Tag: Christianity

The love beyond all loves

Isaiah Chapter 43

(God is talking to Israel here, but Gentiles are grafted into Israel through Jesus Christ)

I really needed encouragement today, and God provided as I was reading his word. I hope this will give someone else encouragement as well.

FEAR NOT, FOR I HAVE REDEEMED YOU (verse 1)
Who redeems us? Do we redeem ourselves through our own works? NOPE. “All our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away.” (Isaiah 64:6)
Can other people save us? NOPE. “No man can redeem the life of another or give to God a ransom for him–the ransom for a life is costly, no payment is ever enough, that he should live on forever and not see decay.” (Psalm 49:7-9)
Sounds like we’re up the creek, unless God himself is willing to do the deed. “But God will redeem my life from the grave; he will surely take me to himself.” (Psalm 49:15)

That is the best possible news! But I know what a horrible, wicked, ugly person I really am. Why would God be willing to redeem ME?

I HAVE SUMMONED YOU BY NAME, YOU ARE MINE (verse 1)
What is this telling me? Only that God knows me and you each personally, to him we are not just a blur in an ocean full of faces. He knows us each by name and says we belong to him. God in his omniscience knows every last detail about me — the good (not much) and the bad (tons). Yet he says I belong to him. I am his possession and he owns me spirit, soul, and body. People generally love the things that belong to them, so wouldn’t God love them even moreso?

YOU ARE PRECIOUS AND HONORED IN MY SIGHT (verse 4)
God is with us through all the hard trials of our lives, through flood and through fire (verse 2). Although in punishment God’s people were sent into exile, he never forsook them, never forgot them. It was all part of his long plan of redemption. He reminds Israel (and us) again in verse 3, “For I am the Lord, your God, the Holy one of Israel, your savior.” He’s trying to get it through our skulls that he alone is our savior, he wants to do it and he will do it. Ultimately in Jesus Christ he HAS done it. But why???

BECAUSE I LOVE YOU (verse 4)
Well, I know I am not lovable by nature, so God must have made a conscious choice to give me his love, anyway. That means his love is unconditional. We don’t earn the love he gives us, it is not dependent upon our performance or our natural charms. God won’t love you any better if you were a more holy person, or if you were prettier or smarter or stronger. He loves you completely, with everything he has to give, because it is his will to do so and he’s never going to take it away even if you screw up 100 times a day like I do. I don’t know about you, but that is a huge burden off my shoulders.

GOD IS MAKING A POINT AND WANTS US TO PAY ATTENTION
“I, even I, am the Lord, and apart from me there is no savior.” (verse 11) Jesus says in John 14:6, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” We don’t save ourselves, God alone saves us, and he does that through Jesus (for details read the Gospels).

GOD NOT ONLY FORGIVES OUR SINS, HE FORGETS THEM
“I, even I, am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and remembers your sins no more.” (verse 25)
We don’t deserve anything from God except his wrath and an eternity separated from him and everything good. “We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way,” (Isaiah 53:6), but God himself takes care of our sin problem. He paid a debt he did not owe in order to save us from a debt we could never repay. “The Lord has laid on him [Jesus] the iniquity of us all.” (Isaiah 53:6).

Why on earth would God save us? Because he loves us. Why does he love us? Because he made the choice to do so. Not only that, but God loves us with all of Himself, he holds nothing back. He gave us everything that he had to give. “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son [Jesus], that whosoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.” (John 3:16-17). Jesus gave us everything he had to give us when he laid down his life to save us from the eternal death we bought for ourselves.

God doesn’t just love you, he loves you with all of himself. A love so big, so wide, so deep, so high, that our little human selves can’t even begin to comprehend it. But it is amazing! If you are a Christian, be encouraged and uplifted by remembering what God has done for you. If you do not yet belong to Christ, all you have to do is ask him in and all this forgiveness, new life, love, and joy can be yours right now.

“…if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved. As the Scripture says, ‘Anyone who trusts in him will never be put to shame.’ For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile — the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for ‘Everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved’. ” (Romans 10:9-13)

Thank you, Jesus! Please come for us soon.

The Pope was Wrong

Pope Francis was speaking in Singapore recently and made a remark that’s gone viral. He said: Tutte le religioni sono un cammino per arrivare a Dio. I interpret this to literally mean “All religions are ways to arrive at God.” Google Translate interprets it as “All religions are a path to God.

There are two big problems with this: 1) People can’t ever find God on their own, and 2) It was either Christ doing the job, or no one.

1. People have different takes on what the pope meant here, but even in the most generous light he is dead wrong. The generous view is that all religions are about people trying to reach God, the implication being if you try hard enough you’ll get there. Some religions may be closer to the mark than others but they still miss it.

There aren’t many religions in this world. There have only ever been two and they are diametrically opposed to one another. The first, which comes in many flavors, is Works. You achieve your goal – Heaven, Jannah, The Celestial Kingdom, Nirvana, Utopia, Reincarnation, etc., based on how you live your life and the things you do. It’s all about you.The second religion is Christianity – all our best works are filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6) because of our sin and nothing we can do can make us clean. We have all bought Hell for ourselves but God, in the form of Jesus Christ, came to earth, lived a blameless life, died on a cross to pay for our sins and was resurrected from the dead. All who call upon his name will be saved. It’s what Jesus did that counts.

2. If there was any other route to salvation, Jesus would not have died. The very night he was betrayed, he was praying in the garden of Gethsemane with his disciples. According to Matthew’s gospel, in verse 26:39, he prayed:

“My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as You will.”

A little later, in 26:42, he prayed:

“My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless I drink it, may Your will be done.”

Jesus is asking here if there is any other way for mankind to be saved apart from Him dying on the cross. The first time he prays, he’s asking for God to provide another way. The second time he is being obedient to whatever God wants him to do. God did not provide another way and so a few hours later Jesus was nailed to the cross.

Do you see what this means? THERE WAS NO OTHER WAY. If there was, would God the Father have allowed His beloved son to be beaten, tortured, humiliated, and hung to die on a Roman cross? Why would Jesus have to die if you can get to Heaven by being a good Mormon, or Hindu, or Muslim, or Sikh, or whatever, and following the rules of your preferred religion? We can’t be a good anything because we’re all sinners. We need to be rescued. We need a savior. There is no other way. And no one can save us but God himself, which he did in the form of Jesus Christ.

Whatever his intentions may have been, the Pope’s statement could end up leading many people on the path to Hell, an eternity of being separated from God. He had an opportunity to share the true Gospel and he blew it.

You have an opportunity right now to have your eternity secured. Romans 10:13 says “All who call upon the name of the Lord [Jesus] will be saved.” That’s it. He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to God the Father apart from Christ. (John 14:6) All you have to do is believe, and call upon the name of Jesus. He already did all the work. You just have to either accept or reject Him.

free thinking just like everyone else

What is one of the main differences between all of us and Jesus of Nazareth? He sought to do the will of God the Father while we by nature want to do whatever we want, however we want, whenever we want. That includes not just the seven deadlies like greed, gluttony, sloth, etc., but the little choices we make every day that affect others. Not tipping the waitress who just brought us lunch. Going to the boss behind a coworker’s back, making an accusation against them to make us look better. A husband telling his wife how he wishes he had married his high-school girlfriend instead. A wife telling everyone what an idiot her husband is. A parent telling a child they will never amount to anything. Yammering at our friends for an hour about our day and never once asking them about theirs.

I’ve written before that there are only two wills in the universe, “my will be done,” or “thy will be done.” The first one is what every religion there has ever been — save one — boils down to. Your reward, whether you believe in Heaven/Jannah/Nirvana/reincarnation/becoming the god of your own planet/enlightenment/eat drink and be merry for tomorrow ye die, whatever it is, you gain it through your own efforts. Each belief system has its own rules, but it all boils down to yourself, your choices, and how well you play the game.

The other will is God himself. Christ Jesus,

Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and become obedient to death–even death on a cross! – Philippians 2:6-8

This wasn’t a cakewalk for Jesus. It really hit home for me reading through Matthew chapter 26 again. Jesus is in the Garden of Gethsemane with his disciples, after the Last Supper, and shortly before he is betrayed. It says,

He began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then he said to them, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death.” Then, going a little further, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will.” – Matthew 26:38-39

I’ve always thought that Jesus said this because he knew what was coming and dreaded it. The trial, the mocking and beating, the dreadful scourging, and then being strung up naked on the cross to die in agonizing pain, slowly drowning in his own bodily fluids. That in itself is more than enough reason to plead the cup be taken away. But, reading what came just before it, I think what was even harder for him than that was feeling the weight of the sin of everyone in the world, from Adam to the last baby ever conceived, being placed upon him.

I know what the weight of my own sin feels like. If not for the blood of Christ cleansing me it would be unbearable. I also know that the sins of others close to me weigh heavy on my heart as well. Just seeing broken marriages and families, addictions, etc., and the pain they inflict, is also a heavy weight to carry. They cause me great sorrow. Don’t the destructive choices made by the people YOU love also cause you intense pain? Multiply that by however many billions of people have ever existed, and that was the sorrow that Jesus was feeling that night, the unimaginable heavy weight he was carrying.

He didn’t have to do it. He could have walked away at any moment and left us to rot in hell. None of us can honestly say we don’t deserve it. He had the freedom to just walk out of that garden and disappear, but he didn’t. Just a few verses later, when the soldiers come to arrest him and Peter makes a feeble attempt to protect him, it says:

“Put your sword back in its place,” Jesus said to him, “for all who draw the sword will die by the sword. Do you think I cannot call on my Father, and he will at once put at my disposal more than twelve legions of angels?” – Matthew 26:52-53

A Roman legion at that time was about 6,000 men, so 12 legions = 72,000 fighting men. Jesus is saying he has endless resources at his disposal. But we see in these verses that he doesn’t just walk away, or destroy the people who want to destroy him, although he could easily do both. What he does do, is ask God the Father if there is another way. He’s suffering and not enjoying it one bit. “My father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me.” …Don’t ever say that God has no idea what you’ve endured in your life. He knows better than anybody. He’s felt it, he’s LIVED IT. Literally he’s felt both your sins and the sins of the people who have hurt you.

Jesus next prays the same thing again, but with a slightly different tone, this time resigning himself to his task:

He went away a second time and prayed, “My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless I drink it, may your will be done.” – Matthew 26:42

We see in these passages a glimpse of the pain Jesus was feeling, the overwhelming sorrow, and his desire for it all to be taken away. And he could have walked away. But he did not hold his own wishes as being of upmost importance. He knew what God the Father wanted him to do, and he knew that we are all doomed to an eternity of bearing the punishment for our own sins unless He paid the price that none of us can pay. It was him or no one. Only a firstborn male lamb, perfect in all its ways, without spot or blemish, could be sacrificed to cover sin (Read Exodus Chapter 12). None of us are perfect, we are all stained with sin. Jesus alone was perfect in all his ways, without spot or blemish. He alone could pay what we never can.

And it was possible because Jesus did not live to please himself and exert his own will. He loves us with all his heart, he lived to submit his will to God, and by his obedience all the world can be saved. We are saved not by our own actions or will, but by His.

The best we can do in our lives is to accept what Jesus did for us on the cross, and let him be the Lord of our lives. That means beating our own will down with a stick, and saying to our Lord Jesus what he said to God the Father: “Not my will be done, Lord, but yours.”

That is the difference between Christianity and every other religious or philosophical system that has ever been or ever will be. It wasn’t easy for Jesus, and it isn’t easy for us. But it is so worth it. Our will always leads to misery and destruction. His will leads to eternal life, freedom, and joy.

If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved…for everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved.” – Romans 10:9-13

The mega-fun topic of SIN, DEATH, and FORGIVENESS!

Jesus said, “You must be born again.” John 3:3

Why can’t God just forgive us and be done with it?

I have to admit, I have put this off for months. It’s been nagging at me since September, now here it is, almost Christmas. All I do for this blog is just read scripture and write down my thoughts, so why is this so much harder than any other post? Maybe because that pesky question of forgiveness is what the entire Bible is all about?

Our common ancestors, Adam and Eve, were given Paradise and completely screwed it up by the third chapter of the first book of the Bible. I found this hard to understand when I was a little kid reading my Children’s Bible for the first time. Why was eating some fruit so terrible? It sounds silly, even comical. They didn’t kill anybody, right? Sure, God told them not to do it. But they were sorry afterwards, weren’t they? Why didn’t he just forgive them and let everything get back to normal? He’s a loving God, right? Why kick them out of the Garden and curse them (and us)? That just seems cruel.

James 2:10 says, “For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it.” But there are over 600 laws in the Old Testament! Who then has a chance? It isn’t fair! Is it?

Theologians, atheists and everybody and their grandma who’ve ever given any thought at all to the God of the Bible wonder about this sooner or later. I’ve read a lot about it, and heard a lot of scholars talk. I’ve read the Bible myself and prayed over it, gotten angry over it, and questioned God over it. I’ve had to do a lot of soul-searching, examining choices I’ve made and wondering about the effects I’ve had on other people. The conclusion I’ve come to is there is no such thing as a sin that’s “no big deal.” It’s not possible.

The above verse in James is hard to grasp for most of us. For myself, at least. Is God really saying that if you broke one point of the law you’ve broken all of it? So, me snapping at that clerk in the store and making her cry condemns me just as much as Hitler slaughtering 6 million Jews?

Yes . . . and here are just a few reasons why I believe it:

1. In the story of the rich man and Lazarus in Luke Chapter 16, the guy in hell wants Lazarus to bring him some water. But Abraham tells him “…between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.” A lot of Bible teachers believe this is a story of actual people and not a parable. So if we assume that there is a real chasm between heaven and hell, then the question is how and why did it get there. I think the moment Adam and Eve bit the forbidden fruit, they were on the rich man’s side of the chasm. They rejected God because they rebelled against the only law He gave them. They thought it was more prudent to listen to a snake than to listen to the voice of God. And from then on they were separated from God, with no way to get back to Him. All because they ate a piece of fruit. It wasn’t a “little thing,” after all.

2. God gave mankind authority over all the earth in Genesis 1:28: “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground.” But when they listened to the devil’s lies instead of to God, they handed that authority over to Satan, thus becoming the servants of Satan (sin/rebellion/death). Remember when Satan tempted Jesus he said, “I will give you all their [the earthly kingdoms’] authority and splendor, for it has been given to me, and I can give it to anyone I want to.” (Luke 4:6). Jesus called Satan the “prince of this world” in John 12:31.

(Note: Satan doesn’t own this world and he isn’t the supreme ruler. God has always had that authority. “To the LORD your God belong the heavens, even the highest heavens, the earth and everything in it.” – Deuteronomy 10:14. It’s kind of like God owning a building, giving the superintendent’s keys to Adam and Eve, then they give those keys to Satan. Satan may be able to run all over the building for now, but he doesn’t own it and he never will.)

3. When Adam and Eve rejected God’s authority by eating the fruit, they died. Their spirits were dead from that day on, and their bodies started on the road to decay and death. What God told them in Genesis 2:17, “…you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die,” was the truth. So if He had just said, “oh, well, you silly kids, you shouldn’t have but I guess I’ll let it slide this time,” then He would have been a liar and a fool and therefore not someone worthy of our worship and our trust.

4. The sin is laid on Adam’s shoulders, not Eve’s, even though she ate first. There are debates on this but I think it was because Adam was the head of the house. It sounds like he was right there when the snake was talking to Eve. He had the authority to order the snake to be quiet, but he didn’t. He could have corrected Eve when she misquoted God’s command, but he didn’t. He could have knocked the fruit out of her hand, but he didn’t. He could have refused the fruit when she offered it to him, but he didn’t. Eve was deceived; Adam made a deliberate, conscious choice to reject God. We are all his descendants and so we all inherit his nature—the nature of a dead spirit that is enslaved to sin. All the pain, suffering, greed and hate that we call history happened because of the choice that one man, the ancestor of all of us, made one day thousands of years ago.

The first sin recorded in the Bible was eating a piece of fruit.

The second was murder.

No small sin.

————

(This isn’t my original thought; I’ve heard it many times but it makes sense and is in perfect alignment with the Bible) If God is perfect, then he can’t just sweep sin — any sin — under the rug. Because if He does that, then He is not a just God. Nor would He be a loving God, if you think about it. If a drunk driver ran me over and crippled me for life, I would want justice. That driver knew it was wrong and dangerous to drink and drive but he did it anyway. His choice ruined the rest of my life. I would cry out for justice. When the case came to court, if the judge said to the drunk driver, “I forgive you. Cased dismissed,” he might be very merciful and kind toward the driver but he wouldn’t be fair or kind to ME.

And think about eternity. God’s kingdom is absolutely perfect. It is a place of perfect love, joy, peace, beauty, and community among all its inhabitants. I think it is a place that almost all of us desperately long for in our hearts. So what if God swept just one sin under the rug and it was never dealt with? Just one little thing, say one person who occasionally gossips about other people. How long would it take for that one little thing to destroy all of Heaven and turn it into the same cesspool we’ve turned Earth into? Remember, Adam and Eve snacked on some forbidden fruit, and their son murdered his own brother. God absolutely cannot allow even the smallest taint of sin to go undealt with .

Paul warned the people of Corinth, “Don’t you know that a little yeast works through the whole batch of dough?” Sin MUST be dealt with, or it will grow like the yeast in bread dough and infest everything.

It’s no good trying to deal with it ourselves. Remember that chasm that has been fixed between hell and Heaven. As sinners we are on the wrong side of that chasm. What can we do to fill the abyss so we can cross over? It’s eternally deep. What are our “good deeds” worth? They are a joke. Most of our works are selfishly motivated anyway, if we are honest with ourselves. And even the most noble thing a person can do, which is to die to save someone else, can’t fill that hole because we are dead sinners trying to save other dead sinners.

No man can redeem the life of another or give to God a ransom for him—
The ransom for a life is costly,
No payment is ever enough—
That he should live on forever and not see decay.
– Psalm 49:7-9

We sin every single day and we know it. Even if we really, really don’t want to. That cruel remark slips from our lips, that lustful thought enters our head, that little thing is just sitting there for us to steal, that little white lie is so easy to say….I didn’t mean it! I’m sorry! I’ll do better tomorrow! But tomorrow comes and we don’t do better. We don’t fill that chasm, we just keep digging it deeper and deeper. We are lost. We are in that rich man’s same hell and we are as hopeless as he is to ever get out of it.

UNLESS . . . . .