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Your sense of walking through life alone is your wrongest sense. Jesus hems you in, both behind and before.
Remember: Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. (Is. 41:10) For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Rom. 8:38,39) The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing. (Zeph. 3:17) And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. (Jn. 14:16,17) It is the Lord who goes before you. He will be with you; he will not leave you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed. (Deut. 31:8) Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. (Jn. 14:27) The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear The Lord is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid? (Ps. 27:1) My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. (Ps. 73:26) (And I could keep going and going!)
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We are not important enough for what has already been done for us. Thus “Faith” is the heart’s command to the intellect to cease its self-important strivings—to, at once, surrender. It is telling all circumstance I will heed you not; it is commanding emotion Stand at heel; it is reminding one’s will You are in subjection to the One who has already bought you.
Jesus responds to such Belief: “I assure you, I delight in this posture! Those who entrust themselves to me will be gathered from every generation, from all corners of the earth, to sit at the Banqueting Table with me, my Father, and our Spirit. The Kingdom belongs to those who will believe in me; I am the great Within to those who are without. “Come and live! Your belief is your ‘Yes!’ to all I have already done for you.” In other words: Our Faith is our experience of His healing. (from Mt. 8:5-13) The daily word of Jesus to our restless, anxious, reckless, feckless, prone-to-wander hearts, spirits, minds: “Now don’t be afraid, just go on believing!”
When the world, or life, or circumstance, or our deceitful human heart proclaims hope dead: “Now don’t be afraid, just go on believing!” When the troubles of others seem to eclipse our own; when we feel ourselves insignificant in the economy of God: “Now don’t be afraid, just go on believing!” When we feel as though the enormities and exigencies of human existence swallow up the meaningfulness of our lives: “Now don’t be afraid, just go on believing!” When the annoyances and busynesses and frictions of our day-by-days annoy, overwhelm, rub our belief the wrong way: “Now don’t be afraid, just go on believing!” When the reality of our freedom becomes a long-lost memory—or a victim of our now-rigid orthodoxies: “Now don’t be afraid, just go on believing!” When our past will not allow us proper experience of His present presence: “Now don’t be afraid, just go on believing!” When personal tragedy strikes: “Now don’t be afraid, just go on believing!” When mundane normalcy numbs: “Now don’t be afraid, just go on believing!” Lord Jesus, would you whisper again to my restlessness, my anxiety, my foolishness, my waywardness with your wonderful words of old: “Now don’t be afraid, just go on believing”? Today, I am listening. (from Mk. 5:21-36) The citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven possess its wonders in the inward depths of their own humility. They accept the heavenly comfort offered them as they mourn for the kingdoms of the earth. They aim not at claiming anything here for themselves; yet, possessing nothing, they attain to everything worth having. They delight in feasting daily on the goodnesses of the Kingdom of Heaven: their satisfaction knows no end.
The citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven are merciful with the mercy they’ve received; they, in turn, receive additional mercies. They are of the truest-hearted natures, and, by those, they experience daily glimpses of the face of God. They are passionate after peace and bring its bounties where’er they go: they are sons of God, like Jesus, in this. They are fearless in their sufferings and carry their courage, intact, within them: they are, too, like Jesus, in this. The citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven are joyful—yes, effervescently joyful—for their lives are already “hid with Christ” in Heaven. They are following in His Way alongside Him, surrounded by the glory-cloud of witnesses from all the ages. Thus the citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven are countenanced. The citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven are truly blessed. (paraphrased from Mt. 5:1-12) “The greatest issue facing the world today, with all its heartbreaking needs, is whether those who, by profession or culture, are identified as ‘Christians’ will become disciples – students, apprentices, practitioners – of Jesus Christ, steadily learning from him how to live the life of the Kingdom of the Heavens into every corner of human existence.” Dallas Willard The Great Omission * * * * Jesus left there and as he passed on He saw a man called Matthew sitting at his desk in the tax-collector’s office. “Follow Me!” He said to him—and the man got to his feet and followed Him. (Mt. 9:9)
“God’s high freedom in Jesus Christ is His freedom for LOVE. The divine capacity which operates and exhibits itself in that superiority and subordination is manifestly also God’s capacity to bend downwards, to attach Himself to another and this other to Himself, to be together with him. This takes place in that irreversible sequence, but in it is completely real. In that sequence there arises and continues in Jesus Christ the highest communion of God with man. God’s deity is thus no prison in which He can exist only in and for Himself. It is rather His freedom to be in and for Himself but also with and for us, to assert but also to sacrifice Himself, to be wholly exalted but also completely humble, not only almighty but also almighty mercy, not only Lord but also servant, not only judge but also Himself the judged, not only man’s eternal king but also his brother in time. And all that without in the slightest forfeiting His deity! All that, rather, in the highest proof and proclamation of His deity! He who DOES and manifestly CAN do all that, He and no other is the living God.” Karl Barth
The Humanity of God We are not meant to remain as children at the mercy of every chance wind of teaching and the jockeying of men who are expert in the crafty presentation of lies. But we are meant to hold firmly to the truth in love, and to grow up in every way into Christ, the head. For it is from the head that the whole body, as a harmonious structure knit together by the joints with which it is provided, grows by the proper functioning of individual parts to its full maturity in love. (Ephesians 4:14-16)
Two thoughts here to start our week. Many of you have heard me reference this before, but, to the point of harmony, I want you to read the very best thing I’ve ever seen on the subject. A.W. Tozer, in The Pursuit of God, writes: ‘Someone may fear that we are magnifying private religion out of all proportion, that the “us” of the New Testament is being displaced by a selfish “I.” Has it ever occurred to you that one hundred pianos all tuned to the same fork are automatically tuned to each other? They are of one accord by being tuned, not to each other, but to another standard to which each one must individually bow.’ Yes! As you and I are bringing our every day’s gaze unto the face of Jesus, we become a “harmonious structure knit together.” The members all answer to the one “Head,” Jesus himself. Then something else you, perhaps, heard me reference before. When I think about the difference between continuing to be spiritual “children at the mercy of every chance wind” versus those who are “coming into their own” (Rom. 8:19), I think of a simple thing one of my dear friends said to me 10 or 12 years ago, while we were having breakfast. I asked him: How do you describe the difference between spiritual maturity and just staying stuck where we are? And he quite quickly replied: “On the day of a battle, a young child in the household will be hidden away in a cupboard, for his safekeeping; a full-grown son will be told to go get his armor.” Yes! Friends, let us “hold firmly to the truth in love,” ever growing up, every attaining to our Lord, ever after our “full maturity in love.” Let us want to learn to learn to BE HIM! To make ourselves as FULLY AVAILABLE to this world as He Himself always was! “Christ Jesus said: 'I am the Vine, ye are the branches.' In other words: 'I, the living One who have so completely given myself to you, am the Vine. You cannot trust me too much. I am the Almighty Worker, full of a divine life and power.' You are the branches of the Lord Jesus Christ. If there is in your heart the consciousness that you are not a strong, healthy, fruit-bearing branch, not closely linked with Jesus, not living in Him as you should be—then listen to Him say: 'I am the Vine, I will receive you, I will draw you to myself, I will bless you, I will strengthen you, I will fill you with my Spirit. I, the Vine, have taken you to be my branches, I have given myself utterly to you; children, give yourselves utterly to me. I have surrendered myself as God absolutely to you; I became man and died for you that I might be entirely yours. Come and surrender yourselves entirely to be mine.'” Andrew Murray
Absolute Surrender 160 He speaks of the widow’s sacrificial giving Mark 12:41-44 Then Jesus sat down opposite the Temple almsbox and watched the people putting their money into it. A great many rich people put in large sums. Then a poor widow came up and dropped in two little coins, worth together about a halfpenny. Jesus called his disciples to his side and said to them, “Believe me, this poor widow has put in more than all the others. For they have all put in what they can easily afford, but she in her poverty who needs so much, has given away everything, her whole living!” In the moment… With a deep sigh, she lifts her hand to the slot in the box and, one by one, listens to the fall and chink of the pair of coppers. She lifts her eyes to Heaven and entreats. Then she turns again and walks toward the gate through which she’d entered and begins her long, trudging journey back to her barren room. She can already imagine her arrival there: of opening up the thin, broken door upon its creaking, loosening hinge, and shuffling to her bed to sit down; of nibbling at the remaining crust of bed and then lying down—in the gathering darkness—to consider her life; of nodding off to sleep amidst the bustling sounds of the city and then rising tomorrow to another such day of poverty.
All this she can clearly see as she walks off. But then she also sees another sight... She sees the look in the eyes of a man—sitting on a bench o’erlooking the treasury box—who is intently regarding her. His head is set to one side; the hint of a grin is curling up the edge of his lip. His eyes are lovely. They are love. She nods her head at him, as if to say a quiet hello, as she passes. His hint of a grin becomes a full, beautiful smile. Suddenly her whole inward prospect changes. For she knows this man, suddenly. She is certain she has seen the one who will provide for the morrow. This poor widow just knows it. Two hours ago,—after a day He’d spent in healing, teaching, and speaking parables—you’d gotten into the boat, by moonlight, to sail to the other side of the Sea. Jesus, exhausted, fell asleep in the stern. Can you see Him there?
Thirty minutes ago,—after an initial stretch of smooth sailing—an enormous storm came rushing down the heights and made the sea of Galilee into a boiling cauldron. The wind howled; the waves began swamping the boat. Can you see Him, just behind you, still asleep? Less than a minute ago,—after you’d stumbled back to wake Him, screamed your fears right in His face—He stood up, lifted His hands, whispered quietly… and everything stilled to the most profound silence. In fact, the only sounds you can hear now are your own breath and the drip-drip-drip of droplets from the sailcloth, onto the water. Can you see Him, standing in the stern, glancing over at you—smiling good-humoredly? Just as surely as He was trustworthy on that night--and totally present—He is trustworthy with everything this Monday, and this week, might hold. (And, just to remind you, just as present as always!) For the last few months, I've been positively stuck on the words of Colossians 1, and I want you to join me in that "stuck" spot. Consider the overwhelming progression of theological concepts (and Heavenly realities!) offered to us by Paul, here:
"Now Christ is the visible expression of the invisible God. He existed before creation began, for it was through him that everything was made, whether spiritual or material, seen or unseen. Through him, and for him, also, were created power and dominion, ownership and authority. In fact, every single thing was created through, and for him. He is both the first principle and the upholding principle of the whole scheme of creation. And now he is the head of the body which is the Church. Life from nothing began through him, and life from the dead began through him, and he is, therefore, justly called the Lord of all. It was in him that the full nature of God chose to live, and through him God planned to reconcile in his own person, as it were, everything on earth and everything in Heaven by virtue of the sacrifice of the cross... "For I am a minister of the Church by divine commission [as are we too!], a commission granted to me for your benefit and for a special purpose: that I might fully declare God’s word—that sacred mystery which up to now has been hidden in every age and every generation, but which is now as clear as daylight to those who love God. They are those to whom God has planned to give a vision of the full wonder and splendour of his secret plan for the sons of men. And the secret is simply this: Christ in you! Yes, Christ in you bringing with him the hope of all glorious things to come." (Col. 1:15-20, 25-27) “Give us, O Lord, a steadfast heart, which no unworthy affection may drag downwards; give us an unconquered heart, which no tribulation can wear out; give us an upright heart, which no unworthy purpose may tempt aside. Bestow upon us also, O Lord our God, understanding to know you, diligence to seek you, wisdom to find you, and a faithfulness that may finally embrace you; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.” Thomas Aquinas
'The victorious Christian neither exalts nor downgrades himself. His interests have shifted from self to Christ. What he is or is not no longer concerns him. He believes that he has been crucified with Christ and he is not willing either to praise or deprecate such a man. 'Yet the knowledge that he has been crucified is only half the victory. “Nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.” Christ is now where the man’s ego was formerly. The man is now Christ-centered instead of self-centered, and he forgets himself in his delighted preoccupation with Christ. 'Candor compels me to acknowledge that it is a lot easier to write about this than it is to live it. Self is one of the toughest plants that grows in the garden of life. It is, in fact, indestructible by any human means. Just when we are sure it is dead it turns up somewhere as robust as ever to trouble our peace and poison the fruit of our lives. 'Yet there is deliverance. When our judicial crucifixion becomes actual the victory is near; and when our faith rises to claim the risen life of Christ as our own the triumph is complete.' A.W. Tozer
Man: The Dwelling Place of God “Christ avoided suffering until his hour had come, but when it did come he seized it with both hands as a free man and mastered it. Christ, as the Scriptures tell us, bore all our human sufferings in his own body as if they were his own – a tremendous thought – and submitted to them freely. Of course, we are not Christs, we do not have to redeem the world by any action or suffering of our own. There is not need for us to lay upon ourselves such an intolerable burden. We are not lords, but instruments in the hand of the Lord of history. Our capacity to sympathize with others in their sufferings is strictly limited. We are not Christs, but if we want to be Christians we must show something of Christ’s breadth of sympathy by acting responsibly, by grasping our ‘hour,’ by facing danger like free men, by displaying a real sympathy which springs not from fear, but from the liberating and redeeming love of Christ for all who suffer.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Letters and Papers from Prison "Remember not the former things,
nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a NEW thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert." (Isaiah 43:18,19) _____________________________________ "For behold, I create NEW heavens and a NEW earth, and the former things shall not be remembered or come into mind. But be glad and rejoice forever in that which I create; for behold, I create Jerusalem to be a joy, and her people to be a gladness." (Isaiah 65:17,18) _____________________________________ And He who was seated on the throne said, “Behold, I am making all things NEW.” Also He said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.” And He said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To the thirsty I will give from the spring of the water of life without payment. The one who conquers will have this heritage, and I will be his God and he will be my son.” (Revelation 21:5-7) At this same time Jesus said, “O Father, Lord of Heaven and earth, I thank you for hiding these things from the clever and intelligent and for showing them to mere children. Yes, I thank you, Father, that this was your will.” (Mt. 11:25,26, Phillips) * * * * “For it is good to be children sometimes, and never better than at Christmas, when its mighty Founder was a child Himself.” Charles Dickens
A Christmas Carol Despite the fact that they are One, perfectly mutual in their self-understandings, perfectly aware of the mind of the Other, perfectly in-sync in every conceivable way, I want us to imagine a conversation between the Lord Jesus and the Holy Spirit prior to the mass indwelling you and I know as the first Pentecost. This would be some time in the ten days between the Ascension and that morning...
“Spirit,” Jesus says, “unless they are born of water and of You, they cannot enter into our Kingdom. You must cause them to be born all over again.” “Yes,” says the Spirit, “for the thirsty have come to You and, believing in You, they have drunk. Now I will go to them and be the flowing rivers of living water that will flow out from their hearts.” “Will you be their constant help?” Jesus asks. “I will,” returns the Spirit. “I will be with them forever. I will abide with them--within them—they will never not be with You; I will carry Your very Spirit into their spirits.” “Will you teach them?” asks Jesus. “I will,” responds the Spirit. “I will teach them anything they wish to know. I will bring to their remembrance everything You’ve ever said to them. And I will be their living peace.” “And what of the ones who do not know me?” Jesus asks. “To them I will bear witness,” the Spirit says. “How will You do that?” asks Jesus. “By bearing witness from within those ones who are Ours,” the Spirit replies. “Their lives, filled with Me, filled with You, will convict the world of its sin, show Your righteousness, and point away from judgment. The lives of Your friends will be just as Your life.” Jesus is quiet a moment. “My friends…” He says, softly. “I miss them already.” “Oh, but you need not!” the Spirit laughs. “For I will be with them, guiding them always unto You—unto the Truth—and I will whisper to them everything You want them to know. Whatever I hear You saying, I will say to them. I will glorify You by taking what You are, who You are, and pouring it into the inner lives of those friends of Yours. Nothing that is Yours will not be theirs.” Jesus smiles. “Well, in that case, shall we begin?” So Jesus said to them, “Unless you do eat the body of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you are not really living at all. The man who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life and I will raise him up when the last day comes. For my body is real food and my blood is real drink. The man who eats my body and drinks my blood shares my life and I share his. Just as the living Father sent me and I am alive because of the Father, so the man who lives on me will live because of me. This is the bread which came down from Heaven! It is not like the manna which your forefathers used to eat, and died. The man who eats this bread will live forever.” (John 6:53-58, Phillips) * * * "To them that long for the presence of the living God, the thought of Him is sweetest itself: but there is no satiety, rather an ever-increasing appetite..." Bernard of Clairvaux
On Loving God 12th Century A.D. If Jesus Himself is both the King of the Kingdom of Heaven and also the Kingdom Personified, it bears telling what sort of King and what sort of Kingdom He is.
Jesus is:
“The more we get what we now call ‘ourselves’ out of the way and let Him take us over, the more truly ourselves we become. There is so much of Him that millions and millions of ‘little Christs,’ all different, will still be too few to express Him fully. He made them all. He invented—as an author invents characters in a novel—all the different men that you and I were intended to be. In that sense our real selves are all waiting for us in Him. “It is no good trying to ‘be myself’ without Him. The more I resist Him and try to live on my own, the more I become dominated by my own heredity and upbringing and surroundings and natural desires. In fact what I so proudly call ‘Myself’ becomes merely the meeting place for trains of events which I never started and which I cannot stop. What I call ‘My wishes’ become merely the desires thrown up by my physical organism or pumped into me by other men’s thoughts or even suggested to me by devils... “Until you have given up your self to Him you will not have a real self. Sameness is to be found most among the most ‘natural' men, not among those who surrender to Christ. How monotonously alike all the great tyrants and conquerors have been: how gloriously different are the saints.” C.S. Lewis
Mere Christianity To be blessed, ie. to inherit the Kingdom of Heaven, is to realize one's abjectness before God.
To be blessed, ie. to receive the individualized attentions of God, is to weep for realizing the prior disconnect. To be blessed, ie. to stand on one's two feet, is to learn to offer up empty hands. To be blessed, ie. to be filled to the brim by God, is to hearken unto a holy sort of hunger and thirst. To be blessed, ie. to receive the mercy of God, is to strive to offer mercy toward one's fellowmen. To be blessed, ie. to see God, is to see the way God purifies one's heart. To be blessed, ie. to dwell in the Family of God, is to always seek the peace of God. To be blessed, ie. to inherit the Kingdom of Heaven, is to expect no less than was afforded to its King. “Believe me, no one greater than John the Baptist has ever been born of all mankind, and yet a humble member of the kingdom of Heaven is greater than he. From the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of Heaven has been taken by storm and eager men are forcing their way into it." (Matt. 11:11-13) * * * * "Do not delay in coming to grace, but hasten, lest the robber outstrip you, lest the adulterer pass you by, lest the insatiate be satisfied before you, lest the murderer seize the blessing first, or the publican or the fornicator, or any of these violent ones who take the Kingdom of heaven by force. For it suffers violence willingly, and is tyrannized over through goodness." Gregory of Nazianzus
4th Century "Each new trial offers scope for the growth of faith; so that which is potential becomes real. Faith can neither be stationary nor complete: faith always becomes. 'He who is a Christian is no Christian' (Luther). That is to say, every Christian is always becoming a Christian, believing again and again." Dale Bruner
The Gospel of John: A Commentary Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” (John 8:12) * * * “You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.” (Matthew 5:14-16) * * * “To shine, we must keep in his light, sunning our souls in it by thinking of what he said and did, and would have us think and do. So shall we drink the light like some diamonds, keep it, and shine in the dark. Doing his will, men will see in us that we count the world his, hold that his will and not ours must be done in it. Our very faces will then shine with the hope of seeing him, and being taken home where he is.” George MacDonald
The Hope of the Gospel Imagine that there’s a Kingdom of the heart—a Kingdom of Heaven, in fact—and that its King is an everlasting King. Meaning, this King existed before existence and time and history; this King will endure far beyond the point of history, time and (what we think of as) existence. The Voice of this King is powerful to the degree that what He thinks of—and speaks—takes on the exact form of the idea He envisions. His power is so completely all-encompassing that it reaches not just to the lives of His subjects, but directly into the heart, the soul, the spirit of each.
And this King is good—wonderfully so. So wonderfully good that He invaded our human reality. Not, as many a mighty conqueror would, with intrigues, violence, siege works, advancing armies; no! He invaded, silently, as Himself—and on His own. He grew up within the class we might call “peasant,” and learned the ups and downs of His citizens—from right within their midst. His love for His people only grew and grew, thus. He literally fell in love with the subjects-to-be of His Heavenly Kingdom. For He had made Himself one with them. Then, at a certain age, He began to reveal Himself: to let a few know that He, the King, had actually been here all along. He began, as it were, to show His hand. In this way, more and more were gathered to Him. The crowds began to arrive from all over the earthly kingdoms surrounding His place of ministry: He greeted them all with love; with His attention. They followed Him up and down the coastline of an inland sea—waiting upon His next word, His next healing, His next miracle, His next look. One day, He turned to the west and began ascending a trail, away from the sea, up into the foothills, winding His way through a grassy, wildflowery meadow. Toward the top, He sat down upon a large rock. The crowds pressed ever nearer—and then they sat down to listen. He Himself was now looking out over their numbers, down toward the sea—waters which sparkled in the midday sunlight. A faint breeze was blowing through the meadowgrass. And then, without any warning at all, He began to speak: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied. “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy. “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." |
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