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Deuteronomy 6 Obey the Great Command and Things Will Go Well With You

2/29/2016

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You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might Deuteronomy 6:5
You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might Deuteronomy 6:5
​Deuteronomy 6
Don’t we all want things to go well for us? We pray things will go well; we bid well for one another; we leave one another will well wishes. There is more to things going well than just hopes. Remaining within God’s will, appreciating that He is The LORD, and understanding who we are in Him lead to things going well. Israel had spent forty years in the wilderness learning the commandments, the will of God and now just before they entered The Promised Land, Moses reminded them of what they learned and exhorted them to be obedient to their discipline. Verses 1-3 read,
“Now this is the commandment—the statutes and the rules—that the Lord your God commanded me to teach you, that you may do them in the land to which you are going over, to possess it, 2 that you may fear the Lord your God, you and your son and your son's son, by keeping all his statutes and his commandments, which I command you, all the days of your life, and that your days may be long. 3 Hear therefore, O Israel, and be careful to do them, that it may go well with you, and that you may multiply greatly, as the Lord, the God of your fathers, has promised you, in a land flowing with milk and honey.”
Obeying the commandment requires fearing the Lord, which is respecting Him and appreciating Him as Sovereign Lord, as I Am, as all of who He is. It means knowing Him as who He says and demonstrates Himself to be and not as who we make Him to be. It also means that we will live in a way that teaches our sons and their sons to know Him like that. Obedience to the commandment—the statutes and the rules— comes with a promise, that it may go well with you, that you may multiply greatly in a land of abundance. What is the commandment? What single commandment is the statutes and the rules? Verses 4-5 read,
“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 5 You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.”
God said it here in Deuteronomy before He said it to the scheming Pharisees in Matthew 22:34-40
But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together. 35 And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. 36 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” 37 And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. 38 This is the great and first commandment. 39 And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. 40 On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”
Jesus said, loving your neighbor with equal concern you have for yourself is like loving God with your entirety. And it is on these two that all the Law and Prophets are hinged. He said it to Moses as well, the command to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and might covers all the laws. This is the commandment that He required be taught. This commandment is what the Ten Commandments spell out. This greatest commandment is the crux for all the Law and every word of God.
He wants us to know this greatest commandment to the point it is part of us, written on our hearts, before our eyes so that it is how we view the world, and on the foundations and entries of our lives and households. This commandment should define who we are as it defined Jesus Christ. Verses 6-9 read,
“And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. 7 You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. 8 You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. 9 You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.”
At some point, many Israelites, those who considered themselves most pious and dedicated took this command which is The Word Himself and removed Him from it. They wrote the words of Deuteronomy 6:5 on tiny scrolls and wore them (and still do) on their hands and foreheads and place them on the doorposts of their homes. I have a Mezuzah on my door. There is nothing wrong with keeping a reminder of God’s Word with you, but how many of the Pharisees who decorated themselves in grand piety had the commandment truly on their hearts as well as on the foreheads and hands? How many who flaunted their religiousness knew the True God well enough to recognize Him when He walked among them? How many of them lived out the truth of the commandment?
And what about us? We put on ‘Christian’ T-shirts, place ‘Christian’ bumper stickers on our cars, and decorate online profiles with “Christian’ pictures, but then we curse at the driver who cut us off in traffic, we gossip about that poor girl who needs prayer, and we promise prayers that we never speak. How can we wear a banner that says “Jesus loves you” and not love people with all the humility, grace and mercy of The Lord?
What is it for things to go well? What does that mean? Does it mean no suffering? Does it mean no battles? The Hebrew word translated as well is טוֹב, towb. It means beautiful, pleasant to the senses, useable and appropriate for its purpose. It is the word used when God described creation in Genesis 1:4
And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness.
Things go well for us when we become as we were created to be light separate from dark. That is why obedience to the commandment of verse 5 makes things go well for us. Loving God so completely with who we are, what we feel, what we do, and how we think expresses itself in loving one another the way Jesus loves us. That love shows the word who Jesus is and it continually disciples us to become more like Him. John 13:31-35 reads,
When he had gone out, Jesus said, “Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him. 32 If God is glorified in him, God will also glorify him in himself, and glorify him at once. 33 Little children, yet a little while I am with you. You will seek me, and just as I said to the Jews, so now I also say to you, ‘Where I am going you cannot come.’ 34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. 35 By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
The Promised Land was made for the promise that things would go well for Israel. In it they would rest in The Lord, depend on Him, and worship Him. He would prove their faith. Verses 10-15 read
“And when the Lord your God brings you into the land that he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give you—with great and good cities that you did not build, 11 and houses full of all good things that you did not fill, and cisterns that you did not dig, and vineyards and olive trees that you did not plant—and when you eat and are full, 12 then take care lest you forget the Lord, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. 13 It is the Lord your God you shall fear. Him you shall serve and by his name you shall swear. 14 You shall not go after other gods, the gods of the peoples who are around you— 15 for the Lord your God in your midst is a jealous God—lest the anger of the Lord your God be kindled against you, and he destroy you from off the face of the earth.”
When things go well, we have no need to look anywhere but to The Lord Our God. Taking our eyes off of Him, not crediting Him for His abundant provision and chasing good fortune rather than God kindles His anger so that He can bring us back to towb again. Keeping faith in God alone allows us to abide in towb.  Verses 16-19 read,
“You shall not put the Lord your God to the test, as you tested him at Massah. 17 You shall diligently keep the commandments of the Lord your God, and his testimonies and his statutes, which he has commanded you. 18 And you shall do what is right and good in the sight of the Lord, that it may go well with you, and that you may go in and take possession of the good land that the Lord swore to give to your fathers 19 by thrusting out all your enemies from before you, as the Lord has promised.”
At Massah, Israel complained about being thirsty. They disregarded everything He had done for them, their deliverance from Egypt, their lives, the riches He let them carry, everything. They whined that they would die of thirst. By their lack of faith they said, “Is the Lord among us or not?” God gave them water out of a rock. (Exodus 17:1-7). He doesn’t require a river or a spring. He can make a rock into a spring. He can make a spring out of thin air. He can move a mountain from here to there. He reminded them who He was in a generous and gracious way even though they had no faith. But now forty years later, they had learned and it was time to stand on what they had learned and not forget again God was with them.
Obedience shows our faith, obedience proves our faith, and obedience grows our faith. Did the people of Israel really think God had saved them from Pharaoh only to let them die of thirst? Or did they just need to complain and flaunt their suffering? They could just as easily trusted Him to provide. Do you think The Lord delivered you from the prince of the world to leave you as you are? Don’t you trust Him enough to know that He is carrying you through the wilderness for the purpose of making things go well with you, for making you the light of the world.
However you live your life, whether as a testimony to Christ or as a testimony to yourself, your children will ask what it means. They will want to know why you live in faith, why you obey the Lord, why you love Him and why you love people. The answer you give is the Gospel! It is the Truth which will enable things to go well for them too. Verses 20-25 read,
“When your son asks you in time to come, ‘What is the meaning of the testimonies and the statutes and the rules that the Lord our God has commanded you?’ 21 then you shall say to your son, ‘We were Pharaoh's slaves in Egypt. And the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand. 22 And the Lord showed signs and wonders, great and grievous, against Egypt and against Pharaoh and all his household, before our eyes.23 And he brought us out from there, that he might bring us in and give us the land that he swore to give to our fathers. 24 And the Lord commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the Lord our God, for our good always, that he might preserve us alive, as we are this day. 25 And it will be righteousness for us, if we are careful to do all this commandment before the Lord our God, as he has commanded us.’
Living in faithful obedience, enjoying the abundance of God’s promise will make your children and your fellow man ask how and why. You can be ready to give a reason for your hope. You can say, “Because the Lord delivered me from slavery to sin and gave me eternal life. My Lord impels me to love as He loves and trust that He always has my good in mind. He keeps me safe in Him so I can enjoy eternity with Him.”
I hope and pray that things go well for you. I pray that we will live in faithful obedience to love the Lord with everything we feel, all our trust, all we do, and all we think by loving others as He loves us. You, believer are the light of the world, separated from the darkness. Obey this great command and shine the good light of Christ into the darkness of the world.
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Deuteronomy 5 Reflection on What is Learned in The Wilderness Comes Before Taking the Promise

2/28/2016

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And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh Ezekiel 36:26
And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh Ezekiel 36:26
Deuteronomy 4:45 – Deuteronomy 5
Israel stood on the precipice of the Promised Land after forty years of wandering in the wilderness, they were finally about to take the promise they had waited so long receive. Moses had followed the Lord and Israel had followed Moses. But now he would not enter the Promised Land with them; he would die and they would go on without him. He would have to trust that they had learned what God had taught them and that Joshua could receive his mantle. He reminded them of what they had realized and gathered in their time learning from God. Deuteronomy 4:45-49 reads,
These are the testimonies, the statutes, and the rules, which Moses spoke to the people of Israel when they came out of Egypt, 46 beyond the Jordan in the valley opposite Beth-peor, in the land of Sihon the king of the Amorites, who lived at Heshbon, whom Moses and the people of Israel defeated when they came out of Egypt. 47 And they took possession of his land and the land of Og, the king of Bashan, the two kings of the Amorites, who lived to the east beyond the Jordan; 48 from Aroer, which is on the edge of the Valley of the Arnon, as far as Mount Sirion (that is, Hermon), 49 together with all the Arabah on the east side of the Jordan as far as the Sea of the Arabah, under the slopes of Pisgah.
When we are on the threshold from the wilderness to the promise, we often have to wait, a period of rest and quiet. It is a time to reflect on what our suffering has taught, how we have changed, and who we have become through it. It is not easy to have patience. We want the promise now. The promise is not going anywhere. It will be no less the gift one week or eleven days from now as it is now. In fact it will be more of a blessing when it comes to us prepared and at the right time.
My friend Jim often uses the example of a young child asking her father for a Ferrari. The father promises to give it to her, but he waits until she is old enough to drive it. I can extend the metaphor by saying that he waits to give her that car until she drives well, has driven and cared for a jalopy, then moved on to being a safe driver and maintain a newer car, and then when she is able to handle the responsibility of the power of the Ferrari he gives her that car promised a decade earlier.
We have to learn the basics first, how to drive. Then we move on to the responsibility of the inexpensive used but safe car. That’s the car that we can’t speed in because the engine is too small or the transmission can’t handle high speeds. We learn what happens when we break the rules and get a ticket for not stopping at the stop sign. Then we move on to a better car and we show that we can drive that one without speeding, even though we now could. And then and only then does our father give us the sports car. But before he does, he sits down with us and reminds us about the rules and laws that came with the promise.
So Moses, The Lord’s friend spoke to Israel and reminded them the laws and statues that they were given in the Wilderness. Chapter 5 Verses 1-5 read,
And Moses summoned all Israel and said to them, “Hear, O Israel, the statutes and the rules that I speak in your hearing today, and you shall learn them and be careful to do them. 2 The Lord our God made a covenant with us in Horeb. 3 Not with our fathers did the Lord make this covenant, but with us, who are all of us here alive today. 4 The Lord spoke with you face to face at the mountain, out of the midst of the fire, 5 while I stood between the Lord and you at that time, to declare to you the word of the Lord. For you were afraid because of the fire, and you did not go up into the mountain. He said:
Israel, these people standing in front of Moses, not their fathers but they themselves had received the Law and they themselves had agreed to keep it. The next generations would each agree based on that agreement. There would come a point in their lives when they had to agree with The Lord and choose to keep the Law themselves. They were circumcised, not as an agreement to keep the Moses Law, but as a sign of Abraham’s promise that they were part of His chosen treasured possession. Each man’s circumcision was his father’s agreement to raise him as God’s own. Keeping the Law is a covenant that each man makes with God himself.
Your parents can teach you. Your Sunday school teacher can present the facts. Your friends can testify. But only you can choose Christ for yourself. Only you can accept the contract for Jesus to be payment for your sins and make Jesus your Lord in order to enter the Promised Land of eternal life with Jesus. God may have prearranged your marriage to Christ, but He does not force you to say ‘I do.’
In verses 6-21 The Lord reminded Israel of the basics, the core of the law, the Ten Commandments.
“‘I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
7 “‘You shall have no other gods before me.
8 “‘You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. 9 You shall not bow down to them or serve them; for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 10 but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.
11 “‘You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.
12 “‘Observe the Sabbath day, to keep it holy, as the Lord your God commanded you. 13 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 14 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter or your male servant or your female servant, or your ox or your donkey or any of your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates, that your male servant and your female servant may rest as well as you. 15 You shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the Sabbath day.
16 “‘Honor your father and your mother, as the Lord your God commanded you, that your days may be long, and that it may go well with you in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.
17 “‘You shall not murder.
18 “‘And you shall not commit adultery.
19 “‘And you shall not steal.
20 “‘And you shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
21 “‘And you shall not covet your neighbor's wife. And you shall not desire your neighbor's house, his field, or his male servant, or his female servant, his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor's.’
Unlike the Levitical laws of sacrifices, feasts, and offerings which taught what sin was and that payment for sin required death, these are the laws that exemplify loving God and loving people. These laws did not dissolve when Christ died on the cross. They remain because love remains. Fulfilling the law of love means we obey the Ten Commandments, not in order to be saved, but because we are saved. Verses 22-29 read,
“These words the Lord spoke to all your assembly at the mountain out of the midst of the fire, the cloud, and the thick darkness, with a loud voice; and he added no more. And he wrote them on two tablets of stone and gave them to me. 23 And as soon as you heard the voice out of the midst of the darkness, while the mountain was burning with fire, you came near to me, all the heads of your tribes, and your elders.24 And you said, ‘Behold, the Lord our God has shown us his glory and greatness, and we have heard his voice out of the midst of the fire. This day we have seen God speak with man, and man still live. 25 Now therefore why should we die? For this great fire will consume us. If we hear the voice of the Lord our God any more, we shall die. 26 For who is there of all flesh, that has heard the voice of the living God speaking out of the midst of fire as we have, and has still lived? 27 Go near and hear all that the Lord our God will say, and speak to us all that the Lord our God will speak to you, and we will hear and do it.’
28 “And the Lord heard your words, when you spoke to me. And the Lord said to me, ‘I have heard the words of this people, which they have spoken to you. They are right in all that they have spoken. 29 Oh that they had such a heart as this always, to fear me and to keep all my commandments, that it might go well with them and with their descendants forever!”
Moses reminded Israel how great God is. He reminded them even His voice was too much for them to bear, that they had been in His presence and lived, and how they had felt because of it. It was too much for Israel. And God who loves them so much wished they would always remember the fear they had for Him that day so that they would not sin and suffer, so that he would not have to destroy Israel and scatter the remnant.
When I drive, I endeavor not to speed. I wish I could say I don’t speed because I respect the law that much. That should be the reason but the real reason is, I am afraid to get a speeding ticket. That is why the consequences are in place, to keep us from breaking the law.
Remembering who The LORD is can help us remember He is Justice, He is the Lion of Judah, He is the Wrath of the Lamb and He is the Lord Almighty. It is the first step to knowing God instead of knowing about God. Knowing about God without knowing Him can lead to removing Him from the equation and rather than walk in the Spirit, we walk in ritual. We go to church because it is time to go to church. We serve the poor because we are on the committee. We do what we do because we are supposed to do it. God is Yahweh, I Am. He is The LORD your God. He is Creator. He is The Lord God of Hosts!
The Lord had compassion on Israel, they could not bear His presence. Moses could, because Moses had God’s Spirit on Him, Moses was God’s friend.  Believers have that closeness with God today. His Spirit indwells us. He calls us friend. We move from keeping the law out of fear of death to keeping the law out of love and expression of who God is. Verses 30-33 read,
“Go and say to them, “Return to your tents.” 31 But you, stand here by me, and I will tell you the whole commandment and the statutes and the rules that you shall teach them, that they may do them in the land that I am giving them to possess.’ 32 You shall be careful therefore to do as the Lord your God has commanded you. You shall not turn aside to the right hand or to the left. 33 You shall walk in all the way that the Lord your God has commanded you, that you may live, and that it may go well with you, and that you may live long in the land that you shall possess.
We have to remember what we learned in the wilderness to live long in the promise He give us. Suffering removes your heart of stone and replaces it with a heart of flesh, which The Spirit then writes His law on. Ezekiel 36:24-28 says,
I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land. 25 I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. 26 And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. 28 You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers, and you shall be my people, and I will be your God.
 
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Deuteronomy 4:1-44 The One True God is Revealed in His Law

2/27/2016

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know therefore today, and lay it to your heart, that the Lord is God in heaven above and on the earth beneath; there is no other. Deuteronomy 4:39
know therefore today, and lay it to your heart, that the Lord is God in heaven above and on the earth beneath; there is no other. Deuteronomy 4:39
Deuteronomy 4:1-44
Israel was preparing to finally enter The Promised Land after forty years. They were camped eleven days journey from crossing the Jordan. Moses was speaking to them to make them ready and encourage them. Verses 1-2 begin his second discourse.
And now, O Israel, listen to the statutes and the rules that I am teaching you, and do them, that you may live, and go in and take possession of the land that the Lord, the God of your fathers, is giving you. 2 You shall not add to the word that I command you, nor take from it, that you may keep the commandments of the Lord your God that I command you.
God’s promises are often connected to our obedience. Our obedience is learned through suffering, discipline and time in the wilderness. Israel began their trek, afraid to receive the promise of God. He turned them around and had them journey through the wilderness for forty years. They were not lost, they followed The LORD. He gave them the Law, they learned it and they learned to follow God. The Lord was clear, they were not to add to the Law nor take away from it. The Law as given in the Ten Commandments and as given to the Levites was perfect as it was. The Law revealed the Lord as He is, it gave them the way to worship Him as Him. Later Jeroboam would take away from Levitical Law and create an idolatrous worship. Later the Pharisees would add to it and so remove God from the Law. Because they added to it, they didn’t come to know The One True Living God and didn’t recognize Him when He walked among them.
If we add to or take away from God’s Word or Law we change it and it no longer reflects Him. It no longer becomes the Truth, the Way, and the Life it becomes an image of something else. The Pharisees added to the law in order to ensure they kept it. In doing so they removed the heart of God’s Word and when He came they committed blasphemy and crucified Him.
Jeroboam took away from God’s Word in order to keep Israel from going to Judah to worship. He created a religion that twisted the truth into an idolatry that led to Israel’s destruction instead of the life, He promises. Keeping God’s Word means obedience and it means remaining true to it. Not doing so has consequences. The Wilderness shows us, as it showed Israel the consequences of our choices. Verses 3-8 read,
Your eyes have seen what the Lord did at Baal-peor, for the Lord your God destroyed from among you all the men who followed the Baal of Peor. 4 But you who held fast to the Lord your God are all alive today. 5 See, I have taught you statutes and rules, as the Lord my God commanded me, that you should do them in the land that you are entering to take possession of it. 6 Keep them and do them, for that will be your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples, who, when they hear all these statutes, will say, ‘Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.’ 7 For what great nation is there that has a god so near to it as the Lord our God is to us, whenever we call upon him? 8 And what great nation is there, that has statutes and rules so righteous as all this law that I set before you today?
God is in His Word, His Law. Obedience to His Word reveals Him in us and to others. The world looks at God’s obedient children and stands in awe of God. They ask where our peace comes from, where our hope lies, and how we can respond to life the way we do. Who else can say their god answers, acts, and remains so close? Who else can say their god is always with them and will never forsake them? No one because there is no God like The LORD. He is not far off. He is not silent. He is not apathetic. He cares, He leads, and He is with us. But we must turn to Him, seek to know Him, follow, and listen. Verses 9-14 reads,
Only take care, and keep your soul diligently, lest you forget the things that your eyes have seen, and lest they depart from your heart all the days of your life. Make them known to your children and your children's children— 10 how on the day that you stood before the Lord your God at Horeb, the Lord said to me, ‘Gather the people to me, that I may let them hear my words, so that they may learn to fear me all the days that they live on the earth, and that they may teach their children so.’ 11 And you came near and stood at the foot of the mountain, while the mountain burned with fire to the heart of heaven, wrapped in darkness, cloud, and gloom. 12 Then the Lord spoke to you out of the midst of the fire. You heard the sound of words, but saw no form; there was only a voice. 13 And he declared to you his covenant, which he commanded you to perform, that is, the Ten Commandments, and he wrote them on two tablets of stone. 14 And the Lord commanded me at that time to teach you statutes and rules, that you might do them in the land that you are going over to possess.
Other religions claim that their gods speak to them, but which can claim that they spoke audibly out of fire to the entire nation at once? Which other people can assert that their gods wrote their law with their own hands onto stone tablets? None, because their gods cannot speak or act. I have experienced God speaking the same words to many people at the same time. I have been there when someone else spoke the words He told me or I spoke and confirmed what God spoke to them. He is like no other gods. He is real and even though invisible, He is tangible in His Word and deeds. He gives us faith which opens our blind eyes to see the invisible and eternal Kingdom of Heaven. He does not need us to give Him a form or define Him by assigning Him an image. We know who He is and no image can contain the wholeness of The Lord God Creator of Heaven and Earth and everything in it. Verses 15-24 say,
Therefore watch yourselves very carefully. Since you saw no form on the day that the Lord spoke to you at Horeb out of the midst of the fire,16 beware lest you act corruptly by making a carved image for yourselves, in the form of any figure, the likeness of male or female,17 the likeness of any animal that is on the earth, the likeness of any winged bird that flies in the air, 18 the likeness of anything that creeps on the ground, the likeness of any fish that is in the water under the earth.19 And beware lest you raise your eyes to heaven, and when you see the sun and the moon and the stars, all the host of heaven, you be drawn away and bow down to them and serve them, things that the Lord your God has allotted to all the peoples under the whole heaven. 20 But the Lord has taken you and brought you out of the iron furnace, out of Egypt, to be a people of his own inheritance, as you are this day.21 Furthermore, the Lord was angry with me because of you, and he swore that I should not cross the Jordan, and that I should not enter the good land that the Lord your God is giving you for an inheritance. 22 For I must die in this land; I must not go over the Jordan. But you shall go over and take possession of that good land. 23 Take care, lest you forget the covenant of the Lord your God, which he made with you, and make a carved image, the form of anything that the Lord your God has forbidden you. 24 For the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.
Trying to define The Lord by deciding what He looks like and who He is outside of His Word invites us into idolatry. How many people bow down to the crucifix, instead of the Risen Lord? How many people move from the statue of a dying god to statues of past believers? It is idolatry to worship those images. It is idolatry to make a statue of anything and put it on the altar as god. It is idolatry to put anything or anyone on the altar or place anything or anyone on the throne of your heart. God has shown us the consequences and if we fall into Israel’s pattern of idolatry or the world’s motif of idolatry we too will suffer the aftermath of disobedience. Suffering teaches obedience. Even God learned obedience through His suffering. As Jesus prayed in Gethsemane and begged The Father to let Him not be crucified, when He suffered betrayal from His closest friends, when He stood trial an innocent man ready to die for our sin, He learned obedience and exercised it by laying down His life willingly. Hebrews 5:7-9 reads,
In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence. 8 Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered. 9 And being made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him,
Moses warned Israel and prophesied what would happen as a result of their idolatry. He exhorted them not to fall into worship of images, false gods, and carvings made by human hands. He urged them to cling to God’s Word as if their lives depended on it in verses 25-31,
When you father children and children's children, and have grown old in the land, if you act corruptly by making a carved image in the form of anything, and by doing what is evil in the sight of the Lord your God, so as to provoke him to anger, 26 I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that you will soon utterly perish from the land that you are going over the Jordan to possess. You will not live long in it, but will be utterly destroyed. 27 And the Lord will scatter you among the peoples, and you will be left few in number among the nations where the Lord will drive you. 28 And there you will serve gods of wood and stone, the work of human hands, that neither see, nor hear, nor eat, nor smell. 29 But from there you will seek the Lord your God and you will find him, if you search after him with all your heart and with all your soul. 30 When you are in tribulation, and all these things come upon you in the latter days, you will return to the Lord your God and obey his voice. 31 For the Lord your God is a merciful God. He will not leave you or destroy you or forget the covenant with your fathers that he swore to them.
Israel would disobey and worship false gods and they would be scattered among the nations, a remnant of who they had once been and a shadow of who they were meant to be. But through that suffering they would once again turn to God in obedience. God made them a promise and He has not forgotten it. He made you a promise and He has not forgotten it. When you have learn obedience and can act on it in faith, He will let you take possession of what He has given you, The Kingdom of Heaven. He will let you become who you were created to be, the image of Christ.
For that to happen, you must worship the One True God as He is and not who you make Him to be. You must bow down to The Lord and the Lord alone, not a crucifix, a statue, a bank account, a man, or yourself. Nothing and no one can measure up to the perfect vastness of God. Verses 32-40 read,
For ask now of the days that are past, which were before you, since the day that God created man on the earth, and ask from one end of heaven to the other, whether such a great thing as this has ever happened or was ever heard of. 33 Did any people ever hear the voice of a god speaking out of the midst of the fire, as you have heard, and still live? 34 Or has any god ever attempted to go and take a nation for himself from the midst of another nation, by trials, by signs, by wonders, and by war, by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, and by great deeds of terror, all of which the Lord your God did for you in Egypt before your eyes? 35 To you it was shown, that you might know that the Lord is God; there is no other besides him. 36 Out of heaven he let you hear his voice, that he might discipline you. And on earth he let you see his great fire, and you heard his words out of the midst of the fire. 37 And because he loved your fathers and chose their offspring after them and brought you out of Egypt with his own presence, by his great power, 38 driving out before you nations greater and mightier than you, to bring you in, to give you their land for an inheritance, as it is this day, 39 know therefore today, and lay it to your heart, that the Lord is God in heaven above and on the earth beneath; there is no other.40 Therefore you shall keep his statutes and his commandments, which I command you today, that it may go well with you and with your children after you, and that you may prolong your days in the land that the Lord your God is giving you for all time.”
It is the Lord who made you, called you, saved you and sanctified you. No created god on earth could do that. And though we deserve death for our sins, He gives us sanctuary. He told us what sin is so that we could be holy as He is holy. He gave us a way out of sin. He knows we are not yet perfect and so He gives us mercy. Sinners can seek refuge in the Lord and be saved from the death they deserve and have their part of God’s promise too. Verses 41-43 read,
Then Moses set apart three cities in the east beyond the Jordan, 42 that the manslayer might flee there, anyone who kills his neighbor unintentionally, without being at enmity with him in time past; he may flee to one of these cities and save his life: 43 Bezer in the wilderness on the tableland for the Reubenites, Ramoth in Gilead for the Gadites, and Golan in Bashan for the Manassites.
If the people who had accidently killed without malice went to the cities of asylum they would be safe, but if they ventured beyond them, they were at the mercy of anyone seeking vengeance. Outside of God’s promise they could be killed for their crime, but within the walls of God’s protection they were secure. Don’t go looking for God’s salvation beyond the Kingdom of God. He is not there.
Believer, The Lord is your God. He alone is God, there is none like Him, none comparable to Him, and none other than Him. He is the Word, Perfect and True. He is Salvation. He is Righteousness. He is Obedience and Faith. You cannot find Him outside of the Truth. You cannot change Him into who you want Him to be. He will change you into who you are meant to be.
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Deuteronomy 3 Let the Lord Show You His Greatness and His Mighty Hand

2/26/2016

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O Lord God, you have only begun to show your servant your greatness and your mighty hand. For what god is there in heaven or on earth who can do such works and mighty acts as yours? Deuteronomy 3:24
O Lord God, you have only begun to show your servant your greatness and your mighty hand. For what god is there in heaven or on earth who can do such works and mighty acts as yours? Deuteronomy 3:24
Deuteronomy 3
When Moses retold the adventure of Israel wandering in the desert to them before they were finally going to take possession of The Promise Land, He didn’t retell them their faithlessness, whining and sin. He reminded them of the battles they fought and of how God had defeated their enemies for them and given them land that belonged to giants. He began the summation of the forty years by showing them what He had done for Esau and Lot. Then He had the ragtag group of ex-slaves battle King Sihon of Kedemoth and take his land. In today’s continuation of the recapitulation of the forty years, The Lord, speaking through Moses reminded Israel about another battle. When we consider our suffering, we don’t rehash sin and guilt, we remember God’s greatness, the battles, and the victory. Verses 1-10 read,
“Then we turned and went up the way to Bashan. And Og the king of Bashan came out against us, he and all his people, to battle at Edrei.2 But the Lord said to me, ‘Do not fear him, for I have given him and all his people and his land into your hand. And you shall do to him as you did to Sihon the king of the Amorites, who lived at Heshbon.’ 3 So theLord our God gave into our hand Og also, the king of Bashan, and all his people, and we struck him down until he had no survivor left. 4 And we took all his cities at that time—there was not a city that we did not take from them—sixty cities, the whole region of Argob, the kingdom of Og in Bashan. 5 All these were cities fortified with high walls, gates, and bars, besides very many unwalled villages. 6 And we devoted them to destruction, as we did to Sihon the king of Heshbon, devoting to destruction every city, men, women, and children. 7 But all the livestock and the spoil of the cities we took as our plunder. 8 So we took the land at that time out of the hand of the two kings of the Amorites who were beyond the Jordan, from the Valley of the Arnon to Mount Hermon 9 (the Sidonians call Hermon Sirion, while the Amorites call it Senir), 10 all the cities of the tableland and all Gilead and all Bashan, as far as Salecah and Edrei, cities of the kingdom of Og in Bashan.”
King Og was not just your average king. He was fearsome. His kingdom was large and people trembled before him. He was literally a giant among men. Verse 11 describes him.
 (For only Og the king of Bashan was left of the remnant of the Rephaim. Behold, his bed was a bed of iron. Is it not in Rabbah of the Ammonites? Nine cubits was its length, and four cubits its breadth, according to the common cubit.)
The Rephaim were giants. They were the people who lived in Canaan and made Israel afraid to take possession of the Land. They were the people who lived in Ar, the land given to Lot’s descendants by the Lord. By the time Israel took Bashan, Og was the only giant left. His bed was made of iron, 4 ½ yards long and 2 yards wide. That implies that Og was about 12 feet tall. Goliath was 6’9” (1 Samuel 17:4). In the Israelites time in the wilderness, The Lord had led them first to show them He could defeat giants for them, then handed kings to them and then finally handed the last giant left to them. He taught them in a manner which first gave them head knowledge, then gave them a reason to believe, then took that knowledge and put in their hearts as faith.
They were not yet to The Promised Land, they were on the outskirts of it and God let them take the Bashan. Verses 12-17 reads,
“When we took possession of this land at that time, I gave to the Reubenites and the Gadites the territory beginning at Aroer, which is on the edge of the Valley of the Arnon, and half the hill country of Gilead with its cities. 13 The rest of Gilead, and all Bashan, the kingdom of Og, that is, all the region of Argob, I gave to the half-tribe of Manasseh. (All that portion of Bashan is called the land of Rephaim. 14 Jair the Manassite took all the region of Argob, that is, Bashan, as far as the border of the Geshurites and the Maacathites, and called the villagesafter his own name, Havvoth-jair, as it is to this day.) 15 To Machir I gave Gilead, 16 and to the Reubenites and the Gadites I gave the territory from Gilead as far as the Valley of the Arnon, with the middle of the valley as a border, as far over as the river Jabbok, the border of the Ammonites; 17 the Arabah also, with the Jordan as the border, from Chinnereth as far as the Sea of the Arabah, the Salt Sea, under the slopes of Pisgah on the east.”
They were not done with their trek yet, the land God gave them was only a small portion of what they would possess. He let them leave their women, children, and livestock there while the fighting men were to continue on. Verses 18-22 reads,
“And I commanded you at that time, saying, ‘The Lord your God has given you this land to possess. All your men of valor shall cross over armed before your brothers, the people of Israel. 19 Only your wives, your little ones, and your livestock (I know that you have much livestock) shall remain in the cities that I have given you, 20 until the Lord gives rest to your brothers, as to you, and they also occupy the land that the Lord your God gives them beyond the Jordan. Then each of you may return to his possession which I have given you.’ 21 And I commanded Joshua at that time, ‘Your eyes have seen all that the Lord your God has done to these two kings. So will the Lord do to all the kingdoms into which you are crossing. 22 You shall not fear them, for it is the Lord your God who fights for you.’”
These ex-slaves were now wealthy men of valor with so much livestock that it was prudent to leave for safe keeping with their families. The Lord had made them rich while they wandered in the wilderness. He had taught them to fight, have faith, and be strong and courageous. He had brought them from up from indigent slaves to wealthy noblemen. That is what time in the wilderness does, if we allow it. The Lord shows us His strength, He shows us we do not have to fear the enemy because He fights for us. He matures us so that we are no longer slaves to the enemy but princes in the Kingdom of God.
He has given us eternal life and we enjoy it now, but there is more fighting for us, the Lord’s courageous warriors to do. We continue on until the final battle is fought and all of us have rest together. Ephesians 6:10-13 reads,
Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. 11 Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. 12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. 13 Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm.
The Lord does not expect or want us to fight without Him. He was with Israel as they fought Sihon and Og and He is with us as we fight rulers, authorities and cosmic powers. He is the armor He asks us to put on. He is the Truth. He is our Righteousness. He is the Gospel of Peace and our Peace. He is our Shield and our Faith. He is our Salvation. He is the Sword of the Spirit and the Word of God. We can stand firm because we do not stand alone; The Lord is with us and He fights for us.
Moses had led the people out of Egypt. He had led the people through forty years in the wilderness. But The Lord had told him he would not enter it. Moses had an extraordinarily intimate relationship with God and He was not afraid to ask Him for more. So Moses asked God for more, he wanted to see The Promised Land. Verses 23-29 read,
“And I pleaded with the Lord at that time, saying, 24 ‘O Lord God, you have only begun to show your servant your greatness and your mighty hand. For what god is there in heaven or on earth who can do such works and mighty acts as yours? 25 Please let me go over and see the good land beyond the Jordan, that good hill country and Lebanon.’ 26 But the Lord was angry with me because of you and would not listen to me. And the Lord said to me, ‘Enough from you; do not speak to me of this matter again. 27 Go up to the top of Pisgah and lift up your eyes westward and northward and southward and eastward, and look at it with your eyes, for you shall not go over this Jordan. 28 But charge Joshua, and encourage and strengthen him, for he shall go over at the head of this people, and he shall put them in possession of the land that you shall see.’ 29 So we remained in the valley opposite Beth-peor.
The Lord would not change His mind and let Moses enter The Promised Land. He wanted us to understand the onus of responsibility the leaders hold for their charges. But He did let Moses see it. He showed Him the land and then said, ‘That’s enough! Let’s get on with business.’
Moses had seen God. Moses had been there as God himself wrote the Law onto stones, and did countless miracles. The Lord had done so many great works that they had become commonplace to Israel, yet Moses said, “you have only begun to show your servant your greatness and your mighty hand.” God has done great miracles in your life too. He resurrected you with Jesus and made you new. He has healed, provided, freed you from bondage, and more. His miracles can be so plentiful that we should just expect them, have a need and just know the Lord will meet it. We should always be aware that what we have seen god do is the smallest fraction of His greatness. When the people were dying of thirst, Moses just hit a rock with a staff and gave them water because a miracle is not too much to expect. (Exodus 17:1-7).
The Lord showed Moses His greatness in a way that Israel could not begin to grasp. But Believer, you and I are His friends too and He loves to show us who He is! He loves to do great things for us. It pleases God when we depend on Him and let Him fight for us, provide for us, and give us gifts. You may be in the wilderness, but God is showing you His might so that you can have faith enough to understand that He will always fight for you, hand giants over to you, and give you the impossible.
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Deuteronomy 2 God Promises and Delivers the Impossible

2/25/2016

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When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished, saying, “Who then can be saved?” But Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” Matthew 19:25-26
When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished, saying, “Who then can be saved?” But Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” Matthew 19:25-26
Deuteronomy 2
Moses continued his speech to Israel before they made the final leg of their 40 year trek in the wilderness. He reminded them of what God had done and what they had done in that time. He now spoke to them about what happened after they refused to take possession of The Promised Land and God had turned them back to begin wandering. Verses 1-8 read,
“Then we turned and journeyed into the wilderness in the direction of the Red Sea, as the Lord told me. And for many days we traveled around Mount Seir. 2 Then the Lord said to me, 3 ‘You have been traveling around this mountain country long enough. Turn northward 4 and command the people, “You are about to pass through the territory of your brothers, the people of Esau, who live in Seir; and they will be afraid of you. So be very careful. 5 Do not contend with them, for I will not give you any of their land, no, not so much as for the sole of the foot to tread on, because I have given Mount Seir to Esau as a possession.6 You shall purchase food from them with money, that you may eat, and you shall also buy water from them with money, that you may drink.7 For the Lord your God has blessed you in all the work of your hands. He knows your going through this great wilderness. These forty years theLord your God has been with you. You have lacked nothing.”’ 8 So we went on, away from our brothers, the people of Esau, who live in Seir, away from the Arabah road from Elath and Ezion-geber.
“And we turned and went in the direction of the wilderness of Moab.”
Esau was Jacob’s older twin brother, not chosen by The Lord to be the Father of His people. But The Lord had given his descendants a land of their own. God sent Israel through that land, peaceably and let them buy food and water. They were warned that He had put fear of them into their hearts and they should be careful. They were also told, this land was not for them, it had been given to Esau. Moses also reminded the people that though The Lord did not give them the land He had given to Esau, He had been with them and provided perfectly for them. They lacked nothing. They had no reason to envy the people or want what God had not given them.
Israel had refused the land promised to them and though God still was giving it to them, they had some learning to do in the wilderness. The first lesson let them see that Gracious God gave Esau a place even though he had sold his birthright and done nothing to deserve God’s mercy. He showed them that He can give to whomever He chooses. He taught them that He would provide for them and they had no need to take what was not theirs. He taught them that they would not expect the provision He promised to be given unfairly but that in the provision the buyer and seller, the giver and receiver would be blessed. But the journey and the lesson continued. Verses 9-23 read,
“‘Now rise up and go over the brook Zered.’ So we went over the brook Zered. 14 And the time from our leaving Kadesh-barnea until we crossed the brook Zered was thirty-eight years, until the entire generation, that is, the men of war, had perished from the camp, as the Lord had sworn to them. 15 For indeed the hand of the Lord was against them, to destroy them from the camp, until they had perished.
16 “So as soon as all the men of war had perished and were dead from among the people, 17 the Lord said to me, 18 ‘Today you are to cross the border of Moab at Ar. 19 And when you approach the territory of the people of Ammon, do not harass them or contend with them, for I will not give you any of the land of the people of Ammon as a possession, because I have given it to the sons of Lot for a possession.’ 20 (It is also counted as a land of Rephaim. Rephaim formerly lived there—but the Ammonites call them Zamzummim— 21 a people great and many, and tall as the Anakim; but the Lord destroyed them before the Ammonites, and they dispossessed them and settled in their place, 22 as he did for the people of Esau, who live in Seir, when he destroyed the Horites before them and they dispossessed them and settled in their place even to this day. 23 As for the Avvim, who lived in villages as far as Gaza, the Caphtorim, who came from Caphtor, destroyed them and settled in their place.)
Now Israel had to travel through land given to Lot’s descendants. Lot was Abraham’s nephew and also not chosen to be God’s people. He had chosen to follow The Lord when given the opportunity and God had graciously blessed him. The Emin who had possessed the land before Lot were Rephaim, literal giants. They were giants like the Anakim who lived in Canaan and scared Israel enough to make them afraid to take the Promised Land. Now The Lord showed them, He had overcome giants for Lot, He could overcome them for Israel. At this point, Moses also pointed out to the people, that when Esau took the land given to them, they had to defeat the Horites, who were a fierce people as well. Israel was given the same instructions for passing through Ar as they had been when passing through Seir; do not contend with the people, the land is theirs. God gave Israel a glimpse of what they could have had and of His great power. He did it with kindness and gently as He led them and provided for them.
He showed Israel how He blessed whomever He chose and that no nation was beyond His Sovereignty. He blessed Lot, Abraham’s nephew and spiritual son but not the descendent promised to him. He blessed Esau, Israel’s brother who had sold his blessing. The Lord wanted to bless His own people but they were too afraid to believe God could do it. But God was teaching them, and their next lesson would prove to them that God could do what He promised and they could be strong because He is strong. Verses 24-25 read,
“‘Rise up, set out on your journey and go over the Valley of the Arnon. Behold, I have given into your hand Sihon the Amorite, king of Heshbon, and his land. Begin to take possession, and contend with him in battle. 25 This day I will begin to put the dread and fear of you on the peoples who are under the whole heaven, who shall hear the report of you and shall tremble and be in anguish because of you.’”
So far, Israel had been told not to fight and not to take the land, but now they were told they would fight, they would win and they would take the land because The Lord willed it. Because of what God did with and for Israel, nations would be very afraid of the wandering band of ex-slaves. Verses 26-32 continue the narrative.
““So I sent messengers from the wilderness of Kedemoth to Sihon the king of Heshbon, with words of peace, saying, 27 ‘Let me pass through your land. I will go only by the road; I will turn aside neither to the right nor to the left. 28 You shall sell me food for money, that I may eat, and give me water for money, that I may drink. Only let me pass through on foot, 29 as the sons of Esau who live in Seir and the Moabites who live in Ar did for me, until I go over the Jordan into the land that the Lord our God is giving to us.’ 30 But Sihon the king of Heshbon would not let us pass by him, for the Lord your God hardened his spirit and made his heart obstinate, that he might give him into your hand, as he is this day.31 And the Lord said to me, ‘Behold, I have begun to give Sihon and his land over to you. Begin to take possession, that you may occupy his land.’”
Even before the first fight was fought, God promised the Land was already being given to Israel. He said, ‘start moving in now, it is yours.’ Sovereign God hardened Sihon’s heart and the adamant king refused to let God’s people walk through his land or buy food and water from the people of Kedemoth. Verses 33-37 read,
“Then Sihon came out against us, he and all his people, to battle at Jahaz. 33 And the Lord our God gave him over to us, and we defeated him and his sons and all his people. 34 And we captured all his cities at that time and devoted to destruction every city, men, women, and children. We left no survivors. 35 Only the livestock we took as spoil for ourselves, with the plunder of the cities that we captured. 36 From Aroer, which is on the edge of the Valley of the Arnon, and from the city that is in the valley, as far as Gilead, there was not a city too high for us. The Lord our God gave all into our hands. 37 Only to the land of the sons of Ammon you did not draw near, that is, to all the banks of the river Jabbok and the cities of the hill country, whatever the Lord our God had forbidden us.”
Whatever God said they would have, He gave to Israel. They would not and could not take what He gave to Esau or Lot, but everything in the wilderness of Kedemoth was theirs. Israel was not made of warriors, it was made up of men and women who had built pyramids, farmed, and slaved away under the tyranny of Pharaoh. They didn’t have the skills to win battles. They had The Lord; they had His promises and His Might. That is all they needed at Kedemoth and The Lord taught them it was all they needed at Canaan. Kedemoth was not The Promised Land, it bordered Canaan. God gave it to Israel not for their permanent habitation yet but for their rest, growth, and understanding in order to show them He is The LORD (Deuteronomy 3:18-22).
Has The Lord promised you something? Yes, He has! If nothing else, Believer, He has promised you eternal life in union with Him. He has promised provision and gifts and blessings. I know he has promised you more. I know there are things He has given you beyond those wonderful promises. I know because He loves to give good gifts to His children (Matthew 7:11). Child of God, He adores you! Is what He promised impossible? For you yes it might be, but for God, nothing is impossible (Matthew 19:26).
Are you afraid to believe that His promise will come true because it is too hard? Let God teach you to have more faith and take possession of what He promised. God does not expect you to do the impossible without Him. He asks you to put your faith in Him and obey. He asks you to take the steps he tells you to take and let Him do the impossible. What glory and praise would there be to Him if the giant man defeats the smaller man? But what glory and praise does He receive when the child shepherd without even a sword defeats the giant warrior (1 Samuel 17:50)? Be encouraged, your weakness, your inability is what makes the promise that much greater! 2 Corinthians 12:9-10 reads,
“But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. 10 For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong”
I confess, God promised me something years ago. I wanted it very much but as time passed, I saw it was improbable and my hope faded. I tried to stamp out my desire for it but I couldn’t quench that fire. More time passed and it is now impossible. I believed until this morning that I was mistaken; I believed God did not promise me a daughter. I am an unmarried virgin going through menopause with no prospects of a husband. It is impossible for me to have a daughter. But this morning God reminded me of His promise, He reminded me of the step of faith He asked me to take yesterday (which I did), and He told me, “It is impossible for you but nothing is impossible for Me.”
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Deuteronomy 1 Do Not Be Afraid to Receive the Promises of God

2/24/2016

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but he called out to them, “Don’t be afraid. I am here!
but he called out to them, “Don’t be afraid. I am here!" John 6:20 (NLT)
Deuteronomy 1
Today as we continue in the pursuit to know God more deeply we will begin reading Deuteronomy. God desires for us to know Him and love Him (Hosea 6:6). He is clearly depicted throughout The Scriptures as The LORD, Father God, Jesus Christ the Son, and The Holy Spirit. Allowing Him to reveal Himself to us in books where He is not so plain such as Deuteronomy allows us to know Him in an intimate way that reading only the New Testament does not. He is in the entire Word and leaving portions of it out of our study leaves portions of The Lord out of our knowledge and so endangers us to worship a god based on part of the truth, a god of our own making, a god who is not The LORD.
Authored by Moses and comprised primarily of three discourses spoken to Israel, Deuteronomy is the fifth book of the Pentateuch. The name means the second law. It is the second revelation of the Law to Moses and to Israel. The Hebrew name for the book is Elle haddabharim, which mean "These are the words." That is how the book begins. Let’s dig in to the first chapter. Verses 1-5 read,
“These are the words that Moses spoke to all Israel beyond the Jordan in the wilderness, in the Arabah opposite Suph, between Paran and Tophel, Laban, Hazeroth, and Dizahab. 2 It is eleven days' journey from Horeb by the way of Mount Seir to Kadesh-barnea. 3 In the fortieth year, on the first day of the eleventh month, Moses spoke to the people of Israel according to all that the Lord had given him in commandment to them, 4 after he had defeated Sihon the king of the Amorites, who lived in Heshbon, and Og the king of Bashan, who lived in Ashtaroth and in Edrei. 5 Beyond the Jordan, in the land of Moab, Moses undertook to explain this law, saying, 6 “The Lord our God said to us in Horeb, ‘You have stayed long enough at this mountain. 7 Turn and take your journey, and go to the hill country of the Amorites and to all their neighbors in the Arabah, in the hill country and in the lowland and in the Negeb and by the seacoast, the land of the Canaanites, and Lebanon, as far as the great river, the river Euphrates. 8 See, I have set the land before you. Go in and take possession of the land that the Lord swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give to them and to their offspring after them.’”
Israel had been wandering in the desert for forty years because of their lack of faith to take The Promised Land. The Lord had grown their faith in those years. All the generation of the faithless (over twenty years old at the start) had died except for Caleb and Joshua (Numbers 14:30). Even Moses would not get to enter The Promised Land because he had lacked faith. The Lord had taught the second generation that He is their God and they were His people. They had to learn that truth because they could only depend on The Lord. Isn’t that what our suffering teaches us, to know God and depend on Him?
They were eleven days journey from reaching the Promised Land, the same distance as Egypt to Kadesh-barnea (what would become Israel). They eleven days away from the promise that most of them had lived their entire lives walking towards. There was still a lot ahead of them. They would have to take the land from the people already there, so The Lord had to prepare them. He began by reminding them of what they had gone through the last forty years and having Moses explain the law to them. Verses 9-18 read,
“At that time I said to you, ‘I am not able to bear you by myself. 10 The Lord your God has multiplied you, and behold, you are today as numerous as the stars of heaven. 11 May the Lord, the God of your fathers, make you a thousand times as many as you are and bless you, as he has promised you! 12 How can I bear by myself the weight and burden of you and your strife? 13 Choose for your tribes wise, understanding, and experienced men, and I will appoint them as your heads.’ 14 And you answered me, ‘The thing that you have spoken is good for us to do.’ 15 So I took the heads of your tribes, wise and experienced men, and set them as heads over you, commanders of thousands, commanders of hundreds, commanders of fifties, commanders of tens, and officers, throughout your tribes. 16 And I charged your judges at that time, ‘Hear the cases between your brothers, and judge righteously between a man and his brother or the alien who is with him. 17 You shall not be partial in judgment. You shall hear the small and the great alike. You shall not be intimidated by anyone, for the judgment is God's. And the case that is too hard for you, you shall bring to me, and I will hear it.’ 18 And I commanded you at that time all the things that you should do.”
How wise was Moses to know that the responsibility of an entire nation was so great? He didn’t know at that time that it would be forty long years, he thought it would eleven days or so. He was a humble man who knew enough the great honor of leading Israel was also a difficult one he could not do alone. Solomon said in Ecclesiastes 4:9-12,
“Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. 10 For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up! 11 Again, if two lie together, they keep warm, but how can one keep warm alone? 12 And though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him—a threefold cord is not quickly broken.”
Israel was only too happy to accept the commendation of appointing judges among them. They heard this command and received it gladly. Some promises seem easy to receive, especially the ones with titles and privileges. But they didn’t receive every command from God with such willingness. They were prideful and stubborn like we are. Remember as we read that Israel represents us. What they did and lived is supposed to teach us so that we might skip the mistakes they made. But pride, obstinacy, and rebellion are deep-seated traits of the flesh that too many of us have refused to give to The Holy Spirit. Verses 19-21 read,
“Then we set out from Horeb and went through all that great and terrifying wilderness that you saw, on the way to the hill country of the Amorites, as the Lord our God commanded us. And we came to Kadesh-barnea. 20 And I said to you, ‘You have come to the hill country of the Amorites, which the Lord our God is giving us. 21 See, the Lord your God has set the land before you. Go up, take possession, as the Lord, the God of your fathers, has told you. Do not fear or be dismayed.’”
Israel was right there just outside The Promise Land. God said, “Go take it, it is yours, don’t be afraid.” But this command to take what they had been promised horrified them. They were terrified to receive what The LORD had promised.  Verses 22-28 describe Israel’s response to The LORD’s command to receive their promise.
“Then all of you came near me and said, ‘Let us send men before us, that they may explore the land for us and bring us word again of the way by which we must go up and the cities into which we shall come.’ 23 The thing seemed good to me, and I took twelve men from you, one man from each tribe. 24 And they turned and went up into the hill country, and came to the Valley of Eshcol and spied it out. 25 And they took in their hands some of the fruit of the land and brought it down to us, and brought us word again and said, ‘It is a good land that the Lord our God is giving us.’
26 “Yet you would not go up, but rebelled against the command of the Lord your God. 27 And you murmured in your tents and said, ‘Because the Lord hated us he has brought us out of the land of Egypt, to give us into the hand of the Amorites, to destroy us. 28 Where are we going up? Our brothers have made our hearts melt, saying, “The people are greater and taller than we. The cities are great and fortified up to heaven. And besides, we have seen the sons of the Anakim there.”’
Instead of taking the land as God commanded, they checked it out first. They looked at the Land through their eyes and abilities, not The Lord’s. Instead of being encouraged by the fruit the land offered, they were discouraged by the report of the people. Where was their faith in God? They had just crossed through the Red Sea and remained perfectly dry while the army of Egypt had drowned behind them (Exodus 14:26-31). Where is our faith when God tells us to take what He has promised? Where is our faith when He tells us to do the impossible? For too many of us, we forget we can depend on The Lord, we forget His promise means He will do it, and we think somehow we have to do it by our heart, soul, strength and mind. Deuteronomy 31:6 reads,
“Be strong and courageous. Do not fear or be in dread of them, for it is the Lord your God who goes with you. He will not leave you or forsake you.”
The Lord God Almighty is with you and He will never leave you nor forsake you, don’t be afraid. Go ahead, accept His promise, take the steps you are afraid to take because He said, “Be courageous.” Courage is not having being fearless, it is acting in faith regardless of your fear. That courage comes from depending solely on God, not looking toward your own strength, your bank account, or other circumstances to save you. The author of Hebrews understood that it is fear that leads us to idolize money and other earthly solutions rather than Our All-Sufficient Lord. Hebrews 13:5-6 says,
“Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” 6 So we can confidently say,
“The Lord is my helper;
    I will not fear;
what can man do to me?”
Israel downright refused to take The Promised Land. So He had to teach them, strengthen them and enable them to receive it. Moses reminded Israel of what went on the day they stood where they would stand after another eleven days journey looking at the Promise of God about to be manifested. Verses 29-41 read,
“Then I said to you, ‘Do not be in dread or afraid of them. 30 The Lord your God who goes before you will himself fight for you, just as he did for you in Egypt before your eyes, 31 and in the wilderness, where you have seen how the Lord your God carried you, as a man carries his son, all the way that you went until you came to this place.’ 32 Yet in spite of this word you did not believe the Lord your God, 33 who went before you in the way to seek you out a place to pitch your tents, in fire by night and in the cloud by day, to show you by what way you should go.
34 “And the Lord heard your words and was angered, and he swore,35 ‘Not one of these men of this evil generation shall see the good land that I swore to give to your fathers, 36 except Caleb the son of Jephunneh. He shall see it, and to him and to his children I will give the land on which he has trodden, because he has wholly followed the Lord!’37 Even with me the Lord was angry on your account and said, ‘You also shall not go in there. 38 Joshua the son of Nun, who stands before you, he shall enter. Encourage him, for he shall cause Israel to inherit it.39 And as for your little ones, who you said would become a prey, and your children, who today have no knowledge of good or evil, they shall go in there. And to them I will give it, and they shall possess it. 40 But as for you, turn, and journey into the wilderness in the direction of the Red Sea.’”
The Lord would still fulfill His promise, but only when Israel was ready. The faith of Joshua would ensure The Lord’s promise for their children. Israel was turned around and led back the direction they came, not back into slavery, they were already delivered, but to walk following The Spirit and learning that God is All-Sufficient and Almighty. Verses 41-46 tell us what happened next,
“Then you answered me, ‘We have sinned against the Lord. We ourselves will go up and fight, just as the Lord our God commanded us.’ And every one of you fastened on his weapons of war and thought it easy to go up into the hill country. 42 And the Lord said to me, ‘Say to them, Do not go up or fight, for I am not in your midst, lest you be defeated before your enemies.’ 43 So I spoke to you, and you would not listen; but you rebelled against the command of the Lord and presumptuously went up into the hill country. 44 Then the Amorites who lived in that hill country came out against you and chased you as bees do and beat you down in Seir as far as Hormah.45 And you returned and wept before the Lord, but the Lord did not listen to your voice or give ear to you. 46 So you remained at Kadesh many days, the days that you remained there.”
Israel said, “You’re right! We don’t wanna go back to the wilderness! That eleven days journey was tough! Okay we have faith! We’ll fight like you said.” But God said, “No don’t fight.” He had not told them to fight, He had said He would fight for them. He knew they were not ready to walk in the faith they would need to walk in order to take possession of The Promised Land. He had to take them through the wilderness first.
It might be frightening to take what God has promised you. It was frightening to take the eternal life, the promise of Jesus Christ and live as a child of Our Father in Heaven in the power of The Holy Spirit against the prince of the world. But Jesus overcame him for you. He fought for you then and He fights for you now. If you can’t receive His promises just yet, rejoice He will strengthen you and prepare you to receive them.
Did He promise you healing, blessings, and provision? They are yours. Did He promise you would do greater works than He has done? You will. Did He promise you offspring physically and spiritually, favor, and prosperity of provision and ministry? He will give it. Receive it, do not fear or be dismayed, take the steps He has told you to take or let Him lead you through the wilderness until you have the faith to receive it. For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives.” (Hebrews 12:6).
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Colossians 4 We Need One Another; Christian Life is a Community

2/23/2016

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And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved. Acts 2:46-47
And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved. Acts 2:46-47
Colossians 4
We, the body of Christ are a community of people who love one another in real and tangible ways. Without the fellowship of the church, it is very difficult for a Christian to be comforted through sufferings, mature in Christ, or walk in the Spirit. The final chapter of Paul’s letter to the Colossians begin with a continuation of the picture of how maturing Christians should behave. Verses 1-6 read,
“Masters, treat your bondservants justly and fairly, knowing that you also have a Master in heaven.
2 Continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving.3 At the same time, pray also for us, that God may open to us a door for the word, to declare the mystery of Christ, on account of which I am in prison— 4 that I may make it clear, which is how I ought to speak.
5 Walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time.6 Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.”
Verses 18-25 of chapter 3 talk about the maturing Christians’ relational behavior and verse 1 of this chapter carries that thought on. Paul directed: Wives, submit to your husbands. Husbands, love your Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord.  Fathers, do not provoke your children. Bondservants, obey in everything those who are your earthly masters. Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men.
Our behavior, the way the new-self lives as the image of Christ, continues from how we relate to one another to how we relate to The Lord. How we relate to the Lord enhances how we relate to one another. We are told to pray steadfastly being watchful and thankful. Steadfastly means persistently consistently, unwaveringly, with conviction, and faithfully. We pray not only for ourselves, being aware of our deficits and being thankful for all things in our lives but we pray for one another. We pray for our ministries, for the spreading of the Gospel, and our sufferings.
Mature behavior, that is behavior that exemplifies Christ also impacts how we relate to the world. We walk in wisdom toward non-Christians. The Greek word for wisdom sofia means higher spiritual understanding, clarity, insight, skill (human or divine), and intelligence. The time we have with non-Christians may be limited, they may only cross our paths once. We are called not to waste that time foolishly but to make the best use of it. The best use of that time is to embody The Lord, The Word of God and His Spirit to His glory. We therefore act in graciousness which is defined in Strong’s as kindness through the Lord’s influence on our hearts, expressed as accepting, benefice, favor, giving, mercy joy, liberality, pleasure, and being worthy of thanks. We are to speak seasoned with salt, the saving power of Jesus Christ so that we can answer each person.
Every meeting we have is an opportunity to share Jesus. It may not be an obvious recitation of the Gospel. It could be a few sentences of testimony, an act of love, or a show of kindness in Jesus’ name but it should always be to God’s glory. Peter said,
“But even if you should suffer for righteousness' sake, you will be blessed. Have no fear of them, nor be troubled, but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience, so that, when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame.  For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God's will, than for doing evil.” (1 Peter 3:14-17).
Paul lived out what he wrote to the churches. He wrote this letter and so many of his others from prison. He never let an opportunity to glorify Jesus pass him by. He loved the body of Christ. His letters show his deep feeling for his brothers and sisters, his spiritual children, and his co-workers for Christ. They show his deep devotion and ardor for The Lord. They show his willingness to tell every person he came across about Jesus.
Paul an apostle of Jesus Christ, called after Jesus ascended to Heaven, who is responsible for carrying God’s will of salvation to the gentile world did not live his Christian life alone. He lived it with his brothers and sisters in Christ. Verses 7-18 show us that very clearly.
“Tychicus will tell you all about my activities. He is a beloved brother and faithful minister and fellow servant in the Lord. 8 I have sent him to you for this very purpose, that you may know how we are and that he may encourage your hearts, 9 and with him Onesimus, our faithful and beloved brother, who is one of you. They will tell you of everything that has taken place here.
10 Aristarchus my fellow prisoner greets you, and Mark the cousin of Barnabas (concerning whom you have received instructions—if he comes to you, welcome him), 11 and Jesus who is called Justus. These are the only men of the circumcision among my fellow workers for the kingdom of God, and they have been a comfort to me. 12 Epaphras, who is one of you, a servant of Christ Jesus, greets you, always struggling on your behalf in his prayers, that you may stand mature and fully assured in all the will of God. 13 For I bear him witness that he has worked hard for you and for those in Laodicea and in Hierapolis. 14 Luke the beloved physician greets you, as does Demas. 15 Give my greetings to the brothers at Laodicea, and to Nympha and the church in her house.16 And when this letter has been read among you, have it also read in the church of the Laodiceans; and see that you also read the letter from Laodicea. 17 And say to Archippus, “See that you fulfill the ministry that you have received in the Lord.”
18 I, Paul, write this greeting with my own hand. Remember my chains. Grace be with you.”
Tychius, Onesimus, Aristarchus, Mark, Justus, Epaphras, Luke, Demas, and Nympha are all mentioned by name as being his beloved brothers and sister, co-workers, and co-servants giving him comfort and praying for the church.
Tychius and Onesimus most likely delivered this letter to the church at Colossae and they would also tell the church all that had happened during their visit to Paul in prison. We joyfully share the work of our ministries with each other so as to encourage, embolden, and instruct one another.
Onesimus was a slave to Philemon but had run away, met Paul and become a believer. Because of Paul’s intervention Philemon did not punish Onesimus as he could have (Philemon). It appears that Philemon may have released Onesimus from his servitude and or at least let him serve Paul. Either way, Philemon and Onesimus were master and bondservant in one life and brothers in their lives in Christ. We may have employers, mothers, and fathers in the world but when we are Christians they are our brothers and sisters. Our position in the world is not the same as our position in Christ. In Christ there is no Greek or Jew and no slave or master; we are one in Christ, equals with each other (Galatians 3:28).
Mark had at one time deeply disappointed Paul and for some time Paul did not let Mark work with him (Acts 15:36-41). But Mark learned, he matured and the two reconciled. Paul directed the church to welcome him and no longer hold his past against him. We too cannot hold pasts, present immaturity, or sins against one another. Mark and Justus had been the only comfort from the Jewish Christians that Paul had. We have to ignore denominational lines and remember we are one church, one body with one Spirit. Ephesians 4:1-7 reads,
“I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, 2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, 3 eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. 4 There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call— 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism, 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. 7 But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ's gift.”
Paul pointed out the sincerity and intensity of Epaphras’ prayers for the church and their maturation. We too should care that deeply for one another’s walks as much as our own to pray for one another with the grace of Epaphras.
Nympha hosted a church in her home. She opened her home so that people could meet together, fellowship, learn and mature. Her hospitality made the church in Colossae possible. We have to care enough to meet together. It is in gathering together that we are able to mature in Christ and walk steadfastly in The Spirit. Hebrews 10:24-25 reads,
“And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, 25 not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.”
Believer, you cannot walk in Christ without His body. You cannot mature and so become the image of Christ without the example of who He is around you teaching you to love as He loves. You cannot be comforted and honed by the Spirit if you are the not around those who share His Spirit with you. You need the church and the church needs you.
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Colossians 3 The Intentional Pursuit of The Image of Christ

2/22/2016

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Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. Colossians 3:12-14
Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. Colossians 3:12-14
​Colossians 3
When you were saved, you became a new person. The old you died with Christ and was buried in your obedience as symbolize by your baptism (Colossians 2:12). You came alive but not as the old you who lived to gratify yourself, satiate your own desires and please other people. No you came alive as a new person, a child of God, a friend of Jesus, and the Temple of the Holy Spirit. While we still walk on this earth, we still struggle with our flesh, that dead sin nature trying to defeat the living Spirit of Jesus Christ. In our obedient pursuit of the image of Christ we have to remember that the old self is dead and throw it off. We have to remember the new self is Jesus Christ and put on our new clothes, walk in the Spirit, and become the image of Christ. It is intentional, not happenstance. Verses 1-4 read,
“If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. 3 For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.”
Setting our minds and our goals on Heavenly things, the Kingdom of God keeps our focus where it ought to be. Paul compared our lives following Jesus to athletics. 1 Corinthians 9:24-27 reads,
“Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it. 25 Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable. 26 So I do not run aimlessly; I do not box as one beating the air. 27 But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.”
Athletes have a goal and they work toward it. They train, keeping their goal in mind. I have a friend who runs marathons. He started out running shorter races. He set goals to run longer ones, first a 5K then a 10 K until after several years he could run a marathon which is over 42 kilometers. Then he set his goal to run the marathons at faster times. He now regularly places in the various races he runs whether they are 5 kilometers or 26.2 miles. It did not happen because he set the goal, it happened because he set his mind on it and worked toward it. In Philippians 3:12-16, Paul writes it this way,
“Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. 13 Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, 14 I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. 15 Let those of us who are mature think this way, and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal that also to you.16 Only let us hold true to what we have attained.”
That upward call of God in Christ Jesus, is the image of Christ, it is His glorification and ours (1 Corinthians 2:7). It is a purposeful pursuit. Paul said to forget what lies behind. The enemy will constantly try and tell us we who we use to be. He wants us to remember our old selves, the liars, the thieves, the adulterers, the idolaters, and the selfish. But the Word of God says that we are no longer those people, those people are dead! We are born again, we are not known by those sins any longer. We are now the righteousness of God (2 Corinthians 5:21).  So we do not give in to the lies of the enemy to return to our old lives. Verses 5-11 read,
“Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. 6 On account of these the wrath of God is coming. 7 In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. 8 But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth.9 Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self ]with its practices 10 and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. 11 Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all.”
We let our old selves stay dead, we do not give them new lives. Jesus paid the price for our sins already. He is coming to bring the wrath of the Lamb to everyone who refused to accept His payment. How and why could we stomp over His sacrifice by resurrecting our dead flesh? No we are not who we used to be. We not the image of the world, we are the image of Christ. We are not man separate persons and peoples, we are one people, we are the body of Christ, we are the image of Christ. Believer, every single one of us has this new identity, we are collectively the body of Christ and He is in each one of us. If you do not want the enemy accusing you of being your old dead self, why would you think it is okay to do his bidding and accuse a brother of being his old self? How about pursuing the goal of the image of Christ together? Just as we deliberately put off our old selves, we expressly put on our new selves. Verses 12-17 read,
“Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, 13 bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. 14 And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. 15 And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. 16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. 17 And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.”
What a beautiful description of how we should be living life together. It doesn’t happen by accident, it is done consciously and with intent. It is the goal we set and pursue. Bearing one another is easily written and not always so easily done. There will be people who we, in our flesh have difficulty tolerating. But in The Spirit we can and do love them. The image of Christ is described beautifully in 1 Corinthians 13:4-8a.
“Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
8 Love never ends.”
Remember God is love, to know Him empowers us to love. Love means living in unity and community the way verses 12-17 describe and the way the 1 Corinthians 13 describes. That kind of life doesn’t happen accidently, it doesn’t happen if we just wish or say it is true, and it doesn’t happen by pretending in front of others. There was a woman who for some reason hated me. Every imperfection I have she concentrated on and enlarged so that she couldn’t bear to be around me. She did some things to show other people how lazy, rebellious, and arrogant I was. She rejoiced over the bad things that happened to me because of her hate. It took me years to get over the wounds she inflicted; it took me years to forgive her. But I did because I purposely sought to love her and so forgive her. She is my sister in Christ, forgiven by my Lord, how could I not forgive her? The Lord knows the wrong she inflicted on me. He is God, not me. He is transforming her and He is transforming me.
Looking like Jesus, walking in the Spirit does not look like the world. We look very different from them. Had I been in the world, I would have told the world about this woman’s inadequacies, I would have hurt her back the way I wanted to do. But I am not in the world, I am in Jesus and He is in me. He is greater than the world. I know this to be true and I can overcome the world. 1 John 4:4-12 says it this way,
“Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world. 5 They are from the world; therefore they speak from the world, and the world listens to them. 6 We are from God. Whoever knows God listens to us; whoever is not from God does not listen to us. By this we know the Spirit of truth and the spirit of error.
7 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. 10 In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 11 Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.12 No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.”
If we want the world to see God in us we live like Jesus, which is vastly different than the way of the world. Verses 18-25 tell us what we should like.
“Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. 19 Husbands, love your wives, and do not be harsh with them. 20 Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord. 21 Fathers, do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged. 22 Bondservants, obey in everything those who are your earthly masters, not by way of eye-service, as people-pleasers, but with sincerity of heart, fearing the Lord. 23 Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, 24 knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ. 25 For the wrongdoer will be paid back for the wrong he has done, and there is no partiality.”
The picture we are presented with is one of humility, meekness that is concerned with others rather than exalting our own needs. It is so opposite from the world to submit to your spouse, trusting the love he has for you. It is contradictory to the world to love someone and trust that you never have to be unkind to be treated the way you hope to be treated. It is unlike the world to obey authority figures not in order to please them, gain something, or look good but in obedience to God. Let God be God and let us be who He has made us to be, the image of Christ.
 
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Colossians 2 It is the Work of Jesus not the Rules of Religion that Saves

2/21/2016

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For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled in him, who is the head of all rule and authority. Colossians 2:9-10
For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled in him, who is the head of all rule and authority. Colossians 2:9-10
​Colossians 2
Paul was not in Colossae, he had never met many of them, but he needed them to be encouraged to mature in Christ together and conform to His image. They were inundated with people teaching them the rules of Judaism as well as myths and false teaching that were clearly not biblical. If they took these false teachings seriously they could not mature into the full assurance of understanding and knowledge of God because they would be filled with the knowledge of a false god, carefully constructed to mimic the One True God. Verses 1-5 read,
“For I want you to know how great a struggle I have for you and for those at Laodicea and for all who have not seen me face to face, 2 that their hearts may be encouraged, being knit together in love, to reach all the riches of full assurance of understanding and the knowledge of God's mystery, which is Christ, 3 in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. 4 I say this in order that no one may delude you with plausible arguments. 5 For though I am absent in body, yet I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your good order and the firmness of your faith in Christ.”
Paul encouraged the church to know God, to pursue Jesus, the Truth, the Way, and the Life and so strengthen their faith and not to adulterate the Gospel with lies.
I recently watched a film with a story which took place in 16th century England. The story was largely about the struggle between the Catholic Church at the time ruling Europe and their difficulty accepting a Protestant monarch. The Vatican’s response to anyone who did not follow what they called the one true church reminded me of the Pharisees response to the first Christians and the world’s response to Christians today. In the film, the Catholics had such an ardor for their religion they lost the ardor for Christ. As I reflected on that, I realized that many people begin with a zeal for Jesus that develops into a fervor for Christianity and then into a fanaticism for rules. It is an easy slope to slip down and one we must be rigorous about keeping clear of. If we fall off the path of following Jesus and begin following religion, we will not conform to the image of Christ, we will conform to the image of the Pharisees.
Paul did not want this to happen to the church at Colossae and he knew that it could happen because people were preaching rules rather than Christ to them. He was not with them in person, but they belonged to Christ and had the same Spirit he did. He appealed to them to let The Holy Spirit lead them and not people teaching anything other than Jesus. That does not happen by accident. It is a persistent and deliberate choice. Verses 6-10 read,
“Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, 7 rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.
8 See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ. 9 For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, 10 and you have been filled in him, who is the head of all rule and authority.”
Receiving Christ is not the entirety of faith; it is the first step of a walk. Accepting Jesus places us on the path to follow Him, but following Jesus means actually making Him Lord, taking steps and walking with Him, not merely calling Him Lord and standing at the foot of the path. Jesus is God, all of Him, not part of Him. In Him dwells the completeness of God and you and I have been filled in Him, Jesus our Lord!
Do you get that? The Holy Spirit is inside you. He is the fullness of God and He indwells you! He has become an elemental part of you. Indwells means to possess, inhabit, and exist within. Synonyms are: built-in, complete, connate, elemental, inborn, intrinsic, and utter. He dwells in you. It is not impossible to follow Christ because the same power that raised Him from the dead is in you! Romans 8:10-14 encourages us that we can walk with Jesus.
“But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness. 11 If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you.
12 So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. 13 For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. 14 For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.”
You don’t need anything more! You have the fullness of God in you! It is He who changes you from sinful to righteous. It is not rules and rituals that change you. It is The Lord who conforms you to Christ’s image. Verses 11-15 read,
“In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, 12 having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead. 13 And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, 14 by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross. 15 He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him.”
Jesus willingly laid down His life for us. We willingly give Him the sins of our past, present and future and put our old selves to death with Him. But Jesus raised from death and with His Resurrection we are given new lives. God did that work! No work we do has anything to do with our salvation. God died on the cross, God resurrected, God chose us, God saved us. Our debt of sin is cancelled, it is erased. We can’t pay for something we do not owe! The enemy tries to throw guilt in our faces and tries to get us to think we ought to be following a long list of rules in order to make up for all that sin, but he and his minions were put to shame when Jesus rose from the dead and conquered them forever.
The enemy will keep trying to discredit us. People will accuse us of hatred and hypocrisy. They will accuse us of not doing enough pious acts. But the Law of God was fulfilled in Jesus (Matthew 5:17). There is nothing more we must do to be saved. We humbly hand over our sins to Jesus, make Him Lord over us, and believe He is the Risen Christ and He does the saving (Romans 10:9). Jesus did give us some commandments; love the Lord with our whole selves (Matthew 22:37), love one another (John 13:34), take the Lord’s Supper (Luke 22:19), and make disciples (Matthew 28:19). These commandments are not about being delivered, but rather about living out love. Obedience is the result of our faith (Romans 1:5). It strengthens our faith it does not create it.  Ephesians 2:4-10 reads,
“But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— 6 and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, 7 so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. 8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.”
People will do the job of the enemy and accuse us of not being Christian enough, of not following the rules of the church, and of not following the myths they believe we ought to follow if we call ourselves Christians. But we do not call ourselves Christian, Christ calls us His own! (1 John 3:1). We don’t pray to saints or angels, bow to men, or hate any people. We worship The Lord, the One True God, we obey Him, and we love His people. Don’t let the accusations of the enemy lead you to try and save yourself by your own works. Verses 16-23 reads,
“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. 17 These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ.18 Let no one disqualify you, insisting on asceticism and worship of angels, going on in detail about visions, puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind, 19 and not holding fast to the Head, from whom the whole body, nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments, grows with a growth that is from God.
20 If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the world, why, as if you were still alive in the world, do you submit to regulations— 21 “Do not handle, Do not taste, Do not touch” 22 (referring to things that all perish as they are used)—according to human precepts and teachings?23 These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh.”
No matter how hard you punish yourself, no matter how many rules you follow, you cannot stop the desires of the flesh. Resisting temptation makes you want to satiate those desires all the more. With every self-flagellating strike you only confirm the desire you try and beat out of yourself. With every crack of the whip you repeat the condemnation, “do not lust” and increase your craving. Why punish yourself? Jesus already took the punishment! Does His sacrifice mean nothing? When you take on the work of God and try and save yourself, you exalt yourself and minimize The Lord. Galatians 2:17-21 reads,
“But if, in our endeavor to be justified in Christ, we too were found to be sinners, is Christ then a servant of sin? Certainly not! 18 For if I rebuild what I tore down, I prove myself to be a transgressor. 19 For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God. 20 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. 21 I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose.”
The same passage in The Message puts it this way,
“Have some of you noticed that we are not yet perfect? (No great surprise, right?) And are you ready to make the accusation that since people like me, who go through Christ in order to get things right with God, aren’t perfectly virtuous, Christ must therefore be an accessory to sin? The accusation is frivolous. If I was “trying to be good,” I would be rebuilding the same old barn that I tore down. I would be acting as a charlatan.
19-21 What actually took place is this: I tried keeping rules and working my head off to please God, and it didn’t work. So I quit being a “law man” so that I could be God’s man. Christ’s life showed me how, and enabled me to do it. I identified myself completely with him. Indeed, I have been crucified with Christ. My ego is no longer central. It is no longer important that I appear righteous before you or have your good opinion, and I am no longer driven to impress God. Christ lives in me. The life you see me living is not “mine,” but it is lived by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I am not going to go back on that.
Is it not clear to you that to go back to that old rule-keeping, peer-pleasing religion would be an abandonment of everything personal and free in my relationship with God? I refuse to do that, to repudiate God’s grace. If a living relationship with God could come by rule-keeping, then Christ died unnecessarily.”
Believer, are you trying to save yourself? Are you following rules and rituals to please a religion instead following Christ? Are you working hard make yourself good instead of delighting in the rest of the Lord? Go back to the gospel. Jesus saves. He, the fullness of God is in you! You do not need anything more than Him.
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Colossians 1 Our Hope is the Image of Christ

2/20/2016

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​Colossians 1
Today we begin reading Paul and Timothy’s letter to the church at Colossae. As with most of Paul’s letters, he begins by telling the church how much he loves them. Verses 1-8 read,
“Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,
2 To the saints and faithful brothers in Christ at Colossae:
Grace to you and peace from God our Father.
3 We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, 4 since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints, 5 because of the hope laid up for you in heaven. Of this you have heard before in the word of the truth, the gospel, 6 which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and increasing—as it also does among you, since the day you heard it and understood the grace of God in truth, 7 just as you learned it from Epaphras our beloved fellow servant. He is a faithful minister of Christ on your behalf 8 and has made known to us your love in the Spirit.”
Because Paul loved the church so much, he wanted them to grow into who they were meant to be. Who we are meant to be is the pinnacle of who we are created to be, that is the image of Christ. Man was created in the image of God (Genesis 1:27). But the fall brought sin and death into the world and keeps humanity from living that image. When we come to Christ, The Holy Spirit comes in and begins working on us, changing us back to who we are supposed to be, the image of Christ. The more mature we are, the more we look and behave like Jesus. Maturity or looking like Jesus is the fruit of the Spirit. The fruit of the Spirit is love and love shows in walking like Jesus.
Paul encouraged the Colossians that he saw the fruit of maturity in them, he saw the love they had for all the saints. They didn’t love because they were good people. They loved because of the hope laid up in heaven. What hope is the hope laid up in Heaven? It is our ultimate glorification when we will be perfected in the image of Christ. Every bit of sin and flesh we hold onto now will be gone and we will finally be exactly who we are meant to be seamlessly united with Jesus Christ in New Jerusalem for eternity. 1 Corinthians 15:50-55 says,
“I tell you this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable. 51 Behold! I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, 52 in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed. 53 For this perishable body must put on the imperishable, and this mortal body must put on immortality. 54 When the perishable puts on the imperishable, and the mortal puts on immortality, then shall come to pass the saying that is written:
“Death is swallowed up in victory.”
55 “O death, where is your victory?
    O death, where is your sting?”
And the author of Hebrews wrote in Hebrews 12:22-25,
“But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, 23 and to the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, 24 and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.”
When we read about hope in the Bible, it is not talking about wishing or yearning it is talking about confidence in God’s promise as already fulfilled, faith. Hope gives us the courage to keep going through all the muck and mire of life because we know what and who awaits us. Theses promises such as eternal life and perfection are so sure, that we can consider them already done. Hebrews 10:14 reads,
“For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.”
Jesus perfected us, past tense! It is already done even though we are going through the process still. He perfected or completed us who are being sanctified or purified and made holy. Our love for Jesus causes us to love one another. Our love for one another causes us to want each other to become mature, to grow in the Spirit and be more like Jesus. Jesus’ image is the fruit we bear and Jesus’ image or His glory is what increases our faith and the church. Because of our love for one another we pray for each other to constantly and consistently grow. Verses 8-14 read,
“And so, from the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, 10 so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to him, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God. 11 May you be strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, 12 giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light. 13 He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, 14 in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”
Paul’s prayer for the church in Colossae encourages us that we should be filled with knowing God’s will along with discernment and understanding. We do not just say, God’s will is that all people come to know Him (1 Timothy 2:4) or God’s will is all people glorify Him (Isaiah 43:7). We are filled with it, we act on it, we walk and we bear fruit in every good work. And doing so, increases our knowledge of God which is also God’s will (Hosea 6:6). It is not an easy walk. It takes strength, endurance and patience. But we have our hope and so we can walk that walk with persistence, fortitude, and joy! What is our hope? We are delivered, saved from the kingdom of darkness, ignorance and slavery to the prince of the world and now we are in the Kingdom of God. We belong to the King of kings, Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Knowing God is His will for us. Knowing God results in obedience, faith, and maturity. Knowing God brings us into unity with Him and so conforms us to the Image of Jesus Christ. To know God we must know Jesus. Who is Jesus? Verses 15-20 tell us,
“He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. 16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him. 17 And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together. 18 And he is the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent. 19 For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, 20 and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.”
Jesus is the image of the invisible God. Hebrews 1:3-4 reads,
“He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, 4 having become as much superior to angels as the name he has inherited is more excellent than theirs.”
The fullness of God, everything God is dwelled in Jesus. If we want to know who God is, we need to know Jesus. Jesus made it possible to know or unite with The Father because He, the perfect image of God paid the price of death on the cross for us. He resurrected to give us eternal life (John 11:25). He ascended to give us The Holy Spirit and so fully unite us with God (John 16:7). The Holy Spirit is the nature of God and He chooses to indwell us. He chooses to transform us into Jesus’ image. We can know God because we have His own Spirit in us. Verses 21-23 describe it this way,
“And you, who once were alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, 22 he has now reconciled in his body of flesh by his death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, 23 if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard, which has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, became a minister.”
If we love God, if Jesus is our King, if The Holy Spirit indwells us we will know Him and we will mature and want to know Him more. We want this for ourselves, for one another, and for the sake of the lost. But the transformation does not happen automatically. We walk with endurance, patience and joy through the suffering. It is suffering that teaches us obedience and it is suffering that develops the character of Jesus in us. Romans 5:2-5 reads,
“Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. 3 Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, 4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, 5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.”
Remember what that hope is, it is us perfected to the image of Christ and living absolutely united with him eternally. That is how we go through the trials with endurance, patience and joy. Are we crazy to rejoice in suffering? No, we are wise to rejoice in suffering. We can take joy in suffering because we recognize God’s mercy through it. Verses 25-29 read,
“Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church, 25 of which I became a minister according to the stewardship from God that was given to me for you, to make the word of God fully known, 26 the mystery hidden for ages and generations but now revealed to his saints. 27 To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. 28 Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ. 29 For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me.”
What Paul is saying when he says, “Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions for the sake of his body” is that suffering is what is making him more like Jesus. As he became more mature and knew God more, he was responsible to teach others what he knew. As we grow to be more like Jesus, we have a responsibility to live it out and tell others who Jesus is and how wonderful He is. Unity with Jesus and His Body requires we all become the image of Christ. The more we know God, the more we become like Him, the more we want to know Him. It is a lovely cycle but not a circle an infinite spiral which brings us closer and closer to perfect Jesus. The more mature we are the more we love Jesus and one another. The more we love one another the more mature we want all of us to be. It is another infinite spiral which brings us closer to Jesus and more united with the body. Love and knowing God which leads to maturity form the double helix of the kingdom of God.
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    October 21st 2015
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    September 27th 2015
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