Category: Jesus

FOCUSING ON THE TRUTH

On By Pastor TomIn Bible Teaching, Christianity, Faith, Galatians, Jesus, Uncategorized1 Comment

walk-in-the-spirit-logo

The flesh is loud and insistent. It demands its own way. Above all, the flesh wants self-gratification. The Spirit is quiet, but clear. Above all, the Spirit wants to bring you closer to Jesus, and to bring others closer to Jesus through you.

To listen to the sermon, click the play button:

To download, right click on the link (or do whatever you do on a Mac) and save it to your computer: Download Galatians Part 18

GALATIANS #18. GALATIANS 5:16-18

I say then, walk by the Spirit and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. For the flesh desires what is against the Spirit, and the Spirit desires what is against the flesh; these are opposed to each other, so that you don’t do what you want. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. (Gal 5:16-18, HCSB)

I have struggled to prepare this message, because what is said is here actually quite simple, but at the same time, it is very deep. It isn’t hard to grasp the obvious meaning, but sometimes it is hard to grasp how profoundly this could affect our lives.

We need a little background as we talk about flesh and spirit. The bible describes human beings as made up of Spirit, Soul and Body (Hebrews 4:12; 1 Thessalonians 5:23-24; numerous other verses). We each have a body. We know what that is. Our body life is what our body does – what we do and say, how we behave. We also have a soul. The Greek word in the New Testament for “soul” is “psuche” which we have changed in English to “psyche.” Just like that English word, the soul is your personality, your emotions, your thoughts and decisions. The third part of a human being is the Spirit. The New Testament word for Spirit is a lot like the word for breath. The spirit is the part of the human that interacts directly with God.

Your flesh is located in your body. The soul – your emotions, thoughts and decisions – is the battleground between flesh and spirit. Your soul can give attention and power to the flesh, or to the spirit. Before you are in Jesus, your spirit is dead. The flesh has free reign to do what it wants. The soul may occasionally make an effort to do some good thing, or refrain from something especially bad, but it is not empowered by God to that. It has nothing to go on but what it gets from the body, and that is heavily influenced by the flesh. However, when we come to Jesus, he makes us fully alive, fully perfect in spirit. Now, God’s Holy Spirit has a means to speak to us, to our souls, through our spirits. Now, the battle is on.

It is important to remember that the Spirit is eternal. The soul is also eternal. But the body, and the flesh, are dying, even as you read this. What that means is that the flesh is not the “real you.” The real you is going to live on eternity, either with Jesus, if you continue to trust him, or in the eternal torment of separation from him. If you are with Jesus, your spirit and soul will get a new body at the resurrection, a body that is free from what we call “the flesh.” This idea that the Spirit is the “real you” is very important when it comes to walking by the Spirit and not by the flesh.

I think one of the first questions I have about Paul’s statement, is: “how do we recognize the Spirit?” In order to help us understand, I want to reference a text that I preached on about two years ago. Bear with me if you know it, because I think it will help us. Turn to 1 Kings 19:1-13 (if you are new to the Bible, that means the book of “1 Kings,” chapter number 19, verses 1 through 13). This is a story about the prophet Elijah.

Elijah had some tremendous victories in his life. There were times when he was full of faith, and God did amazing things through him. But there were also times when things were not going well for him at all. His life was a little bit like a roller coaster – up, because things were good, and down, because things were bad. At one point, he got so down that he ran away and lived in a cave. After a time of recovery, the Lord spoke to him, and told him to come to the entrance of the cave, because he was going to reveal his presence to Elijah.

And he said, “Go out and stand on the mount before the LORD.” And behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind tore the mountains and broke in pieces the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire, a thin silence. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. (1Kgs 19:13, HCSB)

I think the Lord was making a point. Elijah was drawing his life from what was going on externally. When things were going well on the outside, Elijah was doing well. When God was working miracles and Elijah was feeling bold, everything was great. But when things were going badly, Elijah was not doing well. We might say, “So what?” Isn’t it normal to do well when things are good, and to feel discouraged when things are not good?”

God was saying to Elijah: “No. It doesn’t have to be that way. My life is not in the external things. My Life is not in things going well, and my life is not absent when things are bad.”

And so God sent a storm. Raging wind, splitting rocks, this beats any tornado you’ve ever heard of. It was noise, excitement, huge, awe-inspiring. But the LORD was not in the storm. So he sent an earthquake. Nothing is solid anymore, everything is shaken. There is nothing to hold on to, no security. But the LORD was not in the earthquake. Then came the fire. I’ve heard many people – even preachers – pray for God to “send your fire.” But the LORD was not in the fire.

Now, obviously, God sent the wind, caused the earthquake, lit the fire. So he was in them in a sense – they resulted from his action. But the true presence of God was not in those things that he sent and did. The true presence of God was a silent, calm voice that spoke into Elijah’s spirit.

What this story shows us, is the difference between flesh and spirit. Flesh is loud and insistent, even demanding. Elijah, even though he was a prophet, had been living according to the flesh. When things were good, he was OK. When things were bad, he was not. His focus was on the clamoring, demanding flesh. But what God showed him is that God’s truest presence is in the spirit. And the spirit is not loud, noisy, or demanding.

I’m reminded of a line from song by the Indigo Girls:

Now darkness has a hunger that’s insatiable;

And lightness has a call that’s hard to hear

I don’t know why that should be true, but it certainly is. This passage calls the call of God a “still small voice.” But it is an odd Hebrew expression that is hard to capture. I’m not much of a Hebrew scholar, so I’m mostly relying on the research of others. But a literal rendering might be “a voice, silent and intangible.” The voice of the spirit is like that. It wasn’t in all the ups and down of Elijah’s circumstances. It wasn’t even in the wind or fire or earthquake. It was a quiet whisper from God’s Spirit to Elijah’s spirit.

But here is something very important: Elijah recognized it. It was small. It was silent and intangible. And yet, it was truly there, and when it came, Elijah knew it. The New Testament seems to take for granted that we too, will recognize the voice of God’s Spirit, when we are in Jesus.

Paul gives us another clue. He says the Spirit and the Flesh are opposed to one another. They desire things that are opposite to each other. So here is a very practical help: If you sense a battle within you, if you want two different things, then one of those things is the voice of the Spirit; the other is the voice of the flesh. Now, I’m not talking about ordinary decisions, like what brand of jeans you should buy, or things like that. But if you are in Jesus, and you are presented with a choice of the flesh, there will be another voice, almost intangible, but recognizable, wanting to make a different choice. That is the voice of the Spirit.

The flesh is loud and insistent. It demands its own way. Above all, the flesh wants self-gratification. The flesh wants to do whatever is necessary – including sin – to gratify itself. Bear in mind, the flesh doesn’t always want to sin overtly. This is not the devil, but rather your corrupted flesh. Flesh just wants to get what it wants. It doesn’t care if it sins to do it, but it doesn’t have to sin to do it. So, you can do some things that appear to be good, and still be doing them in the flesh. I know of a large ministry that is built upon the flesh of the founder. The founding pastor may not be overtly sinning. He’s building a large ministry, which undoubtedly has some positive influence on some folks. But he’s doing it out of his own effort, his own focus on outward success, and ultimately, for his own gratification. It may look outwardly good, but it is still flesh.

The Spirit is quiet, but clear. There is a sense of “goodness” and “rightness” to what the Spirit wants. I don’t mean a religious goodness – I mean a clear, positive feeling, thought or conviction that what it wants is good – good as in positive, and good as in morally right. The Spirit’s goal is not your personal success or immediate gratification. Instead, what the Holy Spirit wants, is to bring you closer to Jesus, and to bring others closer to Jesus through you. Sometimes outward success will do that. Sometimes it won’t.

A lot of what it means to walk by the Spirit has to do with belief and focus. You need to trust it is true when the Bible tells you that the flesh is not the real you:

From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. (2Cor 5:16-17, ESV2011)

We don’t consider the flesh to be our true selves any more. We need to trust this, trust Jesus has really done this for us.

For all that is in the world— the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever. (1John 2:16-17, ESV2011)

As we trust that Jesus has dealt with our sin and our flesh is on the way out, we start to see ourselves the way God sees us. The more you realize and trust that Jesus has made your righteous, the easier and more natural it will be for you to behave accordingly. We don’t need to struggle and strive with our flesh to change our behavior. Instead, we trust Jesus and what he has done for us. We cling to the truth that he has not only forgiven us, but he has changed us in the inmost being and through Him we have put off the old self and put on the new, which is righteous, holy and pure like God himself. And through the power of the Holy Spirit, we will begin to act as we believe. Paul says it like this to the Colossians:

If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory. Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. (Col 3:1-5, ESV emphasis added)

Very few translations include this, but in verse 5, it says literally: “put to death your body parts, the earthly ones…” In other words, the sins Paul names afterward are sins of the flesh and body. And the way to deal with these, the way to put them to death, he tells us in the preceding verses: set your minds on things above. Set your minds on the fact that you died and your real life is hidden with Christ in God. You fight temptation by believing that Jesus has already broken your connection with sin. You walk by the Spirit when you believe that you don’t have to gratify every impulse of your flesh, because real life is in the spirit, and in the spirit you are perfect and complete, and God has already met every need.

Part of this is about focus. We should seek the things that are above. We should set our minds on the things of the Spirit. Paul puts it like this to the Romans:

For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. (Rom 8:5, ESV2011)

As I write this, I am on a “detox diet” with my wife. There are certain foods that I am avoiding for a certain period of time. I am hungry right at this moment. The truth is, I really want some pizza, but I’m not supposed to have any. There’s no good pretending I’m not hungry. And there’s no good pretending I don’t want pizza. But there is also no point in fantasizing about a crisp crust and Italian sausage and jalapenos and the most wonderful cheese. The more I do that, the more I want it, and eventually, it will lead me to go get pizza and ruin the effect of the detox.

I have three things that help me in this situation. First, I recognize that though I want it, I don’t have to have it. I’m not going to die without it. It won’t hurt me at all to abstain, and it will probably be good for me. So I commit to something higher than my own immediate gratification. Second, except for the purposes of this illustration, I refuse to focus on what I should not have. I know it’s available. I know I want it. But I’m not going to waste my time or sap my willpower by continuing to think about it. Third, I am going to get up as soon as I’m done here, and go eat some of the good satisfying food that I am perfectly free to have.

I think walking by the Spirit is very much like that. Of course we are tempted to gratify the flesh. That’s why Paul writes about this. But temptation isn’t sin. You’ll be tempted, so what? It won’t hurt you to abstain, and you can commit to something higher than your own immediate gratification. Second, refuse to focus on it. Instead, focus on the good things you already have in Jesus, and the more good that he wants to give you. Third, satisfy yourself in Jesus with the good that he provides, and especially with his presence and his Word.

Paul also says walking by the Spirit means you are not under law. I think there are two things we should think about in connection with this. First don’t worry about messing up. God’s moral law has not changed. It cannot change, because it is a reflection of his holiness. But Jesus has met that standard on our behalf. If, as we try and walk by the Spirit, we screw up and give in to the flesh, you are not now obligated to be perfect again. Romans 8:1-4 says this:

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. (Rom 8:1-4, ESV2011)

We shouldn’t deliberately continue in a pattern of fleshly living. To do so takes us farther away from Jesus. But if we screw up sometimes, we are not condemned. Sin has already been dealt with for those who walk according to the Spirit. When you fail, get back up and move on in the Spirit. Don’t waste a lot of time condemning yourself, because in Jesus, there is no condemnation.

Second, the fact that we are not under law means we don’t live by a list that tells us how to behave in every situation. Instead, we make our goal to stick close to Jesus, to pay attention to the spirit. If we do that, the Spirit himself will guide us, and we don’t need a set of rules for every situation.

There is a lot here in these two verses this week. Let the Holy Spirit talk to you about it right now.

THE RACE

On By Pastor TomIn Bible Teaching, Church, Faith, Galatians, Jesus, Religion, UncategorizedLeave a comment

marathon

Jesus has done everything for us. But being Christian is not really just about agreeing to the fact that Jesus has done it all. It is about personally trusting Jesus. It isn’t about a fact, it is about a person. We aren’t saved by facts; we are saved by Jesus himself.

To listen to the sermon, click the play button:

To download, right click on the link (or do whatever you do on a Mac) and save it to your computer: Download Galatians Part 16

Galatians # 16 . Chapter 5:7-12

You were running well. Who prevented you from obeying the truth? This persuasion did not come from the One who called you.

Paul says that up until this point, the Galatians had been running well. I want to talk about that word-picture he uses: running. The Christian life is not a one-time ticket-purchase. It is a race. And I will add that it is not a sprint, but a marathon. There are several places where Paul makes this analogy, and the writer of Hebrews also uses it.

Don’t you know that the runners in a stadium all race, but only one receives the prize? Run in such a way to win the prize. Now everyone who competes exercises self-control in everything. However, they do it to receive a crown that will fade away, but we a crown that will never fade away. Therefore I do not run like one who runs aimlessly or box like one beating the air. Instead, I discipline my body and bring it under strict control, so that after preaching to others, I myself will not be disqualified. (1Cor 9:24-27, HCSB)

Therefore, since we also have such a large cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us lay aside every weight and the sin that so easily ensnares us. Let us run with endurance the race that lies before us. (Heb 12:1, HCSB)

Too many “Christians” look at Christianity like life-insurance. Their attitude is, “Sure, it’s something you need, but you don’t really benefit until you die.” So they get baptized, or “make a decision” or get “confirmed” or something like that, and then they ignore Jesus for the rest of their lives, unless, of course, they get into trouble and need his help. Some of these folks think that “going to church” is part of the ticket price, so they may go to church too, but it doesn’t affect how they live here and now. Incidentally, it is those people, and their typical pattern of behavior, who are mostly responsible for giving Christians such a bad name.

But Paul says, “No, that’s not how it is. This is a race we have entered.” We are supposed to remain in the race, committed to, and focused on the goal. It isn’t a little side-part of our lives. It is our life. It isn’t life insurance. It isn’t something we do when the mood strikes us. Yes, we still go to work and pay our bills and take vacations, but all these things now come under the context of the marathon, the race we are running toward heaven. As Paul says, we don’t live aimlessly any more. We aren’t running for no purpose. Marathon runners are not people who just get up on day and say, “I feel like running twenty-six miles today.” They train. They focus. No real marathon runner starts the race, and then, half a mile later, says, “I’m stopping for coffee. Maybe I’ll get back in the race later on.” No, once they are in the race, they don’t stop until they cross the finish line.

That is what it is like to become a Christian. We have entered something. We are engaged upon a lifelong quest. We don’t embark upon it lightly, and we don’t abandon it lightly.

We Christians have sometimes mixed up the gospel. Becoming a Christian is not primarily about agreeing to a certain set of facts. You’ll meet people who present it this way. If you believe A, B, and C, and utter prayer D, then you are a Christian. I remember in college, getting some training in evangelism. That’s how they trained us. We were supposed to share certain facts with people, support the facts with bible verses, and ask for their agreement:

A. The bible says that all people, including you, have sinned (Rom 3:23).

B. Our sin means we are under condemnation from God (Rom 6:23). We can’t fix it ourselves (Eph 2:8-9)

C. God took it upon himself to restore us to him, by coming as Jesus the Son (John 3:16).

D. Everyone who believes in Jesus is saved from their sins and will have eternal life (1 John 5:11-12; Rom 10:8-13).

E. Do you believe this? If so, say this prayer with me….

These things are all true. But the way I first learned to present them might very well have given someone the impression that all they had to do was agree with the facts, say the prayer, and then get on with life.

I don’t want us to get confused in the series on Galatians. Jesus has done everything for us. But being Christian is not really just about agreeing that Jesus has done it all. It is about personally trusting Jesus. It isn’t about a fact, it is about a person. Because it is about a person, it is about personal trust and personal relationship with the One who has saved us. Don’t get me wrong: the things that I preach about Jesus are factually true. But we aren’t saved by facts; we are saved by Jesus himself.

The goal of all we have been learning so far in Galatians is not to get people to say, “Great! I agree that Jesus took care of all it for me. Now I’m off to do my own thing.” No. The goal is for all of us learn to trust and love Jesus. If we already do, it is to increase our trust and love for him. The facts should be inspiration and motivation to do that.

So Paul says that the Galatians were in the race, running well. He goes on:

Who prevented you from obeying the truth? This persuasion did not come from the One who called you. A little yeast leavens the whole lump of dough. I have confidence in the Lord you will not accept any other view. But whoever it is that is confusing you will pay the penalty. (Gal 5:7-10, HCSB)

When he was with them, it seemed that they got it. But now suddenly someone has cut them off, changed their conviction. Paul says that the persuasion that is changing their minds is not from Jesus. He then quotes a proverb that Jesus himself said: “a little yeast leavens the whole lump of dough.” We make bread in much the same way that people did in New Testament times. You combine, flour, water, oil, honey salt and yeast. In a 1kilo (2 pound) lump of dough, you use about 10 grams of yeast (1 tablespoon). By weight, that means the yeast makes up about 1% of all the bread. And yet it profoundly affects every bit of the dough, changing it dramatically. Both Jesus and Paul meant two things by turning this into a proverb:

First, like yeast, false teaching tends to spread and have a much wider influence than you might expect. It only takes a little bit of false teaching to start affecting a lot of people.

Second, I think this comparison shows that many times, false teaching might be just a little bit of lie combined with a lot of good truth. This is one of the favorite tricks of the devil. When he came to Adam and Eve, he said: “Did God really say, ‘You can’t eat from any tree in the garden’? ” Of course, God said they couldn’t eat from just one tree, that was true. But he insinuated the lie that God had forbidden all trees. Then he said,

“No! You will not die,” the serpent said to the woman. “In fact, God knows that when you eat it your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” (Gen 3:4-5, HCSB)

That’s true, in a way. Once they sinned, suddenly they knew about evil in a way that they never did before. They had a greater understanding. But it wasn’t the kind of understanding that the devil led them to believe it was. It was a half-truth. False teaching and temptation often work like this.

One of the most prevalent false teachings in America now is the “prosperity gospel.” It comes in several different forms, but basically it goes like this: “God loves you, and wants to bless you. If you get right with him, and have the right attitude of faith, if you claim what is yours in faith, he will bless you financially.” Subtler forms of this message might end instead with he will heal you; or, he will give you what you want; or, he will make your life easy. There are many different things people add in there. Now, in many ways, a lot of this is true. God does love us. He does want to bless us. We should approach him in faith. There are just two small lies here. The first lie is that if you simply do your part by having enough faith, or the right kind of faith, or testifying to your faith in the right way, God will always do what you want him to. That’s not true. Faith is not lever that we pull to manipulate God. It is the abandonment of ourselves to the One we trust.

The second small lie is that the blessings we want to have are exactly the same as the blessings that God wants to give us. Many times, we want things that, for reasons we may never understand, are not what God wants to do for us right now.

In any case, the point is, false teaching – whatever the specific lie – is very dangerous and powerful. It is often just a few small lies combined with a lot of truth. Paul says those who are doing this – leading the Galatians astray – will pay the penalty. He doesn’t specify what the penalty is, but we can assume it isn’t good.

Paul goes on,

Now brothers, if I still preach circumcision, why am I still persecuted? In that case the offense of the cross has been abolished. (Gal 5:11, HCSB)

The doctrine of the cross of Christ is offensive. To the Jews, it was offensive to say that the law was irrelevant, that you could be saved through trusting Jesus rather than doing the law. It took away the power and influence of the leaders of Jewish religion. In fact, it was a fundamental change.

But it is offensive to others in other ways too. For some people, it is offensive to say that Jesus is the only way to God and to eternal life. We covered that in more depth last week, if you want to go back and read it. Another offensive idea is this: there is something fundamental in each one of us that deserves crucifixion. The cross shows us how evil and ugly sin is. In fact, the cross was the physical judgment of sin, so in the cross sin is judged to be sinful. When we tell people that their favorite, self-serving or sinful activities need the forgiveness brought by Jesus’ death, they often get offended. A lot of folks are willing to acknowledge some petty little sin, or something they don’t mind not doing, or giving up. But if the cross shows up the sinfulness of their lifestyle or of a cherished activity, watch out! It is offensive.

Paul is entirely willing to suffer persecution for the sake of Jesus. That doesn’t stop him from being a human person who was irritated with those who oppose him. His final thought of these verses deserves mention:

I wish those who are disturbing you might also get themselves castrated! (Gal 5:12, HCSB)

With that pleasant thought, let’s pause and listen to what the Holy Spirit may be saying to us.

Have you been looking at following Jesus as sort of ticket that you bought for heaven, or a kind of part time hobby that you do when you feel like it? Let the Holy Spirit correct you and speak to you about that. Let him also speak forgiveness and restoration to you. Trust Jesus, personally.

Are you in danger of believing a lie because it sounds good, or because at least part of it is true? Let the Lord protect you and speak to you about that too.

Finally, are you prepared for the fact that the cross of Christ is offensive to people? Are you ready to run the race, in spite of the scorn and anger of others?

Above all, remember, all this is not about a set of facts, it is about a person, Jesus Christ, who love you, who gave up his life to save you and so that you could be with him.

SELF-JUSTIFICATION, OR JESUS-JUSTIFICATION?

On By Pastor TomIn apostle paul, Bible Teaching, Christianity, Church, Galatians, Jesus, Sermon, UncategorizedLeave a comment

what-is-justification-by-faith-part-5-21502697

Only Jesus can satisfy the demands of the law. Only Jesus can make you holy. Only he can make you good. You don’t have to try any more.

To listen to the sermon, click the play button:

To download, right click on the link (or do whatever you do on a Mac) and save it to your computer: Download Galatians Part 15

GALATIANS #15

Galatians Chapter 5:2-6

Look: I, Paul, say to you that if you accept circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you. I testify again to every man who accepts circumcision that he is obligated to keep the whole law. You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace. (Gal 5:2-4, ESV2011)

Before all you ladies quit reading, I want to make it clear that these verses have to do with some timeless and important principles. It isn’t really about the male anatomy at all. Remember, the situation in Galatia is that some false teachers have come in and are saying that although Jesus is the Messiah, in order to be right with God and be truly saved, you must follow Jewish law. For men, that meant that they must be circumcised. Some of these folks were in Jerusalem with Paul at one time:

But some of the believers from the party of the Pharisees stood up and said, “It is necessary to circumcise them and to command them to keep the law of Moses! ” (Acts 15:5, HCSB)

Now, let’s be clear. Paul himself was circumcised. At one point, he had his helper, Timothy, circumcised, so that he could stay the houses of non-Christian Jews (Acts 16:3). So clearly, Paul did not view circumcision itself as evil or always wrong. The problem was, the Galatians were starting to believe that circumcision was necessary (for men) to get right with God. For both men and women, they felt it was necessary to follow Jewish law.

Paul is saying this: “We are saved by Jesus plus nothing. If you want to count circumcision or the Jewish Law toward your salvation, then you can’t count Jesus. If you want to follow the law, you have to follow the whole thing perfectly, your entire life.” Jesus presents us with an either/or proposition. Either we receive him, and him alone as our only hope, or we try and get right with God through our own efforts. But we can’t do both.

If you think anything other than the death and resurrection of Jesus will get you right with God, then you are on your own. If you say, “well, God needs to let my aunt into heaven because she was so kind and generous,” you are really claiming that one way to get right with God is kindness and generosity. Paul, Jesus and entire New Testament disagree.

You can come to God through Jesus, have no other claim or hope; or, you can come to God with anything else you want, but not Jesus. Jesus is exclusive. Martin Luther, writing about these verses, put it this way:

“This teaching is the touchstone by which we can judge most surely and freely about all doctrines, works, forms of worship, and ceremonies of men. Whoever (whether he be a papist, a Jew, a Turk, or a sectarian) teaches that anything beyond the Gospel of Christ is to necessary to attain salvation; whoever establishes any work or form of worship; whoever observes any rule, tradition or ceremony with the opinion that thereby he will obtain the forgiveness of sins, righteousness and eternal life – will hear the judgment of the Holy Spirit pronounced against him here by the apostle: that Christ is of no advantage to him at all.” (Martin Luther).

People these days do not like the idea that there is only one way to God, and therefore only one way to heaven. According to the Bible, there is only one way to God, and that is through Jesus Christ. Jesus said it himself:

“I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except by me” (John 14:6).

“Enter through the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the road is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who go through it. How narrow is the gate and difficult the road that leads to life, and few find it. (Matt 7:13-14, HCSB)

The apostles all reiterated this teaching of Jesus. John wrote:

And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. The one who has the Son has life. The one who doesn’t have the Son of God does not have life. (1John 5:11-12, HCSB)

The reason Jesus is the only way, is because it is only through his life, death and resurrection that God’s holy standard is satisfied. God is holy. Holiness destroys sin. If we come into God’s presence with sin in us, we will be destroyed. Jesus embodied both the holiness of God the flesh of sinful humanity. Because of who he was, his life, death and resurrection satisfied the holy standards of God’s nature. He was the only one who could do that. As we trust him, he includes us in what he has done. But if we try and justify ourselves in any way, Jesus is useless to us. The Galatians were trying to do it through Jewish law. Let me share a few ways I’ve heard people these days try to justify themselves apart from Jesus:

“Well, I’m basically a good person.”

“I’m no saint, but I’m no worse than anyone else.”

“I’m no saint, but at least I’m not a hypocrite.”

“I’ve gone to church all my life.”

“I take care of the people around me. The bible says to love your neighbor, and I do that, probably better than a lot of church people.”

Folks, this is all self-justification. These statements are all about getting into heaven by your own merit, or at least your own merit compared to other people (but not compared to God’s Holy Standard). This is living by law. In terms of relating to God, it is no different from insisting upon following Jewish law. It is up to you to be good enough, or to be at least no worse than others, or to behave religiously. Paul says that if you rely on such things, Jesus Christ is of no value to you.

Some people look for justification in other religions. They may say that all religions lead to the same goal. I always find that idea kind of humorous, because the one thing all religions seem to agree upon is that the other ones are wrong. Islam claims to be the one right way. Jesus himself excluded any other way but himself. That means you can follow other religions if you want, but you won’t have anything to do with Jesus. Even Hinduism and Buddhism, which many people think are so inclusive, are not really that way. They might be willing to includes Jesus as another one of their thousands of Deities, but they absolutely refuse to let him claim the exclusivity that he claims. In other words, they are inclusive only if you accept their way of looking at things, which of course, means they aren’t that inclusive.

There is one more thing people do to justify themselves. They simply change the standard. Listen carefully here, because it doesn’t sound like living by law, but it is. The ten commandments command us to put God first, to not make or worship idols, to not take the name of the Lord in vain and to observe a day set aside for rest and worship. They tell us we should honor our parents. They say we should not murder, commit adultery, steal, lie or covet. Jesus said they were all summed up by these two ideas: Love God, and Love your Neighbor.

So our current culture says “It’s all about love. As long as you act ‘loving,’ you are a good person.” So, you can cheat and steal and lie as long as you do it to the government or a large corporation, where no one (that you know about) gets personally hurt. You’ll still be a good person. You can have sex with someone you aren’t married to, as long as it is loving. You can have greed and envy and hatred in your heart, as long you don’t hurt anyone. You can gossip, or get drunk, or lie to your boss about why you weren’t there. Our culture has reduced holiness to innocuousness.

Now, all this is still self-justification. We aren’t putting our hope in Jesus to forgive us and make us good from the inside out. We are changing the standard of goodness and holiness so that it describes the way we prefer to behave. We are trying to make ourselves righteous by changing what righteousness is. This isn’t putting our hope in Christ – it is putting our hope in the fact that we can, through our own efforts, meet the reduced standards. If this is our approach to God, we are trying to be right with him so other way than Jesus. Paul says, if that is so, we are cut off from Christ.

Now, again, circumcision in itself is not the problem. Paul writes:

For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision accomplishes anything; what matters is faith working through love. (Gal 5:6, HCSB)

The issue is self-justification. Circumcision might be a good thing for hygiene or even something that helps some people remember they belong to God. But it can’t be a law, or a means to get right with God.

There are many things like circumcision. Fasting can be helpful to focus our hearts and minds upon the Lord. Certain forms of worship and spiritual disciplines can really help us grow closer to the Lord. But if you ever find yourself thinking “If I just do this, I’ll be OK with God,” watch out! The devil is lying to you. If you think, “Only people who do this activity, or observe this ceremony, are real Christians,” you are in deep spiritual danger!

Let me be even more clear. Not even keeping the ten commandments will get you right with God. First, if you are old enough to read these words, you have already failed to keep the ten commandments. It’s already over – you haven’t kept the whole law perfectly for your whole life. You aren’t holy enough to come into the presence of God. You never will be. It’s good to follow the ten commandments – the Holy Spirit, living inside Christians, wants to do them. But if you are trying to follow the ten commandments in order to keep God from smiting you, you are out of luck. The smiting is coming, unless you are in Jesus.

Only Jesus can satisfy the demands of the law. Only Jesus can make you holy. Only he can make you good.

When you are in Jesus, as you submit to the prompting of the Holy Spirit, you will start to look a little more holy, because he wants to live his holy life through you. But it won’t be you trying to be good in order to please God or get to heaven. It will be Jesus in you, being good, as you. And you won’t trust your own goodness or worry if your own goodness is enough – because the goodness of Jesus is enough for you.

I know you screw up, because I know I screw up. I know that even though Jesus has made me good, I don’t always act like it. Paul knew this about himself too. And that is why he wrote verse 5:

For through the Spirit, by faith, we eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. (Gal 5:5, HCSB)

The Greek word there for “eagerly wait,” frequently refers to waiting for the fulfillment of something that has been promised, but hasn’t happened yet. We have this righteousness through Jesus, and yet it isn’t fully complete at this time. So we anticipate it eagerly. Paul wrote about this in 1 Corinthians 1:7; Philippians 3:20 and Hebrews 9:28. He wrote this to the Christians in Rome:

For the creation eagerly waits with anticipation for God’s sons to be revealed. For the creation was subjected to futility — not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it — in the hope that the creation itself will also be set free from the bondage of corruption into the glorious freedom of God’s children. For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together with labor pains until now. And not only that, but we ourselves who have the Spirit as the firstfruits — we also groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. Now in this hope we were saved, yet hope that is seen is not hope, because who hopes for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we eagerly wait for it with patience. (Rom 8:19-25, HCSB)

So what does all this mean for us now? Paul talked about freedom in verse 1. What freedom it is to be done with justifying yourself! You aren’t letting yourself off the hook – you are admitting that you can’t get off the hook and you need Jesus to save you. You are admitting you cannot do it. There is great freedom in that.

There is a warning here, too. If you think you can add to what Jesus had done for you, or if you think you have a part to play in saving yourself, you are in grave spiritual danger. And there is a warning also, to not make good things into necessary things.

Finally, there is this business of eagerly waiting. I see a lot of people who call themselves Christians who do not seem interested, let alone eager, in Jesus bringing his righteousness into their lives. It makes me wonder how much room he really has in their hearts. We don’t need to be perfect. We don’t need to strive to make ourselves good. But we should eagerly anticipate the work of the Holy Spirit in our hearts to do those things. We can be looking for it, praying for it, ready to respond right away as the Spirit prompts us to do something, or refrain from doing something else. We are not supposed to wander off and say, “Well, let Jesus make me righteous if he can, I’m off to do my own thing. Good luck to him.” No, Paul says that we who are in Jesus should be anticipating his work in us, eager to see it come about.

What is the Spirit saying to you today?

FREEDOM!

On By Pastor TomIn apostle paul, Bible Teaching, Christianity, Galatians, Jesus, Religion, Sermon, UncategorizedLeave a comment

freedom_chains

To listen to the sermon, click the play button:

To download, right click on the link (or do whatever you do on a Mac) and save it to your computer: Download Galatians Part 14

Galatians #14 . Chapter 5:1

Christ has liberated us to be free. Stand firm then and don’t submit again to a yoke of slavery. (Gal 5:1, HCSB)

These two sentences are extremely powerful. I want to pause and unpack them a little bit. Paul says that Christ has liberated us. One natural question is – how has he done that? Colossians 2:13-18 gives us a clue:

And when you were dead in trespasses and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive with Him and forgave us all our trespasses. He erased the certificate of debt, with its obligations, that was against us and opposed to us, and has taken it out of the way by nailing it to the cross. He disarmed the rulers and authorities and disgraced them publicly; He triumphed over them by Him.

Therefore, don’t let anyone judge you in regard to food and drink or in the matter of a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath day. These are a shadow of what was to come; the substance is the Messiah. Let no one disqualify you, insisting on ascetic practices and the worship of angels, claiming access to a visionary realm and inflated without cause by his unspiritual mind. (Col 2:13-18, HCSB)

Through the cross, Jesus Christ has liberated us. His death fulfilled the law, and erased our debt and obligation to it. His death triumphed over, and disarmed, the demonic powers that were free to torment us for our failure to keep the law.

Paul says we are liberated to be free. Two more useful questions are, “What are we free from? What are we freed to?”

I’m so glad you asked. What follows all applies to me as much as to you, but I am going to write it as “you” so that you can appreciate the full impact of your freedom. As you consider your freedom, remember this is freedom that you have only in Christ. You didn’t get it. You didn’t earn it. You don’t get to keep it apart from Christ. But in Christ, you are indeed free. Let me explain what I mean by in Christ. You are in Christ when you keep on trusting him. I use the expression keep on trusting quite deliberately. It is a daily (sometimes hourly) habit of continuing to believe who Jesus is, what he has done for us, how he feels about us, and continuing to rest upon it. This is not a one shot deal. This is not a situation where you just say, “Well I got baptized, so I’m good now.” Or “Well, I got saved five years ago, so I’m good now.” This is a process of continually putting our trust in Jesus, day by day. That is what it means to be “in Jesus” and all these things are ours, only in Jesus. I’m not saying that you have to work hard and live the Christian life on your own strength in order to be in Jesus. But I am saying that to be in Jesus, you need to continually rest in Him with trust in what his Word says, and in what he has done for us.

So, in Christ Jesus, you are free.

You are free from the obligations of the Jewish ceremonial law, as Paul has made very clear throughout this letter.

You are free from subservience to the little regulations that religious people sometimes put on you. Things like: The way you dress. What you eat. The way you express worship. Dancing. The manner in which you pray. The music you listen to. Acting externally religious or pious. You don’t have to keep a formula to be right with God. You don’t have to follow man-made rules. Paul wrote to the Colossians:

If you died with the Messiah to the elemental forces of this world, why do you live as if you still belonged to the world? Why do you submit to regulations: “Don’t handle, don’t taste, don’t touch”? All these regulations refer to what is destroyed by being used up; they are commands and doctrines of men. Although these have a reputation of wisdom by promoting ascetic practices, humility, and severe treatment of the body, they are not of any value in curbing self-indulgence. (Col 2:20-23, HCSB

But wait, there’s more.

You are free from the eternal consequences of the fact that you have broken God’s moral law. That’s right, your sins no longer determine your status with God. No, they do not. If Jesus lives in you, he will want to express his life through you in a way that honors God’s moral law. But your failures at times do not determine your status with God. You are free from being defined by your failures and sins.

You are free from trying to make yourself good. Don’t you argue with me, yes you are. In Jesus Christ, God has already made you good. You are free from having to do that.

You are free from shame.

You are free from shame.

In Jesus, there is nothing wrong with who you are. You are not judged based upon your sins, or your failures, or your flaws. You are judged on the basis of the righteousness of Jesus.

You are free from the way others view you. You are even free from the way you view yourself. Now, you can accept the way God views you – which is through the “lens” of Jesus. It’s a little bit like this. When you are in Christ, God looks for you, and finds you there, in Jesus Christ. And what he sees you there, what he sees is Jesus. So he looks at you, and sees the righteousness of Jesus, the love of Jesus, the strength of Jesus, the honor of Jesus. If you are in him, you have the life of Jesus in you. God isn’t deceived when he sees all that, because it is there.

You are free to have joy without guilt. You are free to love yourself, because you are in Christ, and he is in you. You are free to follow the leading of Holy Spirit without beating yourself up for your failures. You are free to wallow with happiness in the fact that you are loved at the deepest core of your being. You are free to live as the person that God made you to be, and not according to the expectations of others.

You are free from trying to get God to bless you. Receive the blessings he chooses to give with joy, and trust him to bless because he is good, not because you are.

You are free from trying to get it right all the time. Let Jesus get it right through you, by continuing on, in Him.

You are free from figuring it out, managing it, controlling it. What is “it?” you ask? Only everything.

Really? Is all this true, without reservation?

Yes.

Paul will go on and talk about walking according to the Holy Spirit – what we might call, “Christian Living.” We’ll see how all that works when we get to that point. But before we move on and talk about Christian living, we have to make sure that we understand this freedom we have in Jesus. You are free. Don’t submit again to slavery. Stand firm.

The word “yoke” in the New Testament usually implies a sense of servitude or slavery. Jesus invited us to take his yoke, and Paul, later considered himself a servant or slave of Jesus. But Jesus said “slavery” to Him was easy, and the burden is light. Other New Testament passages use the word “yoke” with negative connotations about hard service. The Greek version of the Old Testament, also frequently uses the same word this way. So we have two paths: we can be bound to Jesus, but his yoke is easy and light; or, we can be bound in slavery to having to measure up. Listen to how Jesus invites us:

Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” (Matt 11:28-30, ESV2011)

Paul says, stand firm in the free and easy, restful yoke of Jesus. How do we do that? First, I think it is important to recognize that our battle is not against flesh and blood. The verses I just shared from Colossians show us that Jesus has disarmed the demonic powers. So, having been disarmed, their strategy now is to lie to you. They will come to you say, “I know Tom said you were free from shame, but he doesn’t know who you really are inside. You know that you deserve to live in shame.” This will sound like you, talking to yourself, but it is a lie from the pit of hell. Stand firm. Don’t submit to that slavery any more.

They will come and say, “It’s all good to say that you are free from trying to make yourself good, but after all, the bible tells you to follow certain standards of behavior.” In a few weeks we will get into all the stuff about Christian Living and Christian Behavior. Jesus wants to live his life through you, so of course, your behavior should look more and more like Jesus. But you don’t accomplish that by your efforts. You accomplish it by embracing who you are in Jesus, and continuing to trust him. Actually, Jesus accomplishes the “Christian living” through you. All you have to do is trust him, and let him do what he wants to in and through you.

To fight these lies, we should cling to the truth. Jesus said,

So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed Him, “If you continue in My word, you really are My disciples. You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” (John 8:31-32, HCSB)

If we continue in his word – this is part of what it means to be in Jesus Christ. We continue to trust him, and trust his word. His Word tells us the truth, and the truth sets us free. Practically speaking, that means that one very important way to stand firm in our freedom is to know the Bible, and continue to know it even better. Read it. If you aren’t a reader, there are plenty of great CD’s and MP3’s you can get so that you can listen to the Bible. Talk about it with your Christian friends. Grab a devotional that points back to the bible. Stand firm by staying in touch with what the Holy Spirit says through the bible.

It’s also helpful to have allies. Other believers who are continuing on in Jesus can encourage you as you do the same. Listening to these messages, praying together, talking about your struggles and joys – all these help you stand firm.

Sometimes, one of the best ways to stand firm in our freedom is to thank God for it, regularly. Often times, truth really seeps into the soul through the power of thankfulness. If you don’t thank someone for a gift, either you don’t like that person, or you don’t like the gift, or you don’t really believe it has been given you. Thanking God for all this freedom is one way of really grabbing hold of it.

In Jesus, you truly are free. Stand firm in it. Rejoice in it.

Do you have a Sense of Blessedness?

On By Pastor TomIn Bible Teaching, Christianity, Faith, Galatians, Jesus, UncategorizedLeave a comment

blessed

The sense of being blessed is one of the key differences between living by law and living by grace. If you think it is up to you live the Christian life, up to you to please God, it will be hard to feel blessed.

To listen to the sermon, click the play button:

To download, right click on the link (or do whatever you do on a Mac) and save it to your computer: Download Galatians Part 12

Galatians # 12. Chapter 4:12-16

This next little section of Galatians is a very personal appeal from Paul, and it contains a kind of buffet of several different spiritual truths. Please ask the Holy Spirit to show you what he wants to show you here, and then we’ll dig in.

Up until this point, Paul has been pretty stern with the Galatians. Here is a sampling of his tone so far:

As we have said before, I now say again: If anyone preaches to you a gospel contrary to what you received, a curse be on him! For am I now trying to win the favor of people, or God? Or am I striving to please people? If I were still trying to please people, I would not be a slave of Christ. (Gal 1:9-10, HCSB)

Now from those recognized as important (what they really were makes no difference to me; God does not show favoritism) — they added nothing to me. (Gal 2:6, HCSB)

You foolish Galatians! Who has hypnotized you, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was vividly portrayed as crucified? I only want to learn this from you: Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish? (Gal 3:1-3, HCSB)

Paul was clearly upset about what was happening in the Galatian churches. He wasted no time in telling them how wrong and foolish they were. But at this point, (4:11 and following) he moderates his tone a little bit. First, he says, “Become like me, for I became like you.”

I think Paul is referring to the fact that although he was a Jew and Pharisee, he lived with, ate with and associated with the non-Jewish Galatians. He became like them, living as if we were not Jewish. Through Christ, he had the freedom to do this. Now, he urges them to do the same. Remember, certain leaders in these Churches were telling them they had to obey all the Jewish laws to be a Christian. Paul reminds them, that was not how he behaved. He was like them. He is saying, “Look, I was Jewish, and I became like a Gentile. Now you, who have been trying to be Jewish, become like Gentiles again!”

Now, most of us have already become like Paul, in the sense that we don’t strictly follow Jewish regulations. But I think there are two places where this might possibly to speak to us. First, I think it says something about reaching out to others. People do not have to act like us, look like us, talk like us or dress like us before they can become part of our church. They didn’t have to become like Paul – that is, Jewish – in order to receive Jesus. If anything, Paul became more like them. There are, of course some bottom-line aspects to Christianity. To be a Christian, you have to trust Jesus, and surrender your life to him. But once a person does that, we can trust the Holy Spirit to begin manifesting the life of Jesus in that person. We can trust the Holy Spirit to lead that person away from sin. But it doesn’t say anything in the Bible about us all looking the same. The life of Jesus is available to anyone who is willing to surrender control of his or her own life to Him.

Second, it is a reiteration of our freedom in Christ. Some Christians try to put rules on silly things. For instance, you must dress a certain way at church (or all the time); you cannot drink, even in moderation without getting drunk; you can’t watch certain movies, or listen to certain types of music, or dance, or….you fill in the blank. These things are not essential to faith in Jesus Christ. They are external rules. Paul says in Colossians that these rules have little value, spiritually speaking:

If you died with the Messiah to the elemental forces of this world, why do you live as if you still belonged to the world? Why do you submit to regulations: “Don’t handle, don’t taste, don’t touch”? All these regulations refer to what is destroyed by being used up; they are commands and doctrines of men. Although these have a reputation of wisdom by promoting ascetic practices, humility, and severe treatment of the body, they are not of any value in curbing self-indulgence. (Col 2:20-23, HCSB)

Next, Paul makes this statement:

You have not wronged me; you know that previously I preached the gospel to you because of a physical illness. You did not despise or reject me though my physical condition was a trial for you.

Bible scholars debate what exactly Paul’s physical ailment was. Martin Luther believes that when Paul came to the Galatians, he was suffering from the effects of physical persecution. We know that many times Paul was beaten up by mobs. Sometimes he was arrested and whipped. Several times he was imprisoned, and we can assume during some of those incidents, he suffered at the hands of the jailers and the other prisoners. In the Galatian area, in one place he was stoned and left for dead (Acts 14:19).

Other people thought that Paul had a recurring illness. In 2 Corinthians 12:7, Paul speaks of a “thorn in the flesh,” that sounds like it might be a recurring physical problem. Many people suspect that he had some disease of the eyes. We know that on the road to Damascus, Paul was blinded for three days. Here in this passage, he says the Galatians would have torn out their own eyes to give to him. At the end of the letter, he writes this:

Look at what large letters I use as I write to you in my own handwriting. (Gal 6:11, HCSB)

Most of Paul’s letters were actually written down by other people (often, his friend and colleague, Silas). Usually, he just signed them personally at the end. 2 Thessalonians 3:17 is typical of the end of many of his letters:

This greeting is in my own hand — Paul. This is a sign in every letter; this is how I write. (2Thess 3:17, HCSB)

All this suggests that maybe Paul’s vision was not very good, and perhaps he had a condition that flared up and worsened at times. In any case, far from coming to them as strong and having it all together, he first came to them in weakness and in need. This again, is a helpful thing for us as we consider how to reach out to people who don’t know Jesus yet. We don’t have to have it all put together. In fact, sometimes, when we have some kind of need, it opens a door to relationship with others, and opens a door for us to share Jesus with those who help us.

Paul’s other point here is that in spite of all of his rebukes and strong language, he is not upset about their personal interactions. His intensity is not about personality conflicts. It is about the truth of the good news of Jesus Christ. He is saying, “Look, this isn’t personal. I know how you cared for me.” He is reminding them of the joy and friendship that existed between them when they were together. He doesn’t want them to think he is angry for some offense against himself. It is about the truth, not personal conflict. In verse sixteen He says, “Have I become your enemy by telling you the truth?”

I have to say, I have very strong feelings about this subject. Paul is making a distinction here that is absolutely critical for Christians in the world today. In essence, he is saying this: “I love you and appreciate you as people. We have a wonderful friendship. I am even indebted to you. What I say to you does not negate that. You do need to know, however, that your belief, and the direction that your life is going, is wrong.”

The fact that he calls them wrong, takes nothing away from his love for them. In his mind, at least, it doesn’t affect their friendship and the close feelings that existed between Paul and the Galatian Christians. It is simply that, because he loves them, he must make sure that they know the truth. The world rarely understands this. Rick Warren, author of the Purpose Driven Life puts it like this:

Our culture has accepted two huge lies. The first is that if you disagree with someone’s lifestyle, you must fear or hate them. The second is that to love someone means you agree with everything they believe or do. Both are nonsense

That is exactly what Paul is saying here to the Galatians. He is saying, “I love you and appreciate you. This letter isn’t about that. But this letter is about the truth of what we believe and how we live.” The world usually doesn’t understand this attitude. But it is something that we Christians need to keep practicing anyway. Perhaps you have friends or family members who claim to be Christians and are living together, but are not married. The truth is, according to the Bible, that is a sin. But there is no sense in which we should hate someone who does this. There is no way in which we should ever treat them badly, or speak to them hurtfully. If the subject comes up, or if the Holy Spirit leads you to bring it up, we do need to tell the truth. But the fact that we believe as we do does NOT mean that we hate everyone who disagrees with us, or who lives according to different moral standards.

The big moral issue of our present time, of course, is homosexuality. Genesis 19; Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13; Romans 1:27-29; 1 Corinthians 6:9 and Jude 1:9 all teach that homosexual sex is sinful. The bible doesn’t say it is wrong to be tempted, or to consider oneself gay, but it does teach that rather than engage in gay sex, people should remain celibate. Now, many people who call themselves Christian disagree with me. They either ignore some or all of those verses, or they have a different way of interpreting them. For many reasons, I think their bible scholarship and interpretation is very poorly done; and of course, they don’t like my way of understanding the Bible.

But I don’t think acting on gay feelings is worse than any other sin. We are all saved only through Jesus, and I am no better than anyone else. I do not hate gay people. No Christian should. I do not fear them, or what they represent. We shouldn’t mock or hurt gay folks, or deprive them of any civil right. In a free society, everyone ought to have the right to live as they see fit. I have gay people in my family, and I love, respect, and accept them as they are. And we should not hate people who disagree with us about this issue. I certainly don’t.

I’m sure many people have difficulty understanding this, but disagreement is not the same thing as hate or bigotry. If it was, everybody would have to hate billions of people for millions of reasons. If you think you have to agree fully with someone before you can love them or they you, you are in a sad, sad situation. The world is a very big, very diverse place. There are very few people in any group in the world who agree upon everything. If you threatened by people who disagree with you, maybe you need to get out more, and spend more time around such folks. We don’t have to be enemies. In fact, for our part, Christians should not think of anyone besides the devil and his cohorts as the enemy.

Let me give you one more example, as long as I’m in the middle of such controversy. In the course of my life, I have had many friendships with Muslim people. They honestly believe I am going to hell for believing that Jesus is in nature, God. I believe they are going to hell for refusing to receive God’s grace and forgiveness through Jesus. I have discussed these things openly with every Muslim friend I have had. And it has never been a problem for those friendships. I know there are Muslim extremists out there, obviously. But I am telling you, in my personal experience with Muslim people, this is how it has been.

If Muslims and Christians can disagree so fundamentally, and still accept each other, and get along and be friends, certainly we Christians ought to be able to do that with people who are more similar to us. Actually, we are supposed to do that with everyone.

I want to look at one more thing in this passage. In Galatians 4:15 Paul says to the Galatians:

What happened to this sense of being blessed that you had?

This is an important part of the entire message of the book of Galatians. The sense of being blessed is one of the key differences between living by law and living by grace. If you think it is up to you live the Christian life, up to you to please God, it will be hard to feel blessed. If it is up to you to get God to act on your behalf, you might feel obligation. You probably, at some point, feel fear, guilt and especially shame that you aren’t good enough. Sometimes, maybe, you manage to do pretty well, or at least to think you are doing pretty well. Then you might feel self-satisfied; you might even fall into sinful pride. Even so, you’ll feel the pressure to keep doing well. But either way, you probably won’t feel blessed.

We feel blessed when we know – truly know – that we are loved. We feel blessed when we know we have received far more than we could ever earn or deserve, and that it is all given freely, with no thought that we could, or even should, try to repay it. We feel blessed when we are secure in the love and grace and approval of God. All this comes only through Jesus; we get it when we trust him and surrender control of our life to him.

Do you have a sense of being blessed? Or is your life all obligation, shame and fear, or self-satisfaction and pride? At times we lose the sense of being blessed because Jesus is not a very big deal in our lives. We sweep him off into a corner of our lives that we call “religion” or “church.” If he doesn’t have much room to be in your life, naturally, there is not a large sense of being blessed.

For others, sometimes, even after we receive Jesus, he needs to work healing in us, to deal with shame and guilt that is left from our past. But through him, we can receive that sense of being blessed.

Take a minute now, to let God show you that because of Jesus, he approves of you. That’s right, through Jesus, we have God’s approval. Let that sink in, and receive again that sense of being blessed.

WHEN TRADITION HURTS FAITH

On By Pastor TomIn Bible Teaching, Christianity, Church, Faith, Galatians, Jesus, TN, UncategorizedLeave a comment

traditions

To listen to the sermon, click the play button:

To download, right click on the link (or do whatever you do on a Mac) and save it to your computer: Download Galatians Part 11

GALATIANS #11 . Chapter #4:8-11

8 But in the past, when you didn’t know God, you were enslaved to things3 that by nature are not gods. 9 But now, since you know God, or rather have become known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and bankrupt elemental forces? Do you want to be enslaved to them all over again? 10 You observe special days, months, seasons, and years. 11 I am fearful for you, that perhaps my labor for you has been wasted.

The Galatians probably worshipped the Roman/Greek pagan gods, and this is mostly likely what Paul is referring to when he refers to their past. But this makes it an interesting statement. The Galatians are not trying to go back and worship pagan gods – they are trying to follow Jewish Laws and earn something from the true God. But Paul says, this would be just the same as going back to the pagan gods. He says “How can you go back again to these bankrupt elemental principles?” Elemental principles is that word “stoikeon,” which we talked about last time. It is the idea that one thing necessarily follows another; the idea that you earn what you get, and you get what you deserve. Although many things in the universe do generally operate this way, Paul explained last time that this is not how God operates spiritually with those who are in Jesus Christ. Last time we saw that what God says to us is this: “Stoikeon doesn’t work for you, because you aren’t able to do anything of real value to me. So instead, we’ll let Jesus do all the work, and through Him, I’ll adopt you as my dearly beloved children. Let’s have no more of this ‘you do something for me, and in return I’ll do something for you.’ Instead, through Jesus, I’ll treat you as my kids, and you treat me as your daddy.”

Paul says here that going back to that idea of trying to do something for God in order to get him to do something for us, is the same as going back to the old pagan worship that the Galatians used to practice. Even if they are following Jewish Law, they are doing it with the same attitude and relationship with God that is exhibited in their old pagan worship. Pagan worship was all about “stoikeon” or “sequential principles.” If you wanted the help of a god, then you made some sort of sacrifice or vow to the deity you need to please, and you got his or her help in return. Usually in pagan worship, you had to follow the rituals of worship precisely. You had to do and say the right things at the right time in order to get the desired result.

Paul says that when they seek to follow the Jewish law, the Galatians are doing exactly the same kind of thing. They are attempting to do things for God so he will do things for them. Jewish Law emphasizes following certain rituals, and doing things the right way. Paul says, “You observe special days, months, seasons and years.” And he says that the fact that they do this scares him. It makes him think they are losing their faith.

What were the special days and seasons they were observing? The entire letter was written because the Galatians were starting to believe that in addition to believing in Jesus, they had to follow the Jewish law. We need to understand a little bit about Jewish law. The Old Testament, of course, contains many rituals and laws that Jews were supposed to keep. But there is more to it than that. Over the years, Jewish rabbis taught extensively about the Old Testament, and their teachings were passed down orally from one generation to the next. These teachings, or commentaries on the Old Testament, came to be seen as an essential part of Jewish doctrine. Eventually, these commentaries were written down and collected, and today they are called “the Talmud.” So Jewish law came to mean much more than even just the Old Testament. Paul himself, before converting to Christianity, was a rising star in the Talmudic tradition of Hillel.

Though the Talmud was still in development during New Testament times, many of its teachings were already established at that time. So, for instance, the Old Testament commands us to remember the Sabbath and keep it holy. Over the centuries, the Jews grappled with what exactly that means, in practical terms. By the time of Jesus, most Jews accepted to remember the Sabbath and keep it holy, there were “sub-rules,” you had to follow, rules found in Talmudic teaching. For instance, you could only take a certain number of steps, or carry certain things.

I suspect that the Galatians were following both Old Testament commands, and also commands and rituals that were part of the Talmudic tradition. They probably followed a strict Talmudic interpretation of the Sabbath, and celebrated the Jewish events like New Moon, the first and seventh month and the Feasts of Unleavened Bread, Pentecost, and the festival of Booths. Paul writes about these things more specifically to the Colossians:

Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ. (Col 2:16-17, ESV2011)

Now, it isn’t that these things are bad in and of themselves. Our church, New Joy Fellowship, celebrates the Jewish Feast of Passover every year. But there are two important things to remember, and this is what Paul is getting at:

  1. Such things, in and of themselves do not contribute to our salvation or worth in God’s eyes. Celebrate the Passover, or don’t. Eat Pork, or not – it doesn’t matter, spiritually. You won’t be more holy if you do these things; you won’t be less holy if you do. Following laws and traditions will not get God to love you more, and they won’t manipulate God into blessing you. God doesn’t relate to us according to sequential principles.
  2. Such things are shadows; the substance is Christ. Sometimes they are helpful, but they are only helpful if they point us to the real thing, which is Christ. Tradition is nothing, Christ is everything. Tradition is great if it points us to Christ, it is inherently spiritually dangerous if it does anything other than that.

I heard a great quote last week. A pastor at a conference said, “Tradition is the living faith of dead people, but traditionalism is the dead faith of living people.” Tradition can be good. When we remember how people who have gone before us lived their lives in faith and hope, it encourages hope and faith in us. We can use memories and repeated traditions to remind us of those faithful believers who have gone on to their reward. We can use traditions to keep pointing us toward the substance, which is Jesus Christ. But sometimes our faith becomes tied to the traditions. We start to feel that we must keep certain traditions, and if we don’t, we haven’t done it right. We sort of get the idea not that traditions is there to help encourage us, but rather, that certain traditions are a necessary part of our faith. This is what Paul is so concerned about.

Let me give a few examples of good traditions that can lead us astray when we think they are necessary. One of those is the altar call. That is a tradition in most Baptist churches. Sometimes it is helpful. But if you find yourself thinking that no worship service is truly complete without an altar call, you are in danger. If you think the only proper way to get saved is to come to the front of church during an altar call, you are in grave of becoming traditionalist, of confusing living faith with tradition. Lutherans have a lot of traditions in worship too. Some of them can be helpful at times. But if we get the idea that it isn’t really a worship service unless we say the Lord’s prayer, or stand for the reading of the gospel, we are in danger of confusing living faith with tradition.

Our church typically doesn’t fight over these kinds of things, but there are thousands of churches that do fight over traditions; things that are not necessary to true and living faith in Jesus Christ. The reason it becomes such a big deal is that people start thinking traditions are the same thing as faith. They are not. They are only there to aid it, and when they are not useful, they should not be used. The danger of relying too much on tradition is that some people end up with only tradition, and no real faith that is active and alive.

Picture a battery powered radio, the kind of thing we used to call a “boom box.” Imagine someone brought one of these radios to a remote village in Papua New Guinea where there was no electricity. Picture the villagers amazed and thrilled as they hear the music coming from the radio. Imagine the hours they spend, uplifted and made joyful by the music. Every evening at the same time, after they are done with their hard work, the villagers gather together around the radio to listen to the music. They call it “music time.”

But as time goes on, those batteries will die. Picture a time when the music starts to fade, and then imagine one day, it is gone. Now, what will those villagers do? If they are sensible, they will make their own music and enjoy it, and perhaps hope for a time when someone will bring new batteries to the village, so that the radio may be refreshed. But it is entirely possible that after a long time of gathering together every night to listen to the music, they may retain the habit, even after the batteries die. The radio is no longer bringing them music, but still they gather and look at it. Eventually, the villagers may even forget why they gather each night to look at the radio. It’s just what they do. If asked, many of them will say they do it because of music. As they forget, they have started to think of the evening time gathered around the radio as their “music time,” even though music has long ceased to be a part of it.

That is how some of us are with traditions. Tradition is there to bring us the “music” of faith. But tradition itself is not the same as faith. It can bring the music, but it is not music in itself. Sometimes we continue to follow traditions long after they have ceased to encourage our faith. Sometimes we get mixed up, and we forget that our faith is something greater and more alive than the traditions that once helped us in it. We even sometimes start to think that the traditions are faith, or at least an inseparable part of it.

So, we think we haven’t worshipped if we didn’t say a certain prayer or have an altar call or sing a certain song. We think it is isn’t a real church if it doesn’t have candles, or an altar, or a cross, or if it is in someone’s home, or…[you fill in the blank]. We start to think you have to have a guitar, or you can’t have a guitar and many other silly things.

Now, let me be clear. When tradition brings you closer to Jesus and makes you more open to the Holy Spirit, it is a wonderful and useful thing. There is nothing wrong with embracing those kinds of traditions. We need all the help we can get. But we need to be careful that we do not start to think that traditions are necessary to faith, or that they are the same thing as faith.

This is a normal, human tendency, and this is why Paul was so frightened when he heard about the Galatians mindlessly following the Jewish traditions. They were perverting the true gospel, adding on requirements, as if what Jesus did was not enough. They were confusing things that were designed to help faith, with the substance of faith itself.

DADDY TIME!

On By Pastor TomIn Bible Teaching, Christianity, Church, Churches in Lebanon, Faith, Galatians, Jesus, TN, Uncategorized1 Comment

daddy&baby

 

To listen to the sermon, click the play button:

 

To download, right click on the link (or do whatever you do on a Mac) and save it to your computer: Download Galatians Part 10

 

 

 

Galatians #10 . Chapter 4:1-7

1 Now I say that as long as the heir is a child, he differs in no way from a * slave, though he is the owner of everything. 2 Instead, he is under guardians and stewards until the time set by his father. 3 In the same way we also, when we were children, were in slavery under the elemental forces1 of the world. 4 When the time came to completion, God sent His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, 5 to * redeem those under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. 6 And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of His Son into our2 hearts, crying, “* Abba, Father! ” 7 So you are no longer a slave but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God

The last thing we looked at was how Paul describes the law as a Chaperone, or Guardian. This is a continuation of that thought. He says that the heir lives as a slave until he comes into inheritance at the time set by the father. The heir is not free when he is a child – he needs to obey the guardians and stewards in his life.

So, Paul points out that even the chosen people of God (the Jews) were “slaves” in a sense – slaves to the guardian, the Law. We too, before coming into the full inheritance of Jesus Christ, were slaves. We were slaves to the “elementary forces” of the world. The Greek word is “stoikeon” (stoiceion, if anyone cares). Essentially it means “basic, sequential principles.” You might say it is the idea of “one thing leads to another.”

Here is an example of stoikeos in action. You bend down to pick something up off the floor in the kitchen. Next, someone opens a drawer above you. Then, you straighten up and hit your head. Finally, your head hurts. Next time you are there when a friend or family member bangs her head, and exclaims that it hurts, say, “that’s just stoikeos in action.” She’ll appreciate it greatly.

If you take two things and add two more things, you have four things. That’s stoikeon. You might even call it natural law. Here’s another example of a stoikeon: If you sin, the presence of God is so holy that it will destroy you. Sin separates you from God. The spiritual side of stoikeos, is that you get what you deserve. You earn God’s favor and blessing, or his wrath. That’s the natural state of things. It is similar to the idea of karma – you get what you deserve. Your actions lead to either things that are good for yourself, or bad for you.

That is how the law works. If you do the right thing, you get the good thing. If you do the wrong thing, you get the bad thing. Remember, the law isn’t bad. It isn’t wrong or inaccurate. It just isn’t possible for us. Because of that, this arrangement really didn’t work out for us.

Paul has been telling us that there is a new arrangement. The law can’t be eliminated. But we can’t do it. So Jesus did it on our behalf. And he took on himself, our consequences for failing to do it. The law is now satisfied, not broken. And we can move on, in the presence of God, without being destroyed.

Now, I don’t mean to say that now we should sin all we want to. I have talked about this in every message for the past several weeks. We admit we cannot do it; we believe that Jesus can and will do it for us, and we trust him to do it in us and through us.

But a lot of believers are mistaken about how things work now. We think, “OK, Jesus saved us from being destroyed by God’s presence. Now, I am in relationship with God. If I take care of his stuff, he’ll take care of mine.” This is a trap. We think that if we are good little boys and girls, then God will reward us with candy: that is, earthly blessings. Then, when that doesn’t work out the way we think it should, we get angry and upset and disappointed with God. We did our part, why didn’t God do his part? Or, maybe we didn’t do our part, because we didn’t hear from him what we were supposed to do. Why didn’t he make it more clear?

We do not live in relationship of karma. We don’t have the kind of relationship with God where if we do something for him, he does something for us. Instead, God says, “That won’t work, because you can’t do anything that is worthwhile to me. How about instead, I treat you as my children, my heirs? I will do for you what I know is best for your eternal self, and you just keep trusting that what I am doing is good, and good for you.”

We sometimes say, “I don’t care about my ‘eternal self,’ I just want to feel good now.” I understand that attitude. I’ve had it at many points in my life, and I won’t say I’ll never have it again. But it is not a mature attitude. It isn’t wise, or even smart. We see this in three year olds, who think they want many things that will not actually make them happy. Three-year-olds aren’t mature enough to distinguish what is truly best for them, so wise, loving parents do not always give them what they want.

Now, I am not saying that there is no order in the universe. Often times, one thing really does lead to another. If you manage your money wisely, it is likely that you will have enough. If you spend your money frivolously and without thought, you might end up short. Even morally, there is order. Wrong-doing tends to lead to bad results. Avoiding sins like drunkenness and promiscuity and dishonesty often leads to a better life here and now than engaging in those things. That’s because that is how the universe works – God made it that way.

But we don’t have a quid-pro-quo relationship with God. It isn’t “I’ll scratch your back, you scratch mine.” It is, this: “Lord, I owe you everything and I can’t repay it. I trust you. I’m in your hands.”

Jesus was born under the law, as we are. He was born of a woman – that is, in addition to being Divine, he was also human, like us. Because of that, he could fulfill the law. The result is our adoption as sons.

I pointed this out last time, but it bears repeating. We are all sons. Not that we are all male-children, but that we are all the legitimate inheritors of God’s family name, the legitimate inheritors of his riches and grace. Through Jesus Christ, we truly belong to God, and belong in his family.

Paul adds this:

And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba, Father! ” (Gal 4:6, HCSB)

“Abba” is basically the Aramaic word for “Daddy.” Through Jesus, we are such legitimate, dearly loved children, that we can call God “Daddy.” Paul writes something very similar in Romans chapter 8:

For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption, by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father! ” The Spirit Himself testifies together with our spirit that we are God’s children, (Rom 8:15-16, HCSB)

I am fortunate in that my earthly, physical, father has always been an overwhelmingly positive influence in my life. But I know many people who do not have a positive view of fathers, because their own dad was distant, or troubled, or even abusive. Some people respond to this by saying we should not talk about God as a Father, because that is negative for a lot of folks. Nobody has a perfect dad – not even my kids. So, for some, the picture of God as a father may at first be negative or scary or distant. But the point is, God is a perfect father. He loves us perfectly. He cares for us more than any earthly father is capable of. What your earthly father lacked, God does not lack. What your earthly father did wrong, God does not do. The love, attention and affection you may have craved and never received from your earthly dad, is available to you now, in your heavenly Daddy.

Take a moment to Listen to the Father’s heart:

“But now, this is what the Lord says – he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you O Israel: Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine…

Since you are precious and honored in my sight, and because I love you, I will give men in exchange for you, and people in exchange for your life. Do not be afraid, for I am with you; I will bring your children from the east and gather you from the west. I will say to the north, ‘Give them up!’ and to the south, ‘Do not hold them back.’ Bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth – everyone who is called by my name…” (Isaiah 43:1,4-7)

This is God’s attitude toward us – his children. He calls us his sons and daughters and he says we are precious and honored in his sight. He says we are his. He loves us and is willing to make huge sacrifices for us. He is on your side. You can feel safe when you talk with him.

I took a break from writing this to pick out the songs for the service this week. I realize we don’t have many songs written specifically to God the Father. We praise the Lord and we worship God. We praise Jesus quite frequently. There are a few songs that praise God as Father, Son and Holy Spirit, but very few indeed that invite us to worship and praise the Father in his Fatherhood. Even the old hymns don’t have a lot of this.

But this is a tremendous gift.

Jesus once told the parable of the prodigal’s son. When the younger, irresponsible brother returned, the Father embraced him, loved on him, and threw him a party. But the older brother was not pleased.

But he replied to his father, ‘Look, I have been slaving many years for you, and I have never disobeyed your orders, yet you never gave me a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your assets with prostitutes, you slaughtered the fattened calf for him.’ “ ‘Son,’ he said to him, ‘you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. (Luke 15:29-31, HCSB)

The tragedy is this: The older brother had been living like a slave, when he was truly a son. So Paul says to us in verse seven:

So you are no longer a slave but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God

You are no longer a slave, but a son. Again, not necessarily, a male, but the bearer of God’s family name, a dearly beloved child who can walk into the Father’s presence and say, “Hi, Daddy!” Your position as a dear child is not based upon your performance. It is based upon the performance of Jesus.

You don’t have to live like a slave. All that the Father has is yours, in Jesus.

WHY PALM SUNDAY? WHAT’S THE POINT?

On By Pastor TomIn Bible Teaching, Church, Jesus, Sermon, TN, UncategorizedLeave a comment

palmsunday13

It wasn’t wrong for the Palm Sunday crowd to have a raucous celebration. It wasn’t wrong for them to want deliverance from the Romans. But the real thing, the most important thing, was deeper than that.

To listen to the sermon, click the play button:

To download, right click on the link (or do whatever you do on a Mac) and save it to your computer: Download Palm Sunday 2013

PALM SUNDAY 2013

Each year, Christians celebrate and remember the last week in the life of Jesus before his resurrection. We call it “Holy Week.” For Jesus, the week began when he rode into Jerusalem on the back of a donkey, to cries of praise and celebration from the people. By Friday night of the same week, he was hanging dead on a Roman crucifix. On the very next Sunday, he rose from death; one week in total after riding into Jerusalem.

It was a kind of Holy Week for the Jews of that time too. The ancient Jewish calendar was different from ours, and sometime in March (it varies from year to year) was the beginning of the Jewish New Year. Fourteen days into the New Year, the Jews celebrated Passover – a feast commemorating their deliverance from slavery in Egypt. Following Passover was a week-long celebration – the Festival of Unleavened Bread. Although you could celebrate this wherever you lived, most Jews felt the best place to spend Passover and Unleavened Bread was in Jerusalem. Then, forty days later was the Feast of Pentecost. Picture this time of year a little bit Thanksgiving and Christmas in the United States. A lot of people traveled to be with family and loved ones. There was a delicious meal (usually the same every year) and good feelings and a lot of gratitude. Along with it was the knowledge that you were all probably going to get together again in a bit more than a month, for Pentecost. In Israel, this was the “most wonderful time of the year.”

So there was a big crowd headed into Jerusalem that day, just three days before the Passover and the start the Festival. They were probably in a good mood. They were ready for something new and exciting to happen. Then along comes Jesus, riding on a donkey. Certainly, he could not have been the only person riding a donkey into Jerusalem that day. But Luke records that his disciples started shouting and praising God joyfully. Matthew says that the people directly in front of Jesus and those behind him took up the cry. John records that many of the people there for the festival had heard about Jesus raising Lazarus. So they went out to meet him and joined in the praises. Soon, it was a kind of uproar that stirred up the whole city:

When He entered Jerusalem, the whole city was shaken, saying, “Who is this? ” (Matt 21:10, HCSB)

The people took up the cry of Zechariah 9:9

Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is he, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. (Zech 9:9, ESV2011)

That particular prophecy of Zechariah was all about salvation and deliverance. Many Jews probably felt it was fulfilled in some ways when the Maccabeus Family led the rebellion that freed Israel from Greek rule, some hundred and sixty years before the time of Jesus. Now they were thinking that maybe God was going to do the same thing to the Romans and to king Herod, through this Jesus. They were thinking salvation all right, but political salvation.

Now the truth is, I think most of the crowd was cheering in ignorance, and for the wrong reasons. After the crucifixion, the entire number of Jesus’ followers was about 120. But this crowd sounds a lot bigger than that. It would take more than 120 people to shake up the whole city. So a lot people were cheering who didn’t know Jesus very well, or only knew of him. It was party time, and they were partying. It sounded exciting. They thought maybe they had a new Judas Maccabeus on their hands, and maybe they were going to be free from the oppression of Rome and king Herod (Herod was not a Jew).

But why did Jesus do this? What Matthew records makes it sound like Jesus planned it. Luke and Mark also suggest that it was intentional on Jesus’ part. But the crowd had all the wrong reasons, so why did Jesus do it?

Matthew records one of the reasons: it fulfilled the prophecy of Zechariah 9. Some of that prophecy certainly sounds like military deliverance from oppressing nations. In fact, it mentions war against Greece, so some of it may indeed have been fulfilled by the Maccabeus Family. Remember, however, biblical prophecies usually have multiple layers that are not necessarily fulfilled at in one piece. And there are other clues in Zechariah 9 that show us, whatever else it was about, it was also about Jesus.

It says that the one coming to Jerusalem on the donkey is righteous. Who else is truly righteous besides Jesus? It says he is the true king. Who has the right to claim kingship, but him? It says he is bringing salvation, and that he is humble and peaceful. Zechariah 9:11-12, a few verses later, also says this:

As for you also, because of the blood of my covenant with you, I will set your prisoners free from the waterless pit. Return to your stronghold, O prisoners of hope; today I declare that I will restore to you double. (Zech 9:11-12, ESV2011)

Prisoners are set free and given hope – because of the blood of the covenant. Jesus was riding into Jerusalem to shed his blood, to create the New Covenant, sealed with his blood, brought about by his death. Certainly, at the time, no one else knew that, but Jesus did. And later, John writes, the disciples remembered it (John 12:16).

Jesus did this for other reasons too. It was time for him to give up his life for our sins. I think he was deliberately provoking the Jewish leaders into taking the actions that would lead to his crucifixion. Up until this very last week of his earthly life, Jesus had kept a fairly low profile, and avoided popular acclaim and confrontation with the Jewish leaders. But now, I think he was deliberately antagonizing them so that they would do what had to be done.

Finally, if Jesus really is who we believe he is, he was always worthy of worship at any moment in time. So, it is only good and right that as people come to celebrate the Passover, they worshipped the true Passover lamb who would give his life so that they could be spared. It is entirely appropriate that people worship him. He said as much to the Pharisees who criticized him.

Another question I have about all this Palm Sunday stuff, is this: why was it preserved for us in the Bible? Frankly, I don’t think most Christians get the point any more than the First Century Jews. The Jews got all excited about Passover and the Festival of Unleavened Bread, and I’m sure many of them forgot that it was really all about God’s deliverance. We have the same issues in America with Christmastime and Thanksgiving. We get all happy and excited, but often neglect real thankfulness or real remembrance of Jesus. And we do the same with Palm Sunday.

Most churches I’ve been to wave palm leaves around at some point in the service. I’ve been in churches where they brought in live donkeys and camels for Palm Sunday. People shout and jump and sing, just like the Jews did on that first Palm Sunday. Just like the Jews did in ignorance. But we should know better, now.

It reminds me of Elijah’s experience with God:

Then He said, “Go out and stand on the mountain in the LORD’s presence.” At that moment, the LORD passed by. A great and mighty wind was tearing at the mountains and was shattering cliffs before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake there was a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire there was a voice, a soft whisper. When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. (1Kgs 19:11-13, HCSB)

We look for God in the excitement, the noise, the action. And there is some of God in that, sometimes. But Elijah found that the heart of God was something, deeper, quieter, more meaningful. It wasn’t wrong for the Palm Sunday crowd to have a raucous celebration. It wasn’t wrong for them to want deliverance from the Romans. But the real thing, the most important thing, was deeper than that. Two-thousand years later, Judas Maccabeus is sort of a footnote in the ancient history of the Greek empire; many of you may not have heard about him before today. And that’s what the Jews were looking for – another person to give them temporary relief, another person who would end up as just another historical footnote. But they got someone who would not change their local political situation at all. Instead, he changed the entire world.

I think we need to take notice of this. Too often, our vision is too small and limited. We just want Jesus to give us a better job, or more compliant kids, or a more compliant spouse. Those aren’t necessarily bad things to want; it’s just that the vision is too small. What he wants to do inside our soul and spirit is so much bigger than a temporary situation fix. He has a permanent solution to the holes inside our hearts. He has brought us hope, and grace and love and permanent salvation; he has sealed it with his blood.

Zechariah’s prophecy says: “Behold, your king is coming to you, righteous and having salvation.” I say the same thing: Jesus is coming to us. Do you recognize him as your king, the one with the right to rule your life? Are you willing to be part of his real mission, not to temporarily change a little corner of your world, but to bring hope and salvation to all people for eternity? Are you willing to receive not just what you want, but what he chooses to do in your life and with your life?

Right after “Palm Sunday,” Jesus made this comment:

“I assure you: Unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains by itself. But if it dies, it produces a large crop. The one who loves his life will lose it, and the one who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. If anyone serves Me, he must follow Me. Where I am, there My servant also will be. If anyone serves Me, the Father will honor him. (John 12:24-26, HCSB)

Jesus literally gave up his life. The result was eternal salvation for billions. He invites us to join him – not necessarily to literally lose our physical life (though he has called some to martyrdom) but to surrender our hearts and minds and wills to him, so that in return we can receive his salvation and honor.

The party is fine, as far it goes. The celebration is fun. The happiness is good and right and genuine. But let’s use Palm Sunday this year as an opportunity to go deeper, to engage with the real mission of Jesus, and to receive him as our true king.

HOW DO WE LIVE BY THE PROMISE?

On By Pastor TomIn apostle paul, Bible Teaching, Christianity, Faith, Galatians, Jesus, Uncategorized1 Comment

lighthouse

The law is still right. It is still good. It still reflects the character of God. But it is no longer something external to us. When we trust Jesus, The character of Jesus is being formed inside us. We learn to rely on the Spirit within us to guide us; we learn to listen and respond obediently to his prompting. We no longer consult a rule-book. We consult a person.

To listen to the sermon, click the play button:

To download, right click on the link (or do whatever you do on a Mac) and save it to your computer: Download Galatians Part 9

GALATIANS #9

The Law shows the absolute necessity of the promise. The law shows us our need for the promise. If we didn’t have the law, we wouldn’t understand the holy character of God. If we didn’t have the law, we would not realize that sin is a problem, and one we cannot overcome. The Law isn’t wrong. The problem is, we can’t do it.

The Law is not in contradiction to the promise. It was given as complement, to show that the promise was needed. God gave the promise first, to invite his people to live by faith. But he gave the law later, to help them understand why they needed to live by faith.

In Galatians 3:24 it says that the law was our guardian. Although the Greek word sounds like “pedagogue,” (which in English means “instructor of children,” or “teacher”) it has a different meaning here. The best English translation might be chaperone.

In the culture of New Testament times, the guardian, or chaperone, was there to make sure that boys who were intended to be great and noble did not “go bad.” They were there to keep them from making stupid mistakes, or compromising moral character. They protected them from both physical harm and moral harm.

That was the purpose of the law, and in some ways, is the continuing purpose of the law. Sometimes we view the law as a restriction – it seems to be a fence, keeping us in, restricting our freedom. But what there is a cliff on the other side? What if the wall is actually preventing us from great harm?

We considered the first commandment last time. Let’s look at it again. “You shall have no other Gods besides me.” This means that God is supposed to be the most important thing in our lives. He is to be number one, to have precedence over everything. Now, we could look at this and say, “Hey, that’s not fair. What if I want to make sports my number one priority – at least for a period of time? What if I want to make money, or my career or my spouse or my pleasure to be first priority? What’s wrong with going for it? Didn’t God make me with certain desires? Why shouldn’t I embrace them to the fullest?”

All right, let’s say you did make sports your number one priority. What happens when you get too old to compete with younger, fitter people? Your whole life crumbles. You are still alive, but you can’t live for sports anymore. The command protects you from this.

Suppose I decide that being a pastor should be the most important thing for me. That sounds good and reasonable, doesn’t it? But if I put that in front of my relationship with God, look at what happens. If the church does well, I am doing well. But if someone complains, or people start leaving, it destroys my whole world. I have nothing left if I can’t succeed as a pastor. The first commandment protects me from that. If God is the first thing, the most important thing, than no matter what else in the world crumbles, I am ultimately OK.

The other commandments protect us in similar ways. I am sure that adultery must be pleasurable and exciting. But ultimately it destroys marriages, it handicaps the lives of the children conceived by it, and the lives of the children whose parents divorce because of it. It often spreads diseases. Eventually, it destroys society as a whole, and we are even now starting to see the unraveling of Western culture because so many people have run away from the protection of the commandment against adultery. Now, let’s be clear that God forgives it, and works in the lives of those who have failed to obey it, and brings healing and redemption. But my point is that the commandment is to protect us, not to spoil our fun.

So Paul says, the law was a chaperone, a protector. In Greek and Roman culture, the chaperone’s job ended when the child became a man. The idea was that by that time, the young man had internalized good moral character. He knew right from wrong, and was willing to do right. He was strong enough to protect himself from physical harm also. It isn’t that he should no longer live morally or safely. The idea was that now those attitudes were inside of him; he would behave that way because of the character that been formed in him.

The law is still right. It is still good. It still reflects the character of God. Our lives should still look more and more like the character of God as shown in the law. But it is no longer something external to us. When we trust Jesus, The character of Jesus is being formed inside us. We learn to rely on the Spirit within us to guide us; we learn to listen and respond obediently to his prompting. We no longer consult a rule-book. We consult a person. The prophet Jeremiah prophesied about this new relationship to the law:

“Look, the days are coming” — this is the LORD’s declaration — “when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. This one will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt — a covenant they broke even though I had married them” — the LORD’s declaration. “Instead, this is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after those days” — the LORD’s declaration. “I will put My teaching within them and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be My people. No longer will one teach his neighbor or his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they will all know Me, from the least to the greatest of them” — this is the LORD’s declaration. “For I will forgive their wrongdoing and never again remember their sin.” (Jer 31:31-34, HCSB)

In the case of the noble Greek and Roman families, the chaperone/guardian did not take a child and turn him into a nobleman. No, the child was born a nobleman. They did not become noble by following the guidance of the guardian; rather, they were made noble by their birth. Something preceded the guardian, and that was noble birth.

So with Christians, following the guardian (that is, the law) is not what makes us Christians. It is our spiritual re-birth into Jesus –what we call “being born again.” We are born according to God’s promise to save and transform all who trust in Jesus Christ. The law is good and right. But the promise is greater. The law serves the promise, not vice versa.

Paul puts it this way:

The law, then, was our guardian until Christ, so that we could be justified by faith. But since that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian, for you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ like a garment. There is no Jew or Greek, slave or free, male or female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, heirs according to the promise. (Gal 3:24-29, HCSB)

In the Greco-Roman culture of the Galatians, the sons in the family were the ones who inherited everything and carried the family name. But they did not have the rights and privileges of sons until they reached adulthood Until then, they were still under the authority of their chaperone. So Paul says – we are all “sons.” I think he means sons who have come into adulthood. We are no longer under the chaperone of the law, but in the trust-relationship of the promise. When he says were are “sons,” he doesn’t mean we are all male, he means that all of us – whether male or female, Jewish or not, slave or free – are inheriting the grace of God through Jesus Christ. We are all counted as legitimate and free, we all carry God’s family name, through faith in Jesus Christ. The Jews in Galatia have been telling the Christians that being Jewish is necessary and important, that anyone who is not Jewish is, in a sense, “illegitimate.” But Paul says, “No. We are all the same in Jesus Christ. We are all legitimate in Jesus Christ. Jews aren’t better than Gentiles. Free people aren’t better than slaves. Men aren’t better than women. The only thing that counts is Jesus Christ. In him, we are all legitimate inheritors, legitimate bearers of the family name of God.”

Paul wraps it up by saying that if you are in Christ (that is, if you trust Jesus) you are a true Jew – you are a “descendant” of Abraham. You stand in the true tradition of Abraham, which is salvation by trust in God’s promises, especially trust in the promises that were fulfilled in Jesus.

So, what does this mean for all of us today?

First, it is important to realize that the law is good and right. But we don’t become righteous through it, because we cannot do it all, or consistently. We don’t live by a set of rules. We live by a relationship of trust in Jesus, and reliance upon the Holy Spirit. He has already fulfilled the law for us. We are already completely righteous through him. He will guide us so that our lives do reflect the character of God as expressed in the law. But that character and that behavior forms in us not through our strenuous efforts, but through listening to the Holy Spirit and obeying his guidance.

How does this work? Some things are quite obvious. It’s silly to pray, “Jesus, do you want me to commit adultery?” Of course he does not. Although the law can’t save us, it is still true and right and good. A better prayer might be “Jesus, prevent me from even having the opportunity to commit adultery.” Or, “Jesus I give you my will and my body, to use as you want. Keep me from sinning.” Remember and recognize that through Jesus, you are already holy in spirit. Keep up that conversational prayer. It’s hard to be talking to Jesus, while at the very same time you are doing something unrighteous and unholy. His character within you doesn’t want to do it. If you feel a strong desire to sin, be honest with him about that, and keep up that conversational prayer.

Second, as I read these verses, I have a strong sense that some of you need to hear this: you are legitimate. You aren’t second class. You are a full heir of God, you carry His family name. No one who trusts Jesus is any worse – or any better – than you. There are no second-class citizens in the kingdom of God. Your failures are irrelevant. Your socio-economic position is irrelevant. Your gender is irrelevant. Your ethnicity is irrelevant. Through Jesus, you have become one of God’s Chosen Ones.

HOW DO YOU LIVE BY FAITH?

On By Pastor TomIn Bible Teaching, Christianity, Faith, Galatians, Jesus, Uncategorized1 Comment

live by faith

Living by faith means we depend upon God; particularly we depend upon his mercy, forgiveness and underserved kindness to us in every situation and on into eternity. It means we depend on him when things are good, and when they are not good. It means we trust even when we don’t understand.

To listen to the sermon, click the play button:


To download, right click on the link (or do whatever you do on a Mac) and save it to your computer:
Download Galatians Part 7
Galatians #7 . Chapter 2:19-21

For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose. (Gal 2:19-21, ESV2011)

Last week in our small-group, someone raised this question about trust: How do we do it? It’s a good question. Paul said in the verses we studied last time, that we are justified by faith. We looked at what that means. Now, in these verses, he says that we “live by faith in the Son of God.” So how do we “do” trust? How do we live by faith?

Paul says here that living in faith/trust starts with dying. He says he died to the law. He was crucified with Christ. I think being crucified with Christ means several things. First, that is how God accomplished our justification. When we trust Jesus, we were punished by Christ’s crucifixion. We deserved to die because we cannot meet the holiness standard* (*see last week’s message). So we did die – through Jesus.

Laws only apply to live people. You can’t serve a prison term if you are dead. You can’t obey traffic laws if you are dead. There is no relationship between the law and dead people. So, because we died in Jesus, we are dead to the law. According to the law, we were punished and killed and buried with Christ. So living in faith means we are done with the law. We are done with thinking we can make ourselves holy. We are done with thinking we can earn something from God.

Therefore, part of living in faith, means recognizing that we can’t do anything. We always want God to do things for us. But dying to the law and living in faith means that we can’t get him to do anything for us. Our own resources are useless. There’s no plan, and no back-up plan. We have to abandon ourselves to Him.

I have met people who seem to turn “live by faith” back into a law. They suggest that the reason you don’t have enough money is because you aren’t claiming it by faith. Others might say that if you are sick, it is because you have not claimed your healing by faith. Their idea is this: you must “speak the word of faith” and believe it with all your might; also, you must avoid speaking or thinking words of doubt.

These people frequently says things like this: “I am not accepting this diagnosis of appendicitis. I am speaking against it in the name of Jesus. I claim his healing, and I am believing on Jesus for it.” Then, if they are healed, they chalk it up to their exertion of faith. If they are not healed, and have to have surgery, they think they somehow failed to have enough faith, or maybe they didn’t speak the right promise.

It sounds exhausting to me. In fact, it sounds a lot like living by law. If this is how to “live by faith” then it is still all up to you. If have the right kind of faith and speak the right words and avoid saying things that express doubt about an outcome, then God has to respond by making everything right for you. But if you fail to do these things, then the bad outcome is your own fault. Brothers and sisters, this is just another version of the law. The good news is, it isn’t up to us. But the scary thing is, it isn’t up to us. We can’t control God either by obeying the law or by “speaking in faith.” Living by faith means we allow him to be in control.

We have to depend on his choice of mercy and grace, even when we don’t understand why he makes certain choices. We have to trust that he truly does love us with an unimaginably great love, that he always has our best in mind. We have to trust those things to be true, even when we don’t understand what we are going through in life. Living by faith means we depend upon God; particularly we depend upon his mercy, forgiveness and underserved kindness to us in every situation and on into eternity. It means we depend on him when things are good, and when they are not good. It means we trust even when we don’t understand.

Now, I realize that some people may read this and say, “but you still aren’t telling me how to do it. What do I do?” I am very cautious about giving specifics, because we could easily turn them back to into laws that we think we have to obey to get right with God. If I give you seven steps to living in faith, will you really live by faith, or will you live by those seven steps?

It’s a little bit like gardening. How do you make flowers or vegetables grow? You don’t. You can prepare the soil. You can water the plants. You can plant seeds in places that get the right amounts of sunlight and soil drainage. But you can’t make them grow. Nobody grows anything. We tend to things that grow. But the growth itself is beyond us. All we can do is try to maximize conditions for growth to take place.

Living by faith is exactly like that. You can take advantage of certain things so that you are in a position to live by faith. But the life – according to Paul – is lived by Jesus, not by you. Jesus has to do it. All we can do is maximize conditions for him to live our lives. This is what he means when he writes: “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.”

A friend of mine, and one of my mentors in ministry, wrote this on Facebook this week. It is a specific example of what I am talking about:

“I am experimenting asking Jesus if He wants me to give to those standing at stop signs on street corners. I do not meant to sound spiritual with this. I am seriously asking Jesus what He wants me to do. Sometimes I hear yes, sometimes I hear, you decide, sometimes I hear nothing. The question is not, “What would Jesus do WWJD??” but what does Jesus want me to do? I am learning how to live my life in the kingdom with Jesus as Jesus would live my life if He were who I am.” – Pastor Joe Johnson (emphasis added)

It is no longer Joe who lives, but Jesus who lives in Joe. What Pastor Joe wants, is to let Jesus have the freedom to express himself through Joe’s life. That is what it means to live by faith. It has nothing to do with pleasing God. It has nothing to do with controlling life, or using God to make life work out better. It is about depending on the Lord, so that he can do in you and through what he wants.

So please don’t turn what follows into rules that please God. You can’t please God. Jesus did that for you. You can’t live like Christ. Instead, Jesus Christ uses your life to express his own will and intentions in the world. All we can do is let him – or not.

With all that in mind, here are some things we can do that help us to allow him to live his life more fully through us.

Read the Bible. The bible reveals Jesus to us. If we want to live in dependence on him, it is helpful to know him. Reading the bible doesn’t make you a better person. But it does help you get to know Jesus, and the better you know him, the easier it is to trust him. It isn’t a law or a rule. But it’s hard to trust a stranger. So as you read the bible, Jesus becomes more real, more familiar and trust is easier. The Bible is one of the primary ways, and is certainly the most reliable and important way, that God speaks to you. If you never hear someone talk, it will be hard to get to know him. Reading the bible is like listening to the Lord. Sometimes he says things that we don’t understand, or that seem irrelevant. That is just because we are very young spiritual children. As we grow, we will gradually understand more and more. So regular contact with the bible is for us, what sunshine is for plants. It will cause us to grow. Here are two tips: ask God to reveal himself whenever you read the bible. If you aren’t a big reader, just read a chapter or less at one sitting. Or, get the bible on CD or MP3 and listen to it while you drive. It’s not a law. But it will really help you to live by faith.

Pray conversationally. I have had one long ongoing conversation with God going back to at least 1979. A lot of it is pretty stupid, and from one angle, embarrassing. I remember asking him for things that I am now glad he didn’t give me. I think once I asked him to help me win at marbles. I was playing a kid whose parents were Hindu. I didn’t ask for the kid or his family to become Christians. I just wanted to win his marbles. A lot of my prayers over the years have been like that: childish, selfish and ignorant. A lot of them probably still are. Most of them missed the point. But they had one redeeming quality that overrides all the problems: they were the expression of a life of faith. What I mean is, I was always relating to the Lord. He was always with me. He was there, so I talked to him. I didn’t know Him as well as I do now. I understood Him even less. But I treated him as if he were real and he was with me, and indeed, he was and is. I didn’t have to get it all right. The important thing was, I was constantly living in trust. I wasn’t always living in understanding. I wasn’t always living in external righteousness. But I was living in faith. That’s all he wants. If we live in faith, he can take care of the other stuff. So talk to him. He’s there. Talk to him just like you would any other friend. You can’t get this wrong.

Engage in real relationships with other Christians. Jesus designed the church – the community of those who follow him. He says he is committed to building it. The church is body of Christ, and the Bride of Christ. Jesus says he is with us in a special way when we gather together in his name. So, if you truly want to let Jesus live his life through you, we need to recognize that he really enjoys hanging out with people who are gathered to together to worship him and listen to him. No church is perfect, because we keep getting in the way of Jesus living his life through our lives. But as we truly commit to each other to love each other, in spite of our annoying habits and serious flaws; as we commit to supporting each other as we struggle with life in general and faith in particular, Jesus is with us in a special way. We can learn from each other. Even the flaws and failings of other Christians can be used by Jesus help us to grow. When we stumble the other Jesus-followers around us can help us back to our feet.

By the way, the best place I know of for real, authentic Christian relationships is in small groups of other Christians – fifteen or fewer people gathered together to hang out with Jesus and help each other along.

Music. The first three things to help us live in faith are for everyone. There is no one on earth who would not benefit from all three of those, in terms of getting closer to Jesus. Music isn’t for everyone. It doesn’t do anything for some people. But for a large majority of people, music can help us connect with the life of Jesus in a special way. It doesn’t have to be particularly Christian music either. I know that there is music out there that glorifies violence, or that glorifies and encourages immoral sexuality. Obviously, that kind of thing probably won’t help you to depend upon Jesus in faith. But there are many other songs and musical pieces that can encourage your faith, even if they aren’t explicitly Christian. If you find it helps you feel close to Jesus, make use of it. I suggest that you invite Jesus into your ears as you listen. Say to him, “hey, I love this song. What do you think of it?”

Beauty/Joy. I find my trust in Jesus encouraged by experiences of beauty and joy. I can put myself in a position to experience these things, and thus increase my trust in Jesus. I can’t always have an experience like I want to, but I have discovered certain things that often lift my heart and increase my faith. More often than not, when I am alone at a place of beautiful scenery, I feel closer to Jesus. When I am in the wilderness, I feel it. When I connect with nature through the feel of a fish on the end of my line, I experience a kind of joy and often feel more thankful to Jesus. For some people, they feel it when they exercise. Others get it by building something, or by being with certain people, or by helping folks who need it. Some get it by creating works of art, and others by admiring those works of art. If you start paying attention, you’ll soon learn the kinds of things that are helpful for you.

Christian faith is not a method for getting God to do what you want him to do. It is a life of dependence on Jesus, and learning to let him do what he wants to do through you.