A Kiss from Dad for Today!

Here is an ancient poem, a psalm of David's, that has been used by many song writers.  This beautiful rendition of Psalm 23, The Lord's my Shepherd is by contemporary singer song writer, Stuart Townend.

May you enjoy this kiss of love from our heavenly Father in a new and special way.

Why neither you nor I are going to Heaven!

I had always imagined going to heaven, going to be with God, going to a place.  But suddenly after reading and re-reading this passage in Revelation 21, the image I had had in my mind for so many years completely rearranged itself!  Why?  See if anything strikes you as surprising here:

Revelation 21:1-5a “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away.”  And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.”

Notice what it says and what it doesn’t say.  John who is having visions from God about the end of days tells us this: “…And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God”.  The new Jerusalem is coming down from God.  It doesn’t say “and I saw a holy city as I went up to meet God”. The city of God is coming down, coming to us.  He also describes what he sees – “…prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.”  Verse 11 tells us how the city is adorned - “having the glory of God, its radiance like a most rare jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal.”  When we read further we also find that both the city and the path in the city are pure gold, transparent like glass (v18,21b) and it’s wall is adorned with every kind of jewel (v19). This richly beautiful and glorious city, clothed in the glory of God, is being brought down from heaven for the children of God.  The next part of John’s recount tells us about what he hears from God.  “…And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God….”  He doesn’t say ‘Behold Man is in the dwelling place of God’ or ‘They will dwell with Him’ etc.  He says “God is with man”, and “He will dwell”, and “God himself will be with them”! 

Yahweh is doing EVERYTHING!  From beginning to end it is He who comes to us.  He has been with us from the beginning, walking and talking in the garden, revealing a unique and beautiful relationship. He is with us, living and dying on earth as a man, radiant in his resurrection, rescuing and restoring us from our state of sin. The Son now in heaven with the Father prepares a place for us while the Spirit resides with and within his people. Then at the end of this world comes a new and glorious one.  God is bringing His city, his dwelling place with him for us.  He clothes us in His glory! And he will be with us, and we with him.

Heaven goes by favour. If it went by merit,

you would stay out and your dog would go in.
- Mark Twain, a Biography

Where on Earth is Grace in Suffering?

We live in a world at war with itself. It is filled with beauty and incredible wonders perfectly designed for us to live in, enjoy and rule over (Genesis 1 & 2), yet we know from a thousand experiences that life on planet earth is not as it was designed to be. Since Sin & Death entered the world we experience life as a 'half life', a sinking cruise liner, a banquet on Death Row. We experience the joys and beauty of life much less than what it was meant to be, and have added death, decay, pain and suffering into the mix. (Romans 5:12-14)

More disorienting still, there is no distinction between a "good" or "wicked" person when tragedy strikes. Whether you believe in God or not, whether Christian or not, life is full of 'the good, the bad and the ugly'. We only have to look at Job, who was considered to be blameless and upright because as a sinner he had faith in the promise of the coming of Jesus, yet suffered immense loss and pain.

For years my parents took me back and forth to doctors and the children's hospital until finally my chronic renal failure rendered me close to death and needing a kidney transplant. What parent can make the slightest sense of watching their child spiral this way before them? Thanks to two blessed kidney transplants I have survived for decades but the disease and the treatments are killing me slowly. My husband and 2 daughters also bear the burden of this, along with my extended family and those closest to me.

Where is God in all this? Doesn't he care?  What hope is there?  What's he doing about this? After all he is God.

The temptation we all face is to put our hope in the various things this life has to offer.  Pastor Matt Richard wisely states in his sermon 'Hope in the midst of despair' that  "If we look for hope by how things are going in this life and how we believe things will be going in the future or if we try to derive hope from our past, we can end up hopeless.  Hope is then attached to things that are temporary and fading.... Hope must always have an object that it can anchor to.  Hope needs a source and hope is only as good as the source that it is in....  Christian hope arises only from the fact that God has mercy upon us and instils hope into us. Christian hope never has any other object or matter or foundation than simply the mercy of God, not our works, not our abilities, and not our feelings....  Hope must have an object and that object is God’s faithfulness shown to us in the person and work of Christ."  Homiletic Sources:  Sermon Studies On OT Texts (NWP) ~ Pericope.org

http://www.pastormattrichard.com/2012/07/hope-in-midst-of-despair-lamentations.html

We may not understand or be able to answer the questions to do with why these things happen, apart from the fact that sin is in the world, but we do have an assurance of hope that as painful as the situations may be, they are temporary and fleeting and God is our refuge and strength and because of his grace it will not always be like this.  Revelation 21:1-5a promises us this: Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away.”And he who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things new.”

So what is God doing about it?  The answer is that he already has done something about it.  It is the mystery of his grace delivered in his own suffering that is our help.  "The words ‘Only the suffering God can help’ come from Bonhoeffer’s Letters and Papers from Prison:  

The same God who is with us is the God who forsakes us (Mark 15:34!). The same God who makes us to live in the world without the working hypothesis of God is the God before whom we stand continually. Before God, and with God, we live without God. God consents to be pushed out of the world and onto the cross; God is weak and powerless in the world and in precisely this way, and only so, is at our side and helps us. Matt. 8:17 makes it quite clear that Christ helps us not by virtue of his omnipotence but rather by virtue of his weakness and suffering! This is the crucial distinction between Christianity and all religions. Human religiosity directs people in need to the power of God in the world, God as deus ex machina. The Bible directs people toward the powerlessness and the suffering of God; only the suffering God can help. (pp. 478–79)"  Taken from Jason Goroncy in Dietrich Bonhoeffer, God http://cruciality.wordpress.com/2011/11/09/looking-for-god-%E2%80%93-a-short-reflection/

In the meantime we can bear the pain, because Jesus bore the pain and he suffers with us and for us.  In his letter to the church in Corinth, Paul, who endured much, writes of God's words to him, “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.  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.”  (2 Corinthians 12:9-10).  It is because of God's grace, his plan of salvation, the death and resurrection of Christ, that we have a sure and eternal hope, and that we can bear all things, and look forward to the promise that in Jesus he makes all things new!

 

http://www.sevenstreamsofgrace.com/

Andrew Peterson 'All Things New'

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SoND6QgM3Q&feature=related

Come broken and weary
Come battered and bruised
My Jesus makes all things new
All things new

Come lost and abandoned
Come blown by the wind
He’ll bring you back home again
Home again

Rise up, O you sleeper, awake
The dawn is upon you
Rise up, O you sleeper, awake  
He makes all things new
All things new

Come burning with shame
Come frozen with guilt
My Jesus, he loves you still
Loves you still

Rise up, O you sleeper, awake  
The dawn is upon you
Rise up, O you sleeper, awake
He makes all things new
He makes all things new

The world was good
The world is fallen
The world will be redeemed

So hold on to the promise
The stories are true
That Jesus makes all things new
(The dawn is upon you)

Words by Andrew Peterson
Music by Andrew Peterson, Ben Shive, and Andy Gullahorn

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Andrew Olsen for his input and edits and to Matt Richard for his wisdom and resources!  More of their work can be seen at  http://andrewolsenblog.blogspot.com.au/  and http://www.pastormattrichard.com/ 

The Law - a gift of Grace?

Romans 5:20-21

Now the law came in to increase the trespass, but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, so that, as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Grace is a demonstration of God’s Love and so is Law! God’s love is demonstrated through a gift of Grace, that gift being the Law which exposes sin. It is a gift of grace because without it (the Law) we cannot know what is sin and therefore the Gospel has no meaning to us (why would we need saving if there is nothing to be saved from?).  

Why, then, was the law given?

It was given alongside the promise to show people their sins. (Gal 3:19)

For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin. (Romans 3:20)  
A friend of mine described it this way:

"The law was a gift of grace, not a method for grace. it was is a gift because (a) it reveals the inner nature of the Triune God, (b) it forms the society of extraordinary beauty [see Deut 4 below], and (c) it exposes our sinful nature and drives us to the gospel." (Andrew Olsen)                                            

Therefore the Law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ, that we may be justified by faith." (Gal. 3:24)

Grace and Law are an outworking/demonstration of God’s love. The Law is not the same as Grace but one can’t be separated from the other. The Law was a gift of Grace. We are able to experience God’s saving Grace because he has given us the Law.

Romans 5:8

 But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

The law supposing I have all,

Does ever for perfection call;

The gospel suits my total want,

And all the law can seek does grant.

The law could promise life to me,

If my obedience perfect be;

But grace does promise life upon

My Lord’s obedience alone.

The law says, Do, and life you’ll win;

But grace says, Live, for all is done;

The former cannot ease my grief,

The latter yields me full relief.

The law will not abate a mite,

The gospel all the sum will quit;

There God in thret’nings is array’d

But here in promises display’d.

The law excludes not boasting vain,

But rather feeds it to my bane;

But gospel grace allows no boasts,

Save in the King, the Lord of Hosts.

Lo! in the law Jehovah dwells,

But Jesus is conceal’d;

Whereas the gospel’s nothing else

But Jesus Christ revealed.

Deuteronomy 4

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?

What God did in His law demand

And none to Him could render
Caused wrath and woe on every hand
For man, the vile offender.
Our flesh has not those pure desires
The spirit of the Law requires,
And lost is our condition.

It was a false, misleading dream
That God His Law had given

So sinners could themselves redeem
And by their works gain Heaven.
The Law is but a mirror bright
To bring the inbred sin to light

That lurks within our nature

Pg 14 Handling the word of Truth

http://www.cyberhymnal.org/htm/s/a/l/saluushc.htm

Es ist das Heil uns kom­men her
Paul Speratus

Your grace and love alone avail
To blot out sin with pardon.
In your gaze our best efforts pale,
Develop pride, and harden.
Before your throne no one can boast
That he escaped sin's deadly coast.
Our haven is your mercy.

In God I anchor all my trust,
Discarding my own merit.
His love holds firm; I therefore must
His fullest grace inherit.
He tells me, and my heart has heard,
The steadfast promise of his Word,

That he's my help and haven.

 Pg 40 "Handling the word of Truth"

Pless-Excerpt from, From Depths of Woe I Cry to Thee. Luther

http://ematthaei.blogspot.com/2006/03/from-hymnal.html

Rest Easy

Andrew Peterson's new album 'Light for the Lost Boy' is due to be released on August 28 this year.  
One of the songs from the album can be heard at http://www.rabbitroom.com/2012/06/hutchmoot-2012-light-for-the-lost-boy-release-concert/ and is called Rest Easy.  It is totally Gospel!  A promise of rest and that we do not have to work or prove ourselves worthy because God already has us!  Here are the lyrics of the song for you to enjoy.

“Rest Easy”

from Light for the Lost Boy

Words by Andrew Peterson

Music by Andrew Peterson and Tyler Cook

You are not alone

I will always be with you

Even to the end

You don’t have to work so hard

You can rest easy

You don’t have to prove yourself

You’re already mine

You don’t have to hide your heart

I already love you

I hold it in mine

So you can rest easy

Do not be afraid
Nothing, nothing in the world
Can come between us now

You don’t have to work so hard

You can rest easy

You don’t have to prove yourself

You’re already mine

You don’t have to hide your heart

I already love you

I hold it in mine

So you can rest easy

You work so hard to wear yourself down

And you’re running like a rodeo clown

You’re smiling like you’re scared to death

You’re out of faith and all out of breath

You’re so afraid you’ve got nowhere left to go

Well, you are not alone
I will always be with you

You don’t have to work so hard

You can rest easy

You don’t have to prove yourself

You’re already mine

You don’t have to hide your heart

I already love you

I hold it in mine

You can rest easy

To Do or To Die?

So much of what I have heard over the years and often continue to hear from church pulpits is what I can do to become a better Christian, or how to grow in Christ, which on face value sounds good and which is also what I want to hear.  I want to know what I can do to become more like Jesus, closer to God, a better Christian who doesn't sin so much.  I want to become spiritually mature.  And sermons on self discipline, self improvement, with tools to make this happen, in the past, have made me satisfied, to a certain extent.  Knowing that all I need to do is meet with other believers, read my bible, pray and spend time with God getting to know him seems fairly straight forward.  Practising the disciplines that Jesus and his disciples lived would surely help me in becoming more righteous, and pleasing to God.  At the very least it would help me feel less guilty knowing I was doing something to contribute to becoming a godly Christian.

The danger with self improvement and becoming disciplined in the processes is that we become fixated on just that - SELF improvement and doing the things that we think will make us become more mature or more spiritual (as if that can actually be measured!).  We genuinely strive to do the best we can, and our desire is to become more like Christ.  Yet we fail miserably and we know it.  Still we confess our sin and continue on the journey of self improvement "with God's help".  It's a struggle, and we become burdened, disenchanted, discouraged and disappointed in ourselves and God.  This is because we have got this whole thing flipped inside out, upside down and totally backwards!

Wanting to become more like Christ, more spiritually mature and practising spiritual disciplines is not in itself wrong. However, believing that the right behaviours help us improve, become more spiritually mature and would move us toward God, sets us on a path where the focus of the Christian faith is about the growth of the Christian and not about the work of Christ. Instead of the Bible speaking about the beauty of God and the story of Jesus it becomes just a book of history, poetry, a narrative, rules to follow and an instruction manual for life.   Even worse, Jesus becomes our great example instead of our righteousness and redeemer.

"Martin Luther said, “Remove Christ from the Scriptures and there is nothing left.” The emphasis of the Bible, in other words, is on the work of the Redeemer, not on the work of the redeemed. As important as how we live is, the spotlight of Scripture is on Christ, not the Christian. “The Bible is not fundamentally about us. It’s fundamentally about Jesus.” (Tim Keller)"  

TULLIAN TCHIVIDJIAN |8:12 AM CT What Does It Mean To Be Biblically Balanced?  http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/tullian/2012/05/28/what-does-it-mean-to-be-biblically-balanced-2/

We forget that our sinful nature cannot be reformed or retrained or improved.  It has to be and can only be put to death, killed, crucified.  We forget that Jesus has already done this and that HE is our righteousness and that when we fix our eyes on him, he is all we need.  We cannot do anything to get closer to God. It is He who comes to us. It is He who makes us righteous.  It is He who makes the change within our heart.  Hebrews 12 says Jesus is the author and finisher of our faith!  When we stop fixing our eyes on him, and start focusing on ourselves and what we must do, we don't grow or become more mature, we actually begin to shrink.

Tullian Tchividjian states in his interview on What is Christian Growth?, "When we stop fixating on our need to improve, that is what the Bible means about improvement.

When we stop obsessing over our need to get better, that IS what the Bible means about getting better." http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/tullian/2012/05/24/what-is-christian-growth/ 

So does this mean that we don't do those things that we call 'spiritual disciplines' and 'good works'?  Of course not! We do them not because we can become like Christ, but because of who we are in Christ.  Spiritual disciplines remind us of what Christ has done, what is real, who we are, who has us. We don't need to fear rejection or disapproval because Jesus has taken care of everything and there is no condemnation for those in Christ.  We can live our lives not in fear of the law but in the freedom of the gospel.

The Difference Between Law and Gospel by Jacquie Sebbage Wednesday, April 25, 2012

I started reading ‘Surprised by Grace’ byTullian Tchividjian recently & had only read a couple of pages when I realised that my understanding of Law & Gospel hadn’t always been as it is now and it has really only been changing I guess over the last 6months. I’ve found that I understand it now. Perhaps not in its entirety or true depth, but it does actually make sense. Plus I don’t think I really understood the gospel until I really understood the Law.

I remember reading & hearing those words in Romans 7, Paul talking about the Law and it always confused me, and I didn’t ask qtns about it because it was like I should already know, after all I was brought up in the church. I don’t remember anyone having explained what the Law was – it was always stated the law this & the law that – the Law was a set of rules that needed to be followed & the Pharisees did that well, but we shouldn’t be like them. I didn’t get that the Law was good. I did get that the Law was to show sin (well I believed it, perhaps not “got” it), but didn’t understand how. Paul was just totally confusing.  I also used to think I had the gospel confused – perhaps the gospel was something else other than Jesus dying for our sin etc. I always thought I was missing something. There was the “gospel” and the “good news” and so much “churchese” or theological talk – I thought people were talking about different things, but it was all actually the same thing! 

Now I read it and can’t see how I didn’t see it before, yet I am still close enough to remember how confusing it all was– WE NEED TO TEACH THIS CLEARLY TO OUR KIDS & the ‘young people’ in the church.  Heck, EVERYONE!  

How did we get the message that the gospel is only for the unsaved and not for those who are saved?!  Is it our own blindness & self-righteousness that has got in the way? I don’t believe it is just me who has been trapped in this lie.    

We need the Law AND we need the GOSPEL.  We need to know the commands of God and that he demands perfection.  The Law shows us that we cannot meet these demands.  However, the Gospel shows us that those demands have been met in Jesus Christ.  We need to hear the Gosepl every day of our lives.

John Bond, Senior Pastor of Lifestreams Christian Church, stated recently in his series on The Passionate Disciple, "I think the whole purpose of this journey and the wrestling with these commands and this teaching is to bring us on our faces before Christ, for Him to show us what that looks like. Because the picture is, and I don’t want you to forget this, He’s the goal. The goal is not even the lost or the poor, the goal is Christ. We want Christ, and He is the centre that drives us. And that’s the whole beauty of this thing because when he’s the centre, then anything that even begins to seem like sacrifice is no longer sacrifice, because the One who died on a cross and rose from the grave and ascended on high and has given eternal life freely to us, He’s the goal."

The goal is Christ!  It is Christ who saves us from the demands of the law.  It is Christ who enables us to do his work.  With Christ all things are possible.