick to build a religious framework and fill it with theological systems to explain a love story. From beginning of time until its conclusion, we are living the story of a man pursuing His love and redeeming her. The Gospel is not just good news that we can be saved from hell. That is too small to be the Gospel. The Gospel is that Jesus came to redeem us from our broken, sinful existence, fill us with the life of God, adopt us into the Father's family, make us co-heirs with Jesus and become an eternal bride for the King. The Gospel is that we have a hope and a future beyond our wildest imagination and it is paid for by the blood of the one that is pursuing us relentlessly.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. [Heb 12:1-2 ESV] 

Our right response to this pursuit is to lay down all the broken and false identities we have clothed ourselves in and become the one we were created and redeemed to become. The bride is the joy set before Jesus that these verses is talking about. It is not just His reunification with the Father. He never had to leave the throne to have that. It is the restoration of His beloved. Jesus gave Himself to buy us back because we bring Him joy.

It is a mistake to say the Bible is just about Jesus. It is the story of a God in Pursuit of His love. He relentlessly pursues because He knew that we were the joy of His heart. He lowered Himself to us so He could eternally raise us up with Him. Don't think you can belittle the bride or demean her place in the heart of Jesus and think you can call it humility. To try and minimize the role of the bride in the story is to reject the Heart of the Bridegroom. We must learn to love and cherish what He loves even when we do not see her yet in the splendor He created her for. 

Song of Solomon is a great lens through which to view the Gospel.