GALATIANS/JOHNS GOSPEL
(1327)
GALATIANS; INTRO- Okay, finally made it, been wanting to teach this letter for
a while. Let me overview some church history that I feel would be helpful in
understanding the book. During the 16th century Reformation you had
an explosion take place within Christianity, though the official ‘schism’ dates
back to the year 1054 between the western [Catholic] and eastern [Orthodox]
expressions of the church, yet in reality it was the 16th century
upheaval that really split the church. A few centuries before [14-15th century]
you had rumblings within the church that had well taught Catholic men
challenging many of the institutional concepts of the church; men like John
Huss, Wycliffe and others. These men were extremely influential and had an
effect on the church. Then in the 16th century you had Catholic
writers who remained within the Catholic Church, but they too challenged the
status quoi. Men like Erasmus of Rotterdam, these intellectuals would call for
the idea of going back to the original sources of study [Greek New Testament
and also other renaissance ideas] and this too would lead to the historic
Reformation. But without a doubt Martin Luther [the Catholic monk out of
Wittenberg, Germany] would be the firebrand of the movement. Martin was a well
trained Augustinian monk who struggled with the guilt of sin for many years.
Not normal guilt, but extreme. A fellow Catholic leader would encourage Luther
to trust in the grace of God for his forgiveness. While reading the book of
Romans [whose themes relate strongly to Galatians] he would come along the
famous passage ‘the just shall live by faith’ and in Luther’s mind this was a
total release from the bondage of trying to appease God thru all the religious
works that he was going thru. In essence Luther discovered the historic gospel
of grace thru the reading of Romans and was set free. Now Luther had no
intention of leaving the Catholic Church, but as a very influential
teacher/scholar out of the university city in Germany, he had lots of
influence. The Catholic church at the time was worldwide and you had differing
views of the church in various states. Many saw the state of the church in Rome
as having given in to materialism and become too worldly. Rome was at the time
trying to raise money for the restoring of the religious buildings at Rome and
one of the priests going around selling indulgences was named Tetzel. The abuse
of selling these ‘get out of purgatory early’ things was offensive to many Catholics,
and Luther had ‘no small stir’ when Tetzel reached his area. These things would
lead to the famous nailing of the 95 questions on the door of Catholic academia
and would be the beginnings of the historic split. While it would take way too
much time to go into all the theological differences between the Protestants
and the Catholics, one of the main issues deals with how we as Christians view
‘being saved’. The historic Protestant position is called ‘justification by
faith alone’ [Sola Fide] the Catholics counter with ‘the only time ‘faith
alone’ is mentioned is in the book of James, where it says a man is not
saved/justified by ‘faith alone’. Ouch! The main point I want to make is this
letter deals with the early church’s belief that man is accepted with God based
on the sacrifice of Jesus on the Cross. Paul will challenge the ‘Judaisers’
[those who believed you needed to keep the law in order to be saved] and will
argue that the law itself [Old Testament books] teaches that men are
justified/accepted with God based on believing in the free gift of God thru
Christ. Make no mistake about it, the New Testament clearly teaches this
doctrine. Catholic and Protestant theologians BOTH agree that man is freely
saved by the grace of God in Christ. But at the time of Luther’s day these
glorious truths were lost in the morass of religious tradition and works. As we
read thru this letter in the next few days, I want all of our readers to see
the argument Paul is making from this basic theological view point. Is man
saved by works [keeping Gods law] or grace? The bible teaches grace. Now I
don’t have the time to also introduce the modern controversy between the ‘new
view’ of Paul between Protestants [called new perspective]. There is an ongoing
debate over whether or not the historic Reformation view of Paul is correct
[men like N.T. Wright and John Piper are hashing it out] and I do think there
are some merits to this discussion, but before we can delve into that aspect,
we first need to see the historic question of works versus faith, and this
letter is one of the best to deal with the issue.
(1328) GALATIANS 1- Mark Twain said ‘the classics
are books that everyone loves to praise, but nobody wants to read’. As we begin
this study I can’t emphasize enough the need for Christians to read the bible!
Many of the current problems in Christianity would be solved if we simply got
back to reading the bible in context. Okay, in chapter one Paul defends his
authority as being one who was sent by God, not man. He explains how after his
conversion he spent years receiving direct revelation from God; he was not
taught the gospel of grace by consulting with man. Paul was in a unique
situation compared to the other apostles, Paul was the first apostle to have
had a strong intellectual background in both Judaism and philosophy; he knew
his stuff. This ‘allowed’ God to reveal things to Paul FROM THE SCRIPTURES that
revealed Gods grace and the reality of how men are justified by faith and not
thru the law. In essence Paul wasn’t out in left field receiving Divine
revelations about things that nobody ever heard about. They were new things in
the sense that they were hidden in God until the time that God chose to reveal
them [Ephesians 3]. Paul rebukes them for forsaking the true gospel and being
drawn to another gospel ‘which is not another’. Okay, what’s the true gospel
Paul is speaking about? It’s not only the definition given by Paul in 1st
Corinthians 15 [the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus] but it includes
being justified by faith and not by the law. The Judaisers did believe in
Jesus, but they were rejecting justification by faith alone. The false gospel
that Paul is refuting is the gospel that said the Gentiles must ‘keep the law
in order to be saved’ [see Acts 13 and 15]. In no uncertain terms Paul condemns
this message; there was no compromising the reality of Gods free grace given to
the elect. The actual faith itself that is deposited in the elect is a divine
act of God [Ephesians 2] the unbeliever is dead in sins with no ability to
‘resurrect himself’ and the new birth is Gods sovereign act of raising a person
from the dead [spiritually] and giving them faith. This is the gospel of grace.
Paul was adamant about rejecting false gospels! In our day there are so many
‘gospels’ going around it’s not funny. I caught a few minutes of a TV
evangelist the other day quoting verses from all over the bible in order to
entice people to vow money to him; yes he used these words in no uncertain
terms. He told the people they must quickly pick up the phone and dedicate the
money to him, because it was this act of faith that would release the harvest.
Now I don’t know how much longer God is going to allow stuff like this to go
on, how much longer networks will continue to air this stuff, but we as
believers/preachers need to condemn these false gospels in no uncertain terms.
Paul will use strong language when defending the gospel; we need to get back to
defending it too.
(1329) GALATIANS 2- Paul recounts his meeting with
the apostles at Jerusalem; some feel he is talking about his first visit [Acts
11- before AD 50] others think he is discussing his Acts 15 meeting [right at
around AD 50] I’m in the latter camp. Paul is basically telling the churches of
Galatia that he already went thru this whole discussion with the main apostles
at Jerusalem [Peter, James and John] and that they had already agreed that the
Gentile believers did not need to get circumcised and come under the law in
order to be saved. I do find it interesting that out of the 4 decrees that were
made [read Acts 15] that the only one Paul recounts here is ‘to remember the
poor’. The only decree worthy enough for Paul to recount is the one on
charitable giving; those of you who have followed this blog for a while know
how much I emphasize this point. If the early church was teaching tithing to
the Gentile churches, surely it would have come up at the Jerusalem meeting,
but it didn’t. This chapter has some important verses that all believers should
commit to memory ‘if righteousness come by the law, then Christ died in vain’
‘the life that I now live I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me
and gave himself for me’ etc. I really want all my Catholic/Protestant readers
to pay attention to the verse’s that I just quoted; the bible clearly teaches
that if men could ‘be saved’ by keeping Gods law, then Christ died in vain.
Paul will go on to teach [chapter 3] that if there had been a law given that
could have given men eternal life, then ‘being saved’ would come that way; but he
then goes on to say that there never was a law given that men could keep in
order to be saved. Paul always gives the caveat ‘does this mean we go out and
break the 10 commandments’? And his answer is always a big NO! The point of
this chapter is we as believers are saved because Jesus died to pay the penalty
for our sin; the proof that the penalty was completely paid is in the fact that
Jesus rose again [Romans 5]. All who believe in this reality are now the
children of God, indeed ‘we are all the children of God by faith in Jesus
Christ’.
(1330) GALATIANS 3- The main point of this chapter
is God made a promise to Abraham that he would ‘bless’ all nations thru one of
his kids someday [Genesis 12). This promise was given to Abraham 430 years
before God gave the 10 commandments to Moses. Therefore the promise that men
would be justified/saved by faith cannot be ‘undone’ by a later act of giving
the law to Moses. The point being that Paul is arguing with the Galatians that
their new view that they need to keep the law in order to ‘be saved’ [the
blessing of Abraham IN CONTEXT!] is false because God already told Abraham it
would be by faith in the coming Messiah. Paul then asks ‘is the law then
against Gods promise’? No, it was given to man [Israel] until the time came for
the promised child to be born [1st century], but now that the
promised child is here we are no longer under the ‘schoolmaster’. The
schoolmaster term can be confusing; the word in Greek means the person who
walked the kids to school [truth] and then dropped them off AND LEFT. Paul is
saying the law period served its purpose; it revealed mans sinful nature to him
and then ‘dropped him off at the Cross’. Paul is saying the law fulfilled its
purpose and we are now under grace. As new creatures in Christ we walk in love
and fulfill the righteousness of the law by our new nature, it’s not a
legalistic thing. There is some confusion today on this chapter; some were
taught that ‘the blessing of Abraham’ was speaking of the promises in
Deuteronomy on financial blessings. And that the curse is speaking about the
curse of ‘poverty’. Though it is true that the bible does speak about this in
the Old Testament, in context Paul is not saying this here. Paul explains what
he means about the ‘curse of the law’. He says it’s the curse of never being
able to do enough to appease God, the man that is under the law puts himself
under this mindset of perfectionism and lives under this constant feeling of
never being able to do enough. This was Paul's previous experience as a
Pharisee. When Paul teaches that we are delivered from ‘the curse’ so the
‘blessing of Abraham might come on the gentiles, that we might receive THE
PROMISE OF THE SPIRIT BY FAITH’ he is not saying Jesus died to make us
financially rich, he is saying Jesus delivered us from the old law mindset of
legalism and we now have forgiveness and acceptance as a free gift- ‘being now
justified by faith we have peace with God thru our Lord Jesus Christ’ [Romans
5].
This post deals with the faulty understanding
expounded by many Evangelical/Protestant ministers [end times scenarios, Tim
Lahaye type books] that exalt ethnic/racial elements into the gospel, and
contribute to the many present tensions between Muslims/Jews/Christians.
(1331) GALATIANS 4- Paul says there was a time
period before the promise would be fulfilled thru Christ; that time has come to
an end [the law] and we are now in ‘the fullness of times’. When we were under
the law we were no different than servants, but now in grace we are mature sons,
people able to inherit the promise. Paul says why do you desire to go back
under the ‘restraint’ phase, the time of discipline and legalism, we are now in
a fullness stage thru the New Covenant and we don’t need the old mentality
anymore. Once again Paul really ‘spiritualizes’ the Old Testament in his
teaching, he says that the law [Old Testament] taught this difference between
law and grace. He uses the story of Abraham having 2 sons [Ishmael, Isaac] and
he says ‘cant you hear what the law is saying’? One son was born by promise
[Isaac] the other thru the works of the flesh [law]. And just like it was back
then, the one born after the flesh persecuted the one born after the Spirit, so
today [1st century] those after the flesh/law are persecuting those
born after the Spirit. It’s important to see that Paul DOES NOT use this
analogy to describe Jewish/Muslim [Arab] relations; he actually refers to
natural Israel as ‘Ishmael’! He says the Judaisers [Jews zealous of the law]
were fulfilling the type/symbol by persecuting Gentile believers. We need to
keep these distinctions in our minds, because when we don’t rightfully discern
the truth we do damage to the non ethnic testimony of the gospel. Paul says the
law relates to natural Israel/Jerusalem who is under bondage with her children,
but the ‘New Jerusalem’ which is above is the mother of us all, and this
Jerusalem relates to the church. The New Jerusalem is not referring to a
physical city that will ‘hover over the earth during the millennium rule’
[EEK!] But it refers to the new community people of God, the church. I have
written on this before and these references in the New Testament [Revelation,
Hebrews- us being the new Zion, etc.] are speaking of the church, the people of
God. Paul once again speaks of ‘natural Jerusalem’ in a negative light, in the
sense that he teaches those who are under the law are not walking in the
fullness of the promises of God as come in the Messiah. The New Testament
spends no time engaging in the glorying of any ethnic group [whether it be
Israel, Gentile, etc.] It’s not that the apostles were being anti Semitic, it’s
just the emphasis is on the new kingdom of God and the new people of God [the
church made up of both Jew and Gentile]. Its striking to compare the writings
of the first Jewish believers to the current trends amongst many evangelical
preachers, the two don’t mesh well.
(1335) GALATIANS 5- Paul’s main theme is if we
possess the Spirit as believers [being indwelt by God’s Spirit] then let us
also walk in/by the Spirit, as opposed to trying to please God by the law and
being circumcised. Paul will use the somewhat controversial term ‘ye are fallen
from grace’ which simply means that these Gentile believers started by faith
and went back to the old Jewish system, much like the themes in the book of
Hebrews. Paul says when you go back to the law you have left grace. Christ has
‘become of no effect to you, you who are justified by the law’. This is a good
example of how words and certain phrases can develop over the centuries of
church history and develop a different meaning over time. In essence the bible
does teach that a person can ‘fall from grace’ but this does not describe what
the modern reader might think. The first church father who attempted to
formulate the Christian doctrine of the Trinity was a man named Tertullian, he
lived in the second century and was what theologians refer to as one of the
Latin fathers [as opposed to the Greek ones- Origen, etc.] Tertullian was
famous for the sayings ‘what does Jerusalem have to do with Athens’ and ‘I
believe because it is absurd’ he was resisting the influence of Greek
philosophy on the church, he felt that Greek wisdom was influencing the church
too much. He was trained in law before becoming a theologian [like Luther and
Calvin of 16th century Reformation fame] and he used the words ‘God
is one substance/essence and also three persons’ later church councils would
agree with this language. But the word ‘person’ at Tertullian’s time was the
Latin word ‘personi’ which was taken from the theater and meant a person/actor
who would put on different masks during the play; the word had a little
different meaning then what we think of today as ‘person’. Later centuries
would come to condemn certain Christian groups who seem to have formulated
language on the Trinity that expresses the same thing as what the original
developer of the doctrine meant to say, but because words and their meanings
change over time we get ourselves into disputes that might be getting us off
track. Paul also tells the Galatians that if they become circumcised that they
are obligating themselves to keep all the law. Of course the medical procedure
that many have done in our day is not what he is speaking about, but in Paul’s
day getting circumcised was the religious rite that placed you into the
religion of Judaism, and this is what Paul is refuting among the Galatians, he
tells them not to go down that road. This chapter has lots of good ‘memory
verses’, the famous lists of the works of the flesh versus the fruit of the
Spirit are found here, and it seems pretty clear to me that Paul identified
circumcision with the moral law of the 10 commandments, that is he saw being
circumcised as an act that obligated you to ‘keep all the law’ some theologians
are discussing whether or not Paul meant the law of Moses when speaking about
going ‘back under the law’ some think Paul was speaking only of the ceremonial
law and the system of animal sacrifices when he was telling the gentiles that
they should not go under the law, I believe if you read Paul in context both in
this letter and the book of Romans, that he is speaking of the moral law too,
not just the ceremonial law. All in all Paul exhorts these believers to fight
for their right to be free from the past restraints of religion and bondage, he
tells them to not desire to go back under a system of bondage, that Christ has
made us free from that legalistic way of life and he has liberated us by giving
us the Holy Spirit- if we ‘walk in the Spirit we will not fulfill the lusts of
the flesh, for the flesh lusts against the Spirit and the Spirit against the
flesh, and these two are contrary one to the other, so that you cannot do the
things that you would’ amen to that.
(1338) GALATIANS 6- Paul closes this short
theological treatise with some practical stuff; help each other out with their
burdens, if you see a brother struggling, restore him in the spirit of
meekness. Those who are teaching you Gods word, ‘communicate’ to them in all
good things [share with them financially and materially]. Good advice that Paul
gives to all of the churches he writes to. As we close our study of this
letter, I want to emphasize that the majority of what Paul is teaching [over
90%] is great theological truth, it would be silly for preachers/teachers to
grasp hold of any single verse and to exalt that above the main body of truths
that we have discussed. It isn't hard for any preacher/teacher to go thru this
letter on a few Sundays and teach the main truths of the letter. We desperately
need to get back to doing it this way in many
Pentecostal/Protestant/Evangelical churches- and yes, the ‘organic church’ guys
too! We all have a tendency to pick out pet doctrines out of the New Testament
and then to make the side issues the main thing. I think the main thing
[justification by faith, the blessing of Abraham in context, etc.] is good
enough without us having to try and find some type of ‘Rhema word’ that is not
the main word of God. Recently a good man died, Oral Roberts. A few weeks have
passed and I think it is okay to mention a few things. The media reported how
many preachers showed up to the funeral in Cadillac’s and expensive cars, there
have been various articles written about the legacy he will leave behind. Some
wrongly said he was the father of the ‘Word of Faith/prosperity movement’ [E.W.
Kenyon was the real father, and Kenneth Hagin and others lay claim to the
title]. The point I want to make is Brother Roberts was a good man who did good
things, but his way of doing doctrine is not my cup of tea. He was famous for
popularizing the ‘seed-faith’ teaching. It comes from Paul’s letters when he
does tell believers that if they give in faith God will bless them, true
enough. But when we read the New Testament there are many warnings against greed
and materialism, and when we take a simple practical truth from Paul, even
though it’s true, and when this truth becomes our main message, then we err. In
this last chapter of Galatians Paul gives practical advice about giving
financially to those who are teaching you, good. But this is one verse in a
letter filled with other main teachings, the important stuff if you will. For
believers in our day to have built ministries/churches and to have as the
foundation of these ministries the few practical side verses, is wrong. We need
to focus on the main thing, and keep the main thing the main thing! [Redemption
thru Christ's Blood, eternal life to those who believe, etc.] I don’t want to
speak bad about brother Roberts, he was a good man who went home to be with the
Lord, it’s just the discussion that has happened after his passing shows us how
easy it is for good men to get sidetracked with a verse or 2 and then to exalt
it out of context. As I conclude this brief study on Galatians, I think I will
go back over a few main verses in the next week or so and give you some
‘practical’ things that I have gleaned these last few weeks. In a sense I will
show you how God can speak to us in a personal way thru these letters, yet at
the same time not losing the original meaning of the letters. One of the
distinctions of the early church fathers was this Christ centered approach to
the scripture, they looked for Jesus on every page. I’ll end with an example
form Saint Augustine; he shared a thought on the story of Jesus walking on the
water to the land, and that the disciples needed a wooden boat to ‘cross over’
he then applied the wood of the boat to the wood of the Cross and said how the
Cross allows us to cross over to God, just like the boat let them cross over to
the land. Now this is a simple example of applying scripture in a sort of
symbolic way that is not in context, but nevertheless it’s okay to do. So I
will do a few things like this in the next few posts. But while doing this, we
want to not forget the main meaning of the letter, a good ‘side example’ should
never negate the main body of truth.
(1340) GALATIANS AFTER-THOUGHTS: As I said the
other day I will try and go back over a few verses and share a few more things
on Galatians. One of the things I wanted to mention was the fact that I
purposefully chose to teach the letter in the classic Protestant way [mostly] I
avoided getting into the ‘New Perspective’ ideas on Paul and ‘what he really
meant’. So let’s talk a little on it; as of the date of this writing there is a
theological debate going on [mostly in the ivory towers, but seeping somewhat
into mainstream thought] that re-looks at Paul and what the context of his day
was. For instance when the Reformers of the 16th century spoke about
being Justified by Faith and not by works, many of them were speaking about the
works of tradition and the things they felt were wrong in the Catholic faith.
Were they wrong in applying Paul this way? No. In context was Paul talking
about the works of ‘Catholic tradition’ when saying men are not justified by
works? No. So it’s good to point stuff like this out. The problem I see with
some of the New Perspective theologians is they can explain stuff and when
you’re done listening [reading] it’s possible to miss the heart of the New
Testament doctrine on Justification by faith, we don’t want to lose people in
the weeds when trying to peel the layers of the onion. So I purposefully chose
to teach this letter in the plain way that most Protestants would understand
it, but I do think that N.T. Wright [Bishop of Durham, Church of England] has
good things to add to the debate [as well as John Piper- the Reformed Baptist
preacher who has taken the New Perspective group and rebuked them]. It’s good
and profitable to engage in these types of theological discussions, but we need
to once again ‘keep the main thing the main thing’. I also avoided getting into
the debate on exactly what ‘works of the law’ meant. Some think Paul was only
referring to the rite of circumcision. In some verses [both here and in Romans]
this is true. But some [N.T. Wright] apply this in a way that says the act
itself was simply an ‘identifying badge’ that brought you into the community of
God, while this is true, they get a little off track by not fully seeing that
in Paul’s writings these things go hand in hand. Paul mixes in the ‘work of
circumcision’ with the idea of keeping the moral law/10 commandments. When
saying ‘we are not under the law’ Paul includes all of it, not just the
ceremonial law. How do we know this? Because whenever Paul makes this argument
he always adds ‘does this mean we go out and sin’? And his answer is always no,
but instead of saying ‘no, don’t sin because we are still constrained by the 10
commandments’ he says ‘no, how can we who died to sin still live in it’. To be
frank about it, many of the Reformed guys have problems with this as well, they
teach a kind of theology that says the N.T. believer is under the law, I
disagree. So as you can see this debate can go on for a while, that’s why I
chose to avoid it in this study. I want all of our readers to be grounded in
the basic truths of the letter before launching into a deeper level. Okay
enough for now, tune in the next week or so and I’ll try and do some practical
stuff from Galatians.
(1342) WHEN THE SEED SHOULD COME TO WHOM THE
PROMISE WAS MADE- As I was teaching thru Galatians this verse ‘spoke to me’ in
a personal way [will explain it in a second]. I felt like the Lord was saying
that there are long term promises/destinies that he has planted within us, both
as individuals and communities, and that often times he is waiting for the
‘seed to come to whom the promise was made’. In the parables of Jesus the seed
speaks of a few things. Most of us are familiar with 'the seed as the word’ imagery-
‘the sower sows the word’. But Jesus also speaks of ‘the seed’ as the children
of the kingdom that his father has planted in the world. And of course in
Galatians Paul is specifically referring to the singular seed, who is Christ.
Every few years I go thru our radio messages and will adjust the programs I
air. I often find that the messages that I marked as ‘o.k.’ are not o.k.
anymore, it’s not that they are bad, it’s just I notice a tone/level of ‘seed’
[spoken word] that is not mature enough, it seems like as the years roll by the
later messages just sound better. God has all of us in a maturing process;
things that we thought were ‘deep revelation’ at one time, now sound quite
silly. As I was marking off the programs that sounded too immature, I felt like
the Lord was saying ‘the seed has come to whom the promise was made’ sort of
like the lord was saying ‘son, I was waiting for your level of maturity to
catch up to the promise’. Also in Romans it says ‘the whole creation groans and
travails in pain together until now’ I also felt like the Lord was saying the
seed, as it pertains to all the people groups we relate to, were also in a
‘birthing process’ that too had to mature to a point where the promises could
be inherited- ‘when the fullness of times was come, God sent forth his son,
made of a woman, made under the law’ [Galatians] God has ‘fullness seasons’
times [Kairos] when he says ‘okay, the promises I made to you at the beginning
of the journey are now ready to be experienced’ in essence the seed has come to
whom the promise was made. Now, this sort of spiritual/symbolic way of hearing
God, is it a good way to develop doctrine? No! Never, ever! Pope Benedict
critiqued the ‘historical, critical’ method of liberal theology in his book
‘Jesus of Nazareth’ the method developed out of the liberal universities in
Germany in the 19th- 20th centuries. Men like Rudolph Bultman would
popularize it. It was a way of reading scripture thru an
historical/archeological lens. Some of the ideas are good and profitable, but
some are not. Many would reject the supernatural aspects of scripture and come
to deny the resurrection. Not good. The Pope also warned against this way of
‘dissecting’ Jesus and Christianity to a point where you really don’t see the
true Jesus anymore. The real Jesus of Christianity and history, the Jesus that
we all have a relationship with by faith. The point being we want to go to
scripture with an open heart and expectancy to ‘hear God’. While doing this, we
also want to recognize that the scripture had the SAME MEANING to the first
century church as to us today, the meaning never changes, the applications do.
That’s the main point I want to make, so today the Lord might be speaking to
you about certain ‘seeds’ coming to maturity in your own life, things that you
have been waiting for and maybe the lord was saying he needed a maturing
process to take place, both in you and the people you relate to. The ‘whole
creation’ if you will.
(1343) One of the other themes that spoke to me
from Galatians was the idea that Israel and the world were under a
‘schoolmaster phase’ until the fullness of times arrived. This phase was the
whole economy of Old Testament law and rule. I felt like the Lord was saying
that many of us have been led, and actually have arrived, at places and
purposes the hard way; i.e. - the ‘tutor’ phase. That is God allowed the
process of trial and error and discipline to work in us until we arrived at the
purpose and goal. Isaiah says that ‘I have chosen you in the furnace of affliction’
yes, this way of ‘arriving’ is much more painful, but it still gets you there.
Now the entire discipline phase for the world was the time period before the
Cross. The law and the Old Covenant were the only way to ‘get there’ so to
speak. If people wanted to have a relationship with God, they were either born
Jews, or converted to Judaism. Today of course we have access thru the Cross.
One of the earliest ‘cults’ of Christianity was a sect call ‘Gnosticism’ these
early adherents mixed Greek dualism [material world bad, spirit world good type
of a thing] in with Christianity, they taught that the God of the Old Testament
was the evil God who created the material world, and that thru Jesus we can
come to know the true God of the New Testament, the God who gives us salvation
by delivering us from the material world. Though it seems like there are verses
in the New Testament that teach that the ‘world’ is evil and that God wants to
‘deliver us from this present evil world’ [Galatians] yet in these contexts ‘the
world’ is simply speaking of the lost system of man and the ‘way of the world’.
In Christian theology matter is not inherently evil. The Apostle John would
deal with the Gnostics in his first epistle by saying ‘whoever denies that
Jesus has come in the flesh is not of God- they are anti-Christ’. Because the
Gnostics believed all matter to be evil they would reject the humanity of
Jesus, John was targeting them in his letter. As I mentioned before the
controversy over the Trinity was settled at the council of Nicaea [a.d.325] but
the church still battled with the nature of Jesus. Nicaea said ‘God is one
essence/substance and 3 persons’. But this did not fully deal with the nature
of Jesus, various ideas rose up [Monarchianism, Dynamic Monarchianism] that challenged
the nature of Christ. In 451 a.d. the church settled on the language that
‘Jesus is one person with 2 substances/essences [natures]’, though to some this
looks like a contradiction to the earlier language of Nicaea, this council in
451 [Chalcedon] was simply saying Jesus was ‘fully God and fully man’ so anyway
we were all under the discipline phase until the ‘fullness of times’. I am
believing God to get us to the destination with less ‘tutoring’ if you will,
less trial and error. Sure, we will never fully get to the point of not making
a few mistakes and stumbling along the way, but as we get older hopefully we
will ‘stumble less’.
(1345) BUT BEFORE FAITH CAME, WE WERE KEPT UNDER
THE LAW,SHUT UP UNTO THE FAITH THAT WOULD AFTERWARDS BE REVEALED- Galatians
3:23 Over the years I have grown in my understanding of ‘church/ministry’ and
have come to see that God requires of us to ‘do justice, love mercy and walk
humbly’- that is we often begin the Christian life [especially minister/pastor]
with a bunch of noble goals and dreams and we become fixated on the finances
and buildings and all the outward stuff that we think is needed to ‘reach the
world’. All well meaning men with noble goals, but often times the whole thing
devolves into ‘if these parishioners would be obedient and tithe 10 % of their
income we could do great things’ and behind the scenes there begins to be an
accusatory spirit by the leaders/pastors towards ‘these rebels’. As someone who
does not receive offerings or money I have been freed from this whole scenario.
Now, how does ‘faith come/ be revealed’? In contrast to the above picture, God
will often speak to us and use us when we do not have the cart before the
horse- when our time and efforts are not always consumed with building ‘our ministry’
or getting the funds needed for what we think is Gods purpose. In the parable
of the great supper, Jesus says a man prepared this great meal/table and he
sent his servant out at suppertime to call the guests, and out of the first 3
groups he goes to, 2 out of 3 couldn’t
make it because they purchased stuff [land, livestock] then the master gets mad
and sends him to the poor, blind and maimed [do justice] and there is still
room so he is told to go out into the highways and hedges and compel them to
come in. The point I want to make is those who were preoccupied with stuff
missed the true riches, it’s not that they meant to be rebellious; it’s just
the nature of the beast. I want to encourage all of our leaders to re-focus as
the New Year begins, sure- you are going to have to deal with practical things
[money, etc.] but don’t become so consumed with ‘the ministry’ that this
becomes the driving factor of your life. I have had ‘minister friends’ who were
always talking about, or trying to ‘build up the work’ some times when we would
interact [run into each other] if I had a homeless guy they couldn’t wait until
I would ‘lose’ the brother so we could talk ministry. I know they mean well,
but they are so consumed with ‘the stuff’ they couldn’t see the true riches;
they were missing the ‘great supper’ and didn’t even realize it. ‘In as much as
you did it unto the least of these, you did it unto me’.
(1353) THE LAW AND THE PROPHETS WERE UNTIL JOHN, SINCE ‘THAT
TIME’ THE KINGDOM OF GOD IS PREACHED- When teaching Galatians we got into the
‘Kairos’ season- that is a time period when God said ‘the old dispensation has
fulfilled its purpose and the new time has come’. In the above heading Jesus
says it’s a ‘kingdom time’. One of the good things about the New Perspective
teaching is they bring out Gods greater world purpose for the whole creation
[Romans 8]. It is easy for believers to see their entire Christian lives thru
the lens of individual salvation, while this is certainly an important subject,
if this becomes the main focus of the believer he can become myopic and miss
the greater intention of God- the ‘since that time the kingdom of God’
intention. When Jesus turned the water into wine at Cana, what exactly was he
trying to show us? Do you find it strange that there just happened to be all
these water containers sitting around? The Jewish religion was very familiar
with the idea of ‘washings/baptism’ the temple system was surrounded by these
baths and pools and in the gospels we see people linking water with ceremonial
cleansing. No one said of John ‘what in the heck is he doing baptizing people
in the Jordan’ they were familiar with the rite. Now Jesus doesn’t pick any old
water buckets lying around, he is using the symbol of ‘old law’ cleansing, he’s
saying ‘look, I just turned your water [old way of getting clean] into wine [my
Blood which will replace/fulfill the old system]’. The significance of what he
did was heavy. The appearing of Jesus in the 1st century and his
death, burial and resurrection [ascension too] enacted a major change from old
testament economy into a new kingdom age, the water served its purpose, but the
new wine has come- party on.
JOHNS
GOSPEL
(562)
John:1[radio # 584] Jesus is called
the Word of God, he comes into the earth as the incarnation, the ‘fleshed out’
fulfillment of Gods Word. John the Baptist is asked who he is. The Jewish
leaders ask ‘are you that prophet?’ he says ‘no’. What prophet? The one Moses
said would come ‘the Lord God will raise up a prophet unto you, like me.
Whoever doesn’t listen to him will be destroyed’. We covered this in
Deuteronomy. They ask him ‘are you Elijah’ he says ‘no’. John was the
fulfillment of the Malachi prophecy that said before the Lord comes he will
send Elijah the prophet. Jesus says this about John. Why did John deny it? I am
not sure, but it might be because he
really didn’t know. Sort of like the thorn in Paul’s side, God allowed things
to happen to Paul so he would not get puffed up in pride and side track his
mission. Maybe the Lord never let John see how truly effective he was. John
does say ‘I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness’ John does see himself
thru the prophet Isaiah. I like this. I have personally had many words from
Isaiah that I felt the Lord had given me, John saw himself in this book too.
John was ‘the voice’ just like Jesus is ‘the Word’ John is ‘the voice’. John was a voice before
he was a man. God had predestined John to carry a message before he was born.
He had this word in his DNA at birth. His body was simply a carrier, an
‘incarnation’ of the voice that he was to have. God has predestined all of us
with a purpose before we were born. Our appearing on the planet is for the sole
purpose of carrying out this destiny. You are not here to be happy, have a nice
income, go to a nice church. You are here to fulfill Gods will, you can have
the other things or not, that is irrelevant. You must first fulfill the
mission! John testifies of Christ by the Spirit descending on Jesus. John says
‘I knew him not, but by the Spirit’ John knew Jesus, he was his cousin! But
John was only going to recognize the gifts and callings on people. He would
follow Paul's admonition ‘know no man after the flesh’. It is incumbent upon us
to recognize the gifts in others and to operate accordingly. Don’t make
alliances and pacts with people based on friendship and personal affiliations.
It’s good to have friends and all, but the Kingdom is built upon recognizing
and receiving those who have come with a mandate from God. John saw Jesus in
this light. Scripture says ‘the world was made by him, he was in the world, yet
they knew him not’ Jesus was creating a divine atmosphere of grace for people
to access. They didn’t even know or recognize him, yet this didn’t side track
him from his purpose. Understand that God has placed you in a geographical
location with a pre planned destiny in mind. God has chosen you to be where you
are and for this season. You will fulfill your calling whether people ‘know’
you or not. God requires us to see the gifts in each other, but many will not
appreciate what you are doing, do it any way, you have come with a destiny to
fulfill, so fulfill it!
(563) John 2[radio # 585]- Jesus does his first
miracle, changes water into wine. They say ‘most people put the good wine out
first, but you have saved the best for last’. This is a type of the new
covenant of his blood [wine], Jesus will introduce a better covenant thru his
blood. Many will not accept this new way because they have been ‘drinking’ old
wine for so long, they are not willing to change. We often see this in
Christian circles, people who have functioned in a limited way for years, God
might bring to them new ways of seeing things, they will often reject the new
wine on the basis of being comfortable with the old way, we don’t want to shake
the apple cart. God wants us to shake it! Jesus finds the money changers in the
temple and drives them out with a whip, turns the tables over and gets mad. He
didn’t take the ecumenical approach! There are times for radical transition, I
feel we are at that place now as the people of God. The gospel is not about us
increasing our portfolio, it’s about laying our goals down for the kingdom.
These money changers lost their influence in the ‘temple’ after Jesus got thru
with them, I think it was prophetic. Jesus says ‘destroy this temple and in 3
days I will raise it up’ those hearing this mistake his Body [temple] with the
building [temple in Jerusalem ].
Evangelicals [some of them] make the same mistake today. They are looking to
the natural events in natural Jerusalem, they should be looking at the real
temple! [Both Jesus and the Body of Christ]. Jesus goes to the Passover, the
people hail him and Jesus says he will not commit himself to them, because he
knew what was in man. What was in man? These same people will be asking for his
death not long from now. Jesus did not seek commitment from men, contrary to
the way we see ministry today. Modern ministry seeks to increase man’s
commitment to them ‘pledge so much money, join this or that’ Jesus knew he had
a destiny, he would fulfill it without the help of man!
(565) John 3[radio # 586]- Nicodemus comes
secretly to Jesus, he is one of the few in leadership that is having doubts.
The others with one voice reject Jesus, Nicodemus is wondering. Jesus rebukes
him for being a ‘ruler’ of the Jews and not being able to comprehend the most
basic stuff. I have found it disheartening over the years to talk with Pastors
who heard someone teach that because Jesus had an expensive coat, that he must
have been rich. Despite all the evidence in the New Testament how Jesus was the
son of a carpenter and lived an average life. The tons of verses where Jesus is
reproving rich people. The whole historical and biblical truth of Jesus being a
man of humble means. The fact that he had an expensive coat can more than
likely be explained by the custom of people doing extravagant acts of worship
towards him. The woman and the expensive perfume poured on him. Things like
this. Someone probably gave him the coat. But for Pastors, who are good men, to
fall for this stuff was unbelievable. Sort of like Jesus telling Nicodemus ‘you
are a leader and can’t discern the most basic stuff’! Jesus teaches the reality
of the new birth. All people must be born of God thru belief in Jesus, or they
will not be saved. We must stand strong for Jesus as the only way to God. John
the Baptist will be told that all men are going to Jesus. John says ‘great, he
must increase and I must decrease’ John understood that the role of leadership
[prophets] was to point to the fame and persona of Jesus. Not to go down the
common road of pointing people towards us. In modern ministry we draw people to
our gifts and abilities. We structure modern churches around the gift of the
Pastor. We allow leadership to become preeminent in our minds and thoughts.
John knew better. We also see that the wrath of God abides on all who do not
believe in Jesus. If you believe in Jesus you escape Gods wrath. It can’t touch
you. Whether you are in heaven or earth, or like David said ‘in hell you are
there’. That is you can’t escape Gods presence anywhere. So if you are in
Christ, wrath can’t get you. If you are not in Christ, it continually abides on
you. You do not escape wrath by leaving the planet during the tribulation. If
an unbeliever was on a rocket ship right before the tribulation started, and
wound up on the moon during the 7 years of wrath, he wouldn’t escape Gods
wrath. You don’t escape judgment by being in the right geographical location,
you escape it by being IN HIM! John also says a man can receive nothing unless
it is given to him. Why be jealous if all of our gifts and abilities are free
gifts? We act like we earned them! John says no man receives his testimony,
then he says ‘to those who have received it’. What’s this mean? Paul told the
Corinthians that we have received the Spirit of God so we might know the things
that are freely given to us from God. God gives us his Spirit first, so we can
receive his testimony. This goes back to the early centuries of the church and
hits all the major doctrines on sovereignty. Augustine, Calvin, Luther [Yes
Luther was a strong believer in predestination, it was no accident that he was
an Augustinian monk!] Paul tells the Ephesians that were are dead in sins and
completely incapable of receiving spiritual truth until God pours his Spirit
into us and we become alive. Thank God that even though no man [in the natural]
can receive his testimony, that God gives us his Spirit and births us so we can
know the things that he has freely given to us in Christ!
(566) John 4[radio # 587]- Jesus talks to the
woman at the well. She is Samaritan and he violates the cultural norms of the
day by speaking to this woman. Critics often say Christianity is bigoted
against women, Jesus gave more honor to women than any other religion of the
day. He tells the woman that if she asked, he would give her the Spirit that
would be a well of water in her. God wants us to flow in revelation and truth,
not just teach from the intellect. Now the intellect is important, God says
‘worship me with you heart, soul, MIND and might’ but you must allow the Spirit
to spring up from you like a well. Jesus tells the woman ‘you have had 5
husbands and the guy you’re shacking up with now is not your husband’ she then
says ‘I perceive you are a prophet’. Funny, she turns the conversation over to
religion! She recognizes the prophetic aspect of Jesus words and says ‘I think
you’re a prophet’. Unlike many Christians today, she believed that prophecy was
more than just preaching, she knew it carried a supernatural element. They
continue to talk ‘religion’ and Jesus tells her all worship takes place in
Spirit and truth, not at a specific location. The religious mind looks for
‘religious’ places to carry out worship, Jesus says ‘from now on it will be
done thru all who worship in Spirit and truth’. He is speaking of the new
concept of the people of God being the temple. No longer will they need the
temple down the block, but they will be the actual dwelling place of God. Jesus
says his meat is to do the will of him that sent him and to finish his work. We
often do the will, but don’t finish the task! I just retired after 25 years as
a firefighter [actually the retirement is in process] and I have seen so many talented
guys join the dept and do a few years and go somewhere else. They might stay a
few years at the next dept. and leave again. It’s not that they aren’t
talented, they just don’t stick it out. God wants us to finish his task, don’t
have a resume with a lot of activity, have one that has some assignments that
were completed. Jesus says look on the fields, they are ready. Don’t say ‘4
more months and then comes harvest’. We are always in the harvest. It is not
something that only happens in church on Sunday. Break the mindset that is
always looking down the road for ministry to happen. Ministry happens right
now, all the time. You and I are in the harvest, are you picking any fruit?
Jesus says a prophet has no honor in his own country. We often want a prophetic
word from some out of town prophet. We enjoy going out of town to a conference
or some vacation venue to get a ‘word from the Lord’. We do not like to receive
from prophets in our midst. They often don’t give good words like ‘Thus saith
the Lord, you will be rich’ and stuff like that. We need to stop looking for
the word we want to hear, and receive from prophets in our area.
(567)
John 5[radio # 588]- Jesus heals the
man at the pool of Bethesda .
Scripture says an angel went down into this pool at a certain time and stirred
the water, whoever got in after the water was stirred was healed. How do we
explain this? Were the people superstitious? Well I think it happened just like
John wrote it. We believe in a supernatural God, he raised his Son from the
dead, he surely can send an angel to stir up some water. Jesus asks the man ‘do
you want to be healed’? You would think ‘of course’ but people that are in
situations that can lend to being irresponsible, having others take care of
them, they often want to stay that way. It gives them an excuse to ‘not act
responsibly’. The man says ‘I have no man to put me into the water after the
angel comes’ he is looking for others to do something for him. He has a victim
mentality. Jesus says ‘quit blaming everyone else, take up your bed and walk’.
It’s time for our society to tell people ‘take up your bed and walk, we love
you, we want to help you as much as possible, but you need to eventually take
up your bed and walk’ hard stuff! Jesus will call God his father, making
himself equal with God. The Jewish leaders will be offended. He then will tell
them if they do not honor him, they are not honoring the Father. He says he
only does what he sees the Father doing first. His life was an exact duplicate
of the heart of God. Our lives should be the result of what God wants and
reveals to us. Your life is not the result of your confession, or you seeking
success. Your life should be the outcome of what God has revealed to you. It
might mean less money, or less success. It might mean a Cross or martyrdom.
Don’t presume that Gods plan for you is simply to have lots of money and be
successful, it might mean less money and obscurity. But it will be an abundant
life because you lived it in the purpose of God. Jesus says the dead will hear
the voice of the Son of God and they that hear will live. You had as much to do
with your spiritual birth as you did with your natural one. Before you were
born you had no power or ability to choose to be born, so in your new birth you
were dead in sin and unable to ‘choose God’ he chose you. Jesus will tell the
religious leaders ‘how can you believe if you seek the honor of men’ he will
challenge the religious mindset of the
day that thrived off of the notoriety of ‘being in ministry’. The leaders loved
the greetings in the markets and public places. They lived for the honor that
came from their status as ‘preachers’ who were well known. Jesus condemned this
mindset. He says ‘I receive not honor from men’ in essence I am here to lay my
life down, I will suffer shame and public humiliation, I will do the will of my
Father and bare tremendous reproach and hatred from men. I will please my
Father. Jesus tells the Jewish leaders ‘Moses wrote about me, you have his
writings. If you don’t believe his writings, how can you believe in me, he
wrote about me’ we have covered a lot of the ‘hidden’ images of Jesus found in
the Old Testament. Paul will use these images time and again in his debates
with Israel .
I find it interesting that Jesus saw himself in the Old Testament also.
(568) John 6[radio # 589]- We see the first
miracle of the feeding of the multitudes. It has been commonly taught that this
was a miracle of ‘location’, that is they were far from the market and couldn’t
get food to feed everyone. This is not the heart of the story. It is actually a
question of finance. Jesus in essence asks ‘how can we buy enough food for
everyone to eat, where’s the money gonna come from?’ His disciples say ‘200
pennyworth is not enough to feed them’. They tell Jesus we don’t have the cash
to cover it. This is important to see, many have taught a doctrine that says
Jesus and the disciples had a large treasury with lots of money. This refutes
that. This story is one of God being our supply, we don’t need to trust him for
the millions of dollars we think we need to reach the world. We need to believe
that he can use our limited finances to reach the world! He did it with Paul,
why not you? We also see the doctrine of sovereignty again. Jesus says all who
the Father gave to him will come to him, and he will raise them up at the last
day. No man can come unless the Father draws him. The Father will draw all who
are called. Jesus will lose none of the ones the father gives to him. These
doctrines are without a doubt taught in this Gospel. I believe them. Some try
to make them ‘fit’ the reasoning of men. They eventually taught that Jesus died
only for the elect. That the ‘world’ in John 3:16 speaks of the ‘world of the elect’. Others taught
that Jesus blood was only shed for the elect [limited atonement]. Christians
have fought for centuries over these doctrines. Our Catholic brothers do not
officially teach predestination, though Catholic scholars have believed in it
[Augustine]. Some will later be called ‘5 point Calvinists’ others ‘4 points’
and so on. I simply believe the words of Jesus. All that the Father gave to him
will come to him, those who come will be raised at the last day. No one comes
unless God brings them. The point is God is the initiator, sustainer and completer
of our salvation. In our minds we can’t grasp this, but without a doubt Jesus
teaches it in this chapter. Now, Jesus will also teach that he is the bread
from heaven and unless a man eats his flesh and drinks his blood he will not
have eternal life. Many good Christians have taught that the way this is
carried out is thru transubstantiation, they teach that the bread and wine turn
into the literal body and blood of Jesus at the Mass [Catholic theologian Scott
Hahn believes John chapter 6 is the foundational chapter for all Catholic
theology]. That it just looks like bread and wine, but it is really flesh and
blood. Luther and Calvin taught something almost identical, consubstantiation.
The doctrine that the bread and wine stay bread and wine, but that the flesh
and blood of Jesus are also literally contained within the bread and wine. This
doctrine differs very little from the Catholic one. Both of these doctrines are
called ‘the real presence’. The only reformer who taught what much of modern
Evangelicals believe was Zwingli. He took it to be a symbol only. Zwingli was
the dear brother who killed the Ana Baptists for their faith! I visited the
spot where this took place in Switzerland
many years ago. There is this huge statue of Zwingli overlooking the town where
he drowned the poor brothers! The Jews in this chapter say ‘how can this man
give us his flesh to eat and blood to drink?’ They are clearly seeing this in
the natural. Jesus goes on and teaches that all who believe in him will never
hunger again. He is associating eating with faith. He also says ‘the flesh
profits nothing, the words I am speaking to you give life’ he is clearly
teaching that he was not going to figure out a way to change bread and wine
into his literal flesh. He was teaching that all who would believe in his death
and resurrection were eating and getting life from Jesus, they would have
eternal life. The bread that if a man eats from will live forever. I believe my
Catholic and Orthodox and Lutheran brothers are Christian, I do not hold to
the view that the ‘real presence’ is a
doctrine from hell. I believe good Christians took the words of Jesus literally
and developed a belief that became an historic belief amongst many Christians.
Some of the greatest Christian theologians hold to this belief. I simply
disagree with them.
(572) John 7[radio # 590]- His brethren say ‘if
you do these things, go up to the feast and show yourself openly’. The mindset
was if you are really as special or gifted as you think, then go public! Jesus
did not seek honor from men. He will ‘go public’ at the right time, but it will
be a public crucifixion before many witnesses. He would not let them make him a
king, or exalt him in their own way. Before exaltation there would be a Cross.
‘Some say he is a good man, others that he is a deceiver’ Jesus caused polarizing
reactions from people. Prophets will be seen as false or good, there is very
little middle ground. ‘How knoweth this man letters, having never learned’
Jesus learned, he was a good Jewish boy. They had the Old Covenant and were
taught it ‘religiously’. The leaders meant he did not have the ‘higher
education’ from the institutions of the day. I want to make a note here, I am
not against higher education, Jesus did avail himself of the Old Testament,
which was the ‘library’ of the day. A great collection of books and wisdom, if
you read the gospels carefully you will also see that Jesus knew current
events, he was not an isolated person coming up with his individual conclusions
of scripture. I think it hurts the church to have an attitude of ‘all I need to
know is the bible’ while it is good to know the Word, you should also expand
your knowledge as much as possible. You don’t need the ‘letters’ or titles from
men, but you should be educated as much as possible. ‘I have done one work and
you all marvel’ the leaders were condemning Jesus for healing the man on the
Sabbath, he tells them ‘you circumcise on the Sabbath, why cant I make someone
whole on the Sabbath?’ circumcision was the cutting away of the ‘flesh’ in
consecration to God. In essence it was saying ‘all that proceeds from me from
this day forward, my lineage and seed and everything I am, is dedicated to God’
if they were allowed, by their own conscience, to ‘cut the flesh away’ on the
Sabbath, then why not permit [in their own mind] the ‘adding’ unto a person by
healing his flesh and giving him back his health. Jesus showed them that even
in their own reasoning they could allow for what he did, but they didn’t give
him the same lenience that they gave themselves. We often reject what a person is
saying based on the actions he has done in the past, even though we allow many
of the same things. Jesus said ‘judge rightly’ use the same measure that you
would use on your self. ‘Yet a little while I am with you, you will seek me and
not find me’ Jesus says this to the Jews who do not accept him as Messiah, they
have been looking for him [unknowingly] for 2 thousand years and haven’t found
him yet, boy are they gonna be surprised! The Pharisees send the officers to
take Jesus, even though he didn’t openly go up to the feast, he later went
secretly. He is teaching publicly and the people are amazed. They say ‘if this
is the one the leaders are trying to get, why don’t they just take him?’ the
officers couldn’t stop him! The Pharisees ask ‘why didn’t you capture him like
we asked’ they respond ‘never man spake like him’ the authority that he had
from God protected him. As the Pharisees discuss Jesus, they say ‘this people
who do not know the law [word] are going after him, none of us are’. Well
Nicodemus is in this group, and we know he snuck out in chapter 3 and did go
‘after him’. He is feeling a little guilty about it and speaks up on Jesus
behalf ‘well, let’s not be so quick to judge, lets hear him out’. The other
Pharisees reject him too ‘are you also from Galilee?’ They had this
intellectual argument going that took all the Old Testament prophecies about
Messiah and where he would come from. There are different prophecies that speak
of Jesus in different ways, they held to a belief that when Messiah came, no
one would no where he came from. Their understanding kept them in the dark.
They were not willing to be corrected, they saw everyone else as ignorant, and
they were the true ‘elites’ of the day. Pride keeps people form truth. We often
can’t be corrected, we think the ‘correctors’ just don’t know the word. This
comes from spiritual pride. Many who view themselves as religious leaders, or
gifted in some way with bible knowledge, can not humble themselves and receive
correction in the area where they pride themselves. For the Pharisees to have
accepted Jesus, they would have had to admit that they were wrong about certain
prophecies, and that the ‘under class’ was right, this was too much for them to
accept.
(585) John 8 [radio # 591]- The Pharisees catch
the woman in adultery and bring her to Jesus ‘Moses in the law says kill her,
what about it Jesus?’ Religion digressed into this conservative moral crusade
that went and found people in sin and singled them out for judgment. Jesus
doesn’t say ‘oh, don’t worry about that silly law of Moses’ he says in essence
‘you guys are right, justice demands strict holiness, you got me now’ instead
he agrees that justice does require her death, and he says ‘go ahead, start
stoning’. One thing ‘you must be free of sin in order to carry out this
punishment’. The law required total righteousness from everyone, even the moral
crusaders! When religion digresses to the point where all it does is go out
into society and find fault, then this type of religion is powerless to change
the ‘fault finders’. Jesus doesn’t side with the ultra liberals either, you
don’t see him marching for the right for homosexuals to marry. He tells the
woman ‘neither do I condemn thee, go and sin no more’. Jesus said this to the
guy he healed a few chapters ago. ‘Go and sin no more less a worse thing happen
to thee’. Was Jesus simply telling them the same thing that they heard from the
religious right their whole lives? Was he simply saying ‘watch out, if you sin
again you will get in trouble’ not really. Jesus words had tremendous power and
authority, he told people who couldn’t see ‘see’ and they would! People who
couldn’t walk ‘get up’ and they did. He was empowering these people by his
words. When he said ‘sin no more’ he was giving them the first freedom from
years of bondage that they ever had. He also was saying ‘I don’t condone sin’
but he was saying much more! Jesus tells the Jews who ‘believe in him’ if you
continue in my word ye shall be free. In the next chapter [9] we will read of
the guy Jesus heals, who also says ‘Jesus healed me’ but doesn’t know who Jesus
is yet, then later he believes in him as Messiah. This is the type of belief
that Israel
and Islam and other religions have about Jesus. They accept him as a good man,
prophet even. But not the Son of God. To these he says ‘if ye continue in my
word then you will know the truth and be free’ if they stick around long enough
they might just see that Jesus is for real! Truth is progressive, often times I
will give a book to someone, or teach something over the radio. People will see
things that they haven’t seen before. A few years go by and they ‘fall back’
into the old mindset. They sincerely forgot that some of the questions they
have now have actually been answered already. ‘Go read the first book I wrote,
it explains it’ oh yhea, I see now. People need to ‘continue in the word’ in
order to be changed. It is not just the one time ‘revelation’ of a certain
doctrine that changes you, it is continuing in Gods truth and knowing him, that
is Jesus, who is the way and truth and life. Knowing doctrine does not set
people free, knowing Jesus does.
(586) John 8-9 [radio # 592] before I cover this, last night I was
watching a preacher from a classic type ministry. Not the flamboyant ‘prosperity’
type with gold hanging off and all. I was a bit surprised [let down] to hear
him teach the classic errors of the prosperity movement. He took the verse in
Corinthians where it says ‘though he was rich yet for your sakes he became
poor’ and taught that Jesus died to make you rich financially [ a direct
violation of 1st Timothy 6]. He went to Genesis and showed how
Abraham was rich, then jumped to Galatians 3 and taught ‘we are Abrahams kids,
therefore we get his blessings[stuff]’ a classic mistake in doctrine. I
explained this in the book ‘House of Prayer or Den of Thieves’ in the chapter
‘The Abrahamic Blessing’[you can read this book on this site!]. This stuff
shouldn’t have been coming from this program, they are not the type that teach
this stuff. You could tell from the look on the faces of the audience that they
were feeling uncomfortable with what this guy was teaching! Now John 8-9. Jesus
says ‘you seek to kill me, a man that has told you the truth that I heard from
God’ often times when people are reproved, they don’t like it. It’s not that
what the ‘reprover’ is saying is wrong, it’s just we don’t like being
confronted with truth. We usually take it out on the messenger. Jesus says
‘before Abraham was, I AM’ this is the name of God in the Old Testament ‘the I
AM’. Jesus is the ‘I AM’ in Johns gospel. I AM the door, I AM the resurrection,
I AM the way and the truth and the life. I believe you find 7 different ‘I
AM’s’ of Jesus in this gospel. Jesus now heals the man who was blind from
birth. They ask him ‘who sinned, this man or his parents’? They had a mentality
that always wanted to place blame on someone for sickness, sort of like some in
the healing movements of today. Jesus said ‘neither’. He simply said ‘this
happened to him so I would heal him and God would get glory’. He heals the man
and the leaders are mad. ‘Who healed you’? A man called Jesus. They get the
guys parents and say ‘you say he was blind, then how come he can see?’ They say
‘ask him’. They go back and ask again. The healed guy answers ‘how many times
do you want to hear it, I told you already’. Though the man still doesn’t know
Jesus is the Messiah, yet he starts to defend him, and even prophesy! ‘We know
that if any man be a worshipper of God, and does his will, him God hears’ good
stuff coming from an ‘unsaved’ guy! Jesus hears that they rejected him, he
tells the guy ‘I am messiah’ and the guy believes. Jesus says ‘I come to give
sight to those who are blind [admit they need help] and to take away sight from
those who see’ [think they know it all]. We often can’t receive correction
because of religious pride, we think we ‘see everything’ someone comes along
and shakes the cart, our first response is ‘who does he think he is, doesn’t he
know that we all know more than him’. Quite often whole groups of leaders have
the same blind spot. This is what enforces the belief that they must be right!
Jesus told them ‘you guys are blind, if you could just admit you didn’t know it
all, then I could show you some good stuff, but because you think you already
‘see’ everything, then you are gonna miss out’. Pride is destructive, it keeps
us in the dark spiritually. NOTE; Let me give an example. I remember reading an
article on tithing from one of the best Christian historical review magazines
in print. They do exhaustive historical research on many subjects. To the
surprise of the readers, this well respected historical magazine, read by many
theologians, showed that all the historical evidence points to the fact that
the churches of the first century did not practice tithing! This seemed to go
against the grain of what many of the theologians believed, who regularly read
this magazine. But you could have easily come to this same understanding from
simply reading the New Testament in context. I have basically taught you guys
this for years, from scripture. Yet this ‘blind spot’ was an area where many
intelligent ‘religious leaders’ were all wrong. They ‘corporately’ were wrong
on this subject. It took a ‘jolt’ from true historical evidence before they
could ‘see’ the obvious! It would be too humbling to have seen it from a
‘layman firefighter’ who has a web site. NOTE; Tithing as a practice for
Christians developed at the same time as ‘the church building’ and the office
of ‘Priest’ and eventually the altar [in the Catholic system] and the mass. The
church got away from the family/community mindset and took on more of the
‘church building’ form. Tithing fit in easily into an idea of church that asked
‘how much should we put in the offering basket on Sunday’. The whole language
and style of church called for the doctrine of tithing to be taught, sort of
like a ‘tax’ on the people of God to support ‘the church’. Now, there are some
good things that came out of the ‘dark ages’ of Christianity. The ‘desert fathers’,
the Catholic mystics and other good spiritual disciplines. I don’t want to fall
into the category of those who see the dark ages as a time of no good
whatsoever. But we also need to see how the church during that time was very
legalistic in the sense that the Mass and Altar and 'Priest’ presiding over the liturgy were all
forms of Christian service that were absent from the churches in Scripture. The
tithe was just one added aspect of this legalistic approach that seemed to make
it all the way into the Protestant churches of today. All these churches are
good Christians in my view, but we need to be open to change and reformation as
the Spirit leads.
(588)
John 10[radio # 593]- I forgot to mention in
John 9 when they asked Jesus who did sin, this man or his parents, that he was
born blind? Jesus said ‘no one’. Later in the chapter after the Pharisees get
done with the guy, they say ‘you were altogether born in sin [after all you
were BORN blind!] who do you think you are, trying to tell us what to do!’ that
secret mentality of condemnation came out. Religion does this to people. It
treats them like ‘yes, God is merciful and we are all sinners’ but in the heat
of the argument the mentality of ‘we are really better than you’ exists. Now in
this chapter Jesus says ‘I am the door’ and also ‘I am the shepherd who comes
thru the door’ how can he be both? Jesus was the one who would fulfill all the
required prophetic aspects spoken of in scripture. There were tons of Old
Testament prophecies that Jesus met to the tee. These requirements were like a
door, as the Jews were waiting for their Messiah they were looking for someone
who met this criteria, Jesus met them! He also IS the door, from this time
onward all other future leadership in the church would have to come ‘thru’ him
and exemplify the servant attitude that he had. Jesus says ‘the hireling flees
when the wolf comes’ the hireling is a mentality that looks at church
leadership as a hired position. People vote on their pastor, if he does a good
job he stays, if not he leaves and they screen for another hired position. Many
good men have been down this road. Often when the ‘wolf comes’ he actually says
to the leader ‘you cant stay in this town any longer, look at all the mistakes
you made’ the accuser gets the hireling to flee, sometimes without the pastor
realizing what’s going on. Jesus wants us to ‘come thru the door’ into the
sheepfold. The ‘prescribed way’ of servant hood and giving your life for the
sheep. I want to encourage all the pastors who read this site, don’t see your
job as completing some vision, or rallying people to a cause. Though these
things are included in pastoring, the main job for all of us is to give our
lives unselfishly for others. It is easy to fall into the trap of ‘the
hireling’ but God wants us to view our callings thru a servant hood mentality.
The good shepherd gives his life [goals, dreams, etc...] up for the sheep. The
Pharisees say ‘he is a mad man, he has a devil, why do you even listen to him?’
The leaders decided to bypass Jesus, they thought ‘we will just ignore him and
he will go away’ the only problem was the average ‘congregant’ was listening!
Often times in prophetic ministry you will find the bulk of leadership by
passing the prophetic word [that which God is saying at the season] it is only
later, after the ‘people’ hear it, that leaders will give it a second look.
Leaders, don’t fall into this category, if you get in on what God is saying
from the start, then you can partake of the good stuff along with the people! Jesus in these last few chapters said he is
Gods Son and the Jews understood it to mean his claim of equality with God.
They understood right! I mention this because some feel that Jesus didn’t claim
deity, he most certainly did. Even 1st century historians noted this
in their writings, that the believers worshipped ‘a God named Jesus’. The deity
question is vital, if you miss this one, you’ve missed it all! NOTE; Let me
make a note here. It would be very easy for me to develop a teaching from this
chapter that says ‘because of all you have seen about the idea of modern
church, and the unbiblical roles of the hired clergy. That therefore all
‘pastors’ are hirelings’. Some have actually taught this. There are a few
reasons why I don’t fall into this camp. First, when God initiates reformation
‘a reforming of the practices of modern church’ he does it with the sheep in
mind. Jesus told the disciples ‘I have many things to say to you, but you are
unable to hear it’ he could have blown them away with doctrine, but the goal
was their development. If all doctrine, even true doctrine, does not build you
up in some way, then it is not accomplishing the purpose that God intends. So
in all the stuff I have taught you guys, the goal is for all of us [Pastors and
people] to grow and change in Gods timing. To use my influence in a way that
would split churches, or have the people viewing their pastors as ‘hirelings’
would be unprofitable. Eventually we all, as a Body, will change and reform as
God directs. But to use this chapter to tear down all current forms of
leadership presently functioning in the church would be irresponsible. With
knowledge comes responsibility. God will give us knowledge and wisdom for the
purpose of edification, not destruction.
(591) John 11[ radio # 594]- Lazarus is sick
and Mary and Martha send for Jesus. They were all friends and supporters of
Jesus ministry, surely they will get special treatment, they know for sure he
will be healed! Jesus waits a few days and lets Lazarus die. When he finally
shows up, Martha comes to ask him ‘why weren’t you here! He would have not died
if you were here!’ Jesus also earlier said ‘I am glad I was not there’ not ‘I
am glad I didn’t heal him’ it’s like Jesus knew if he were there he would have
had no choice but to have healed him, his compassion would have taken over.
Martha and Mary knew it too. These are Jewish friends that are all sympathetic
to his cause, they were known to have been friends with Jesus, they already
carried a cross for him. For him to have let this group down was hard. He knew
God had a better plan, but it still was hard. Martha tells Mary ‘come quickly,
Jesus wants you’ Mary gets up and runs to Jesus. I don’t read where Jesus asked
for Mary, I think Martha might have just said this to encourage Mary. Often
times the closest followers of Jesus need to be encouraged. They have been with
the Lord for years, they have given so much to the cause. They see how God is
doing so much for others and yet all things don’t seem to be working out for
them. They feel like Mary ‘what’s the use, I was following him years before
these others, and yet he doesn’t even have time to come and heal my brother,
he’s out all over the place healing everyone else, his so called ‘great
ministry for God’ and yet I really needed him’ Mary needed to be encouraged,
Martha encouraged her! Jesus does raise Lazarus and God is glorified. Word gets
back to the religious leaders and they are afraid if they don’t do something
they will lose their influence and power among the people. It was a power
issue. Often times leadership will resist the ‘Body of Jesus’ coming into full
functioning maturity, they are afraid that if the Body of Jesus becomes too
influential, they might lose their place. John the Baptist taught us earlier
that this was to be, the Pharisees had other plans. As they hold a council,
Caiaphas the high priest says ‘leave him alone, Rome will come and kill him and it will be
better. That way they can vent on him instead of all of the Jewish nation’ he
prophesies the truth of Christ’s substitutionary death, and doesn’t even
realize what he’s saying! Often times you will get a word from the Lord from
people that don’t even realize they are prophesying! NOTE; I forgot something.
When Jesus and his disciples are going to raise Lazarus, they will be entering
an area where the Jewish leaders ‘have a contract on him’ they are looking to
get him! Jesus reassures the guys they will be safe if they walk in ‘the light’
of Gods will. Thomas says ‘Oh great, lets all go and die with him’. Gee thanks
for the support brother! Jesus never kicks Thomas off of the ministry ‘team’ he
lets him stay on. You often hear ‘if you are the smartest person in your group
get a new group’ or ‘evil communications corrupt good manners’ [scripture does
say this]. But we sometimes teach it in a way that says ‘Don’t ever listen to
the naysayers, eliminate them from your group. They will destroy your team
spirit’ while there is some truth to this, remember Jesus was the smartest
person in the group, his critics actually accused him of having ‘a bad group’
[this man eateth with sinners] so keep a balance in this. We are here to help
the sick, not the well. If you don’t have some ‘bad apples’ in your sphere of
influence than how are you gonna help them?
(593)
John 12 [radio # 595] - Jesus goes to Bethany,
the town where he raised Lazarus. At the house Mary pours expensive perfume on
Jesus. Judas gets mad! ‘We could have sold it and used the money for the poor!’
Judas was the treasurer, he had ‘the bag’. He didn’t care about the poor, but
was stealing from the treasury. Some teach that the treasury had millions of
dollars in it, if this were so then why would Judas be worried about some
perfume worth around $132.00 dollars? You guys teaching this ‘rich Jesus’ stuff
need to read your bibles! In the town of Bethany
Lazarus is the talk of the town ‘hey, did you see the
guy Jesus raised from the dead’? The Pharisees were devising a way to kill
Lazarus too! It’s a funny thing, these leaders were sticklers for the law, real
legalistic. The number one law out of their 10 commandments was ‘thou shalt not
kill’ yet they seemed to be thinking of killing an awful lot! Religion does
this to people, it causes you to overlook the obvious while worrying about the
details. Jesus called this ‘straining at gnats while swallowing whole Camels’.
You see this later on at the Crucifixion, they are all concerned over what day
they kill Jesus ‘God forbid we break our rules of purity WHILE KILLING THE SON
OF GOD!’ Pathetic bunch of losers. The Greeks come to Jesus disciples and say
‘we want to see Jesus’. They go and tell Jesus ‘these Greeks want to meet you’
Jesus responds in a strange way ‘unless a grain of wheat dies it abides alone,
but if it dies it brings forth fruit… If any man serves me, where I am they
will be’. In essence Jesus says ‘I am not here to present myself to people on
some platform, I am here to do the will of my father. If they want to see me
they must lay their lives down and die to self and carry the cross also, where
I am they can be’. His answer was a call to self sacrifice and denial of self.
Today we have an atmosphere of performance ‘lets go watch the great Prophet’.
Going to conferences and stuff. Jesus said prophetic gifts function thru
sacrifice, if you are laying your life down for the gospel you will interact
with all of Gods gifted 5 fold ministers, but they were not designed to be seen
on a stage. ‘While you have the light, walk in it. The darkness comes, and no
one can function then’ Jesus was showing us to ‘strike when the irons hot’ act
when God opens the door. I have found when I ‘go for it’ during seasons of God
showing me stuff, then whatever is instituted at the time [some function of
ministry] becomes really effective. Then there are times where I don’t go for it
when the Lord opens the door, I miss the ‘open window’ and then later try to
get something going, it never works! Like the children of Israel not
entering the Promised Land on the first try, the next day they thought ‘what
the hell, lets do it today’ it didn’t work! Walk while ye have the light [God
showing you the next step] because when it gets dark [you missed the window] no
one can work.
(606) JOHN
13 [radio # 596] - Jesus says ‘I am come
from God, and I am going back to him’. He had this divine sense of mission.
Theologians have disagreed over how much Jesus knew about his own calling as a
young person. I kinda see it like he gradually came to greater wisdom and
understanding as the father was revealing the mission to him. The fact that
Jesus became human also brought with it certain limitations of knowledge and
growth. He did come to see his mission at a young age. When he was in the
temple as a boy he said ‘I am doing my fathers business’. So I see how he grew
in his sense of mission and destiny. You have come from the father, you will
some day go back. Live with destiny in mind. At the table Jesus tells the guys
‘I am giving you an example’ as he washes their feet. Peter is like preachers
today ‘heavens forbid that you wash me, are you saying I need some correcting’!
I have found this response common among leaders [even me!] we sought of cant
get corrected, then when we do realize we need it, we go to the other extreme
‘well, go ahead and give me a bath!’ We want to tear everything down and start
all over! It is funny. Jesus says ‘what I am showing you, you don’t really know
what it means yet, you understand it in your head, but not for real’ I feel the
example of ‘servant leadership’ is a subject that most leaders ‘know’ but the
fact of it being really lived out is rare. We still see ‘ministry’ and ‘church’
from the paradigm of ‘my successful career’. I am not saying everyone is wrong,
I am saying the level we are at is sort of where the disciples were. We ‘know
it’ in our heads, but we still ask ‘who will be the greatest in your Kingdom.
Can we sit at your right Hand?’ Jesus makes one of the worst statements in all
of scripture ‘one of you shall betray me’ he also says in another place ‘it
were better for that man if he were never born’ WOW! How would you feel if this
were said about you? At the table the disciples were feeling insecure. ‘John,
ask Jesus who it is for heavens sake!’ John and Judas know, I don’t know about
the others. It seems as if they leave the meal with the possibility of ‘Oh my
God, could it be me’ this lets you see into the later distress that Peter has
over his denials. He must have thought ‘I am the bad one’. Peter makes every
attempt to not be the one. Jesus says ‘where I am going, you can’t follow’
Peter says ‘why not, I will die for you’! Jesus says ‘I tell you, before the
cock crows, you will deny me 3 times’! “OH MY GOD IT IS ME!’ do you see the
drama here? Why would Jesus say about Judas ‘it would have been better if you
were never born’? It sure seems hard. Jesus said this for Judas benefit, not
his own. Jesus knew that for the fathers plan to work, someone would have to
hate him so much that he would betray him. Jesus loved Judas, he lived with him
for 3 years. He saw THE SINCERITY of Judas as a zealot for his political cause.
You say ‘but he was a thief from the start’ true. But I am sure he justified it
like cheating on your taxes! The point was Judas really thought he was getting
in on this new ‘progressive’ political movement of the day. Sure he was
stealing, but after all ‘I deserve it, the Pay Jesus gives us isn’t cutting it.
Doesn’t he realize we are risking our lives with him. I am deserving of it’.
Jesus knew Judas was the average Joe. Jesus had some good times during the 3
years of friendship. Jesus didn’t lie when he said ‘friend, why are you
betraying me with a kiss’? Jesus wished he had never been born. NOTE; in the
current discussion with ‘Emergent Church’ stuff, some are bringing up the
possibility of hell being symbolic in nature. Does ‘fire’ mean ‘fire’ and stuff
like that. I believe it does, but want you to understand that true thinkers and
movers have differences of opinion on this. Origen, one of the early
intellectual church fathers, taught universalism. That all people will
ultimately be saved. Of more recent fame, Carlton Pearson left his charismatic
roots and embraced ‘no hell’. To be honest, he has gone a lot further than
simply being ‘no hell’. He denies the authority of scripture, thinks John wrote
Revelation as an expression of being delusional. I feel Pearson, in his journey
towards universalism, went way too far. Clark Pinnock, a modern theologian has
taught ‘annihilationism’ that all the wicked will be burned up and non
existent. There are a few verses where you can get this from! The point is some
very good people [and bad] have differences of opinion on this. My point is
this statement from Jesus ‘it would have been better if Judas were never born’
sure seems to indicate that every one will not wind up in heaven! It seems as a
harsh thing to say if Jesus knew his buddy would one day be in heaven. Judas
could rightfully ask ‘why did you say it would have been better if I were never
born, after all, all people who were ever born wind up in heaven.’
(611) JOHN
14 [radio # 597] - Jesus says he is going away to prepare a place for us. He
tells the disciples they know where he is going and how to get there. Thomas
says ‘we have no idea where you are going, how can we know the way’. Jesus
wasn’t talking ‘location’ as much as communion with the Trinity. He was saying I
am going to THE FATHER and you now know the Father, because I have revealed him
to you. You have seen me, you have seen him. Also, the way to the father is
thru the Son, so you not only know where I am going [Father] but the way [Son].
Now I get it! You can take this 2 ways [not three!] you can look at it as Jesus
speaking of the sending of the Spirit as his ‘coming again’, in verse 18 he
does say this. He says ‘I will come to you’ and he is speaking of the Spirits
coming. Thru this chapter the comforter is one just like him. Also you can read
this as the literal second coming. We believe Jesus will come again! Some have
said this chapter is speaking of something else besides these 2 options, they
think this ‘coming’ is the rapture. A separate event from the 2nd
coming. I don’t see how you can believe it this way. Also in this chapter Jesus
is showing the intent of redemption. He didn’t just come to take us to heaven.
In chapter 17 we will read that he prays to the father for us not to be taken
out of the world, but to keep us from the evil in it. Thomas seems to be
thinking ‘location and how to get there’ when he says ‘we have no idea where
you are going, how can you think we know how to get there’? But Jesus is really
speaking the language of fellowship in the Trinity/Unity that he has with the
father and the Spirit. He is telling Thomas ‘my purpose is to bring you into
this oneness that I have with the father, to invite you to partake in this
fellowship’ in essence ‘I am not talking about getting you to a location
[heaven] in as much as bringing you into a state of being with me and my
father’ true ‘HOLY COMMUNION’! You do see this concept thru out the chapter.
The disciples seem to be struggling ‘how will you come back and reveal yourself
to us and not to the world’ Jesus says ‘if a man loves me he will keep my
words, the Spirit will then come and indwell him and we will all have community
together’ [Father, Son, Spirit and all believers]. They are grappling with
these ideas. They were like us, always thinking in terms of being saved to go
to heaven when we die. Now, I thank God for this benefit. I am very happy that
I am not going to Hell! Don’t underestimate this blessing. But Jesus is
speaking on a much higher plane. He even says ‘the words I am speaking are not
mine, but the Fathers’. A few practical things. Jesus says when I leave you
will do greater works because I am leaving and the Spirit will come and indwell
you. The ‘non Charismatics’ say this is evangelism. Jesus will give us the
Spirit and we will evangelize on a mass scale, greater works. The Charismatics
say this is doing more miracles, raising the dead and healing the sick and
casting out devils. Who is right? Take them all! Just be sure and bring people
into the Kingdom. The gifts are not for you to get famous or gain a following,
they are for the purpose of evangelism and expanding the Kingdom. In this
chapter we see Jesus great promises of peace and his dwelling with us forever.
The promise of the Spirit showing us the things of the father. We are invited
into this wonderful communion with him. Let’s allow the work of the Spirit to
use us to bring others into this community. The 2 great commandments Jesus
gives us is to love God and others. The ‘others’ speaks of his desire to bring
people into this community. NOTE; on the radio when I spoke on this entry I
mentioned some stuff on the historic creeds and the language that the early
church used to define the Trinity. In the world today the 3 main religions are
Christianity, Islam and Judaism. Islam and Judaism claim to be Monotheistic.
Christians also claim this, but Islam and Judaism don’t agree. The reason for
this is in the way the historic church came to define the Trinity. There have
been Jewish converts to Christianity who accept Jesus as Messiah but do not
accept the classic language of the Trinity. The verse that says ‘the Lord our
God is one’ is a main text for both Muslims and Jews in their understanding of
Gods oneness. Some of the Trinitarian language has been an obstacle to Muslims
and Jews converting. Now, like I said before, I do believe in the Trinity. But
if you notice the language that Jesus will use in our study in John, it seems
more in line with ‘Unity’ then ‘Trinity’. The truth of the Trinity is there,
but the explanations that Jesus gives sound better than the way the creeds say
it. One of the creeds says Jesus was begotten eternally. That there was never a
time where he was begotten. He was always ‘begotten’. They came to this
language by trying to defend Christ’s deity. The problem is scripture teaches
us that there was a definite point in time when Jesus ‘was begotten’. The fact
that Jesus existed always with the father is different from saying ‘he was
always born as a man’ which is what begotten refers to. So to be honest about it,
the language in this creed is an obstacle. In my recent conversations with my
Muslim friend I stood strong for the deity of Christ and God becoming man thru
the incarnation, but I also tried to use the actual language of scripture when
explaining it. This is going to be important for the future of the church as
she tries to bring both Muslims and Jews into the church. We don’t want to
compromise on the historic truths of Christianity, but we also want to express
our belief in Monotheism in ways that are in keeping with scripture. Also when
I say ‘into the church’ I mean bringing them to God thru Christ, not into some
‘culture of Christianity’ that the world sees as ‘church’. NOTE; I also spoke
on the second coming and Preterism. Preterism is a way of interpreting the
Second coming as having happened in A.D. 70. This belief arose out of a well
intentioned answer to the critics of Christianity. Some critics have brought
out the idea that the early church were all expecting an imminent return of
Jesus, that they took the obvious scriptures that speak of Jesus coming quickly
and stuff like that and were let down when Jesus did not come for the first few
centuries. So some scholars developed the idea that Jesus did come in
‘judgment’ and fulfilled all the verses of the second coming in A.D. 70. Others
have taught how the early church had to later adjust it’s theology around the
‘obvious’ mistaken teachings of Jesus. Some of these guys are believers, but
they fall into the liberal camp. My belief is Jesus will literally come again.
A Protestant scholar actually made an argument for the ‘literalness’ of Jesus
return thru the Catholic teaching on Transubstantiation. He defended our
Catholic brother’s ideas on the Real Presence in the Eucharist. He said the
church has been faithful to the literal return of Jesus and his immediate
presence by the reality of Jesus being present in Communion. Good effort, but a
little too much spiritualizing for me. I believe the best argument that can be
made, if you were going to go down this road, would be this chapter. Jesus says
he will come again and also says the comforter will be the fulfillment of this
coming. Now, I also believe in the future literal return of Jesus, because
later on in the New testament you see Paul teaching a future return after the
initial outpouring of the Spirit at Pentecost. I was watching an end time
teacher using the verse where Jesus spoke on the destruction of the Temple and he was
applying it to a future Temple .
He was wrong. I also believe the Preterists are wrong. I believe the rapture as
a separate event from the second coming is ‘extra biblical’. But in all of our
seeking for truth, I don’t throw out the historic belief of Christ’s return. I
believe the best way to explain the supposed delay of his return is to look at
the character of God. The New Testament says the longsuffering of God is
because he wants to bring as many people into the church as possible. That
which seems to be a delay is really mercy. No need to try and find ways to
explain this to the critics, Jesus is delaying his return for their benefit!
(614) JOHN
15 [Radio # 598] Jesus tells the disciples they are the branches, he is the
vine. If they truncate themselves from him they will perish. In the world of
‘once saved always saved’ and ‘if you walk away you are lost’ a lot of these
verses become arguing points. I believe the main context here is sort of like
when I taught Hebrews [read chapter 6 of the commentary on this blog]. I see
Jesus telling the disciples as a microcosm of the Nation of Israel ‘If you
don’t continue in the Old Testament revelation of me as Messiah, then you will
be cut off [AD 70] and be destroyed’. Basically Jesus telling Israel ‘you must
remain in me [after all you have all come from me! John 1:1] if you want to be
fruitful’. Jesus says ‘I want you to have full joy’ in the same context of
bearing fruit. God designed all of us to be active participants in the
spreading of his kingdom. In many modern scenarios you have the Pastors and
staff finding fulfillment, but the average church attendee is simply a funder
of the organization. They see everything thru this paradigm. ‘Give
sacrificially, we can reach the world!’ It’s good to give sacrificially, but
God wants all of us to ‘reach the world’ to be active participants in this
thing. You can’t have ‘full joy’ unless you do the stuff! Jesus says ‘If I had
not come and spoken unto them [religious leaders] they wouldn’t have known they
were wrong’ also ‘if I had not done the works among them that no one else was
doing’. Jesus reproved by word and deed. I find it funny how after preaching that
you don’t need lots of money to reach the world for Christ, that preachers get
really mad at this. Then when we do impact a large region [basically Texas, New
York area and all the African preachers who have been reading/listening to us
on the internet] with me paying for everything, that this really gets the
‘religious leaders’ mad. Don’t be mad, instill this same concept into your
people and you will have a full reward. Tell them like Jesus told his disciples
‘go into the world, don’t think you need a lot of equipment for this, you are
the equipment. No special appeals for funds, keep it simple’ [Message Bible]
Jesus taught and lived contrary to the professional clergies agenda. They got
mad! NOTE; Jesus says ‘ye are clean thru the word that I have spoken unto you’.
As I was reading this chapter for a few days, getting ready to write on it. I
usually get up early and pray ‘aggressively’ for a while before I write.
Sometimes I just wait on the Lord and just listen [for about an hour] and hear
what he is saying. All of these entries come from this ‘hearing’ time, not from
much ‘head knowledge’. As I was waiting the other day, the Lord spoke to me
about this verse ‘ye are clean [set apart for my purpose] thru the word I speak
to you, not thru what you speak [pray] to me’. I felt like the Lord was saying
there are times in our lives where we simply receive and become the ‘incarnate’
purpose of God. That God desires to reveal himself to people thru us. The
purpose of receiving his word is not for didactic teaching only, but for
becoming what he says. Sort of like the imagery I taught in John 1 [go back and
read it!] we in essence become what he is communicating. We don’t just ‘hear’
it, we experience it. Like the Prophets in the Old Testament, God would communicate
thru them, but they also would go thru some strange stuff! Jesus also says ‘if
you abide in me and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what you will and it
will be done’. I want to credit the Word of Faith guys for bringing out truth
in this area. They popularized the idea of knowing Gods will and purpose by
knowing his word. His will is his word, if you will. The problem became an
unbalanced teaching thru only seeing the ‘good stuff’ and avoiding the
suffering verses. It would become next to impossible to correct these brothers
as they went headlong down the path of materialism. Any attempt to reprove them
would be seen as ‘don’t listen to the negative naysayer’ and they would develop
a mindset that would not receive correction. In the reality of Gods will being
his word, we must understand it is his whole word. Even the verses that give
warnings about end time teachers who would stray from the faith by becoming
money focused! [1st Timothy 6]. So lets give credit where it is due,
but also stay on course.
(618) JOHN 16 (radio # 599) Jesus says ‘these things I have
spoken unto you that you should not be offended’. What things? The reality that
after he leaves they will suffer and go thru stuff. He also tells them it is
necessary for their own growth for him to leave. If he doesn’t leave them alone
they will never experience the true ministry of ‘the comforter’. The Spirit
comforts those who need it. They will need it! If Jesus didn’t tell them about
the difficulty up front, there would have been cause for offense. When the
American church preaches only a gospel of success, when people later go thru
stuff they feel like ‘what’s wrong with me? God, you told me thru your
preachers that if I believed you all would go well’ they get offended because
they weren’t given both sides. Jesus gave both sides. When the Comforter comes
he will reprove of sin, righteousness and judgment [do justice]. Some times we
think the purpose for the church is to simply reprove of sin. God wants us to
do justice [civil rights] and show what is right. I heard a preacher say ‘the
only reason Christians should ever practice civil disobedience is if the govt.
said you couldn’t preach. But if they are killing babies, you shouldn’t
practice civil disobedience’. Remember when we said to use the same measure for
others as you would use on yourself? I would ask this preacher ‘what if the law
allowed for your 2 year old to be killed.’ Say if the law came to your house
and said ‘we are going to get your last bible copy and destroy it, or take your
little girl and chop her head off’ would you use ‘civil disobedience’ to save
the baby or the book? ‘I have yet many things to say to you, but you can not
bear them now’ I think the American church is simply not able to ‘bear stuff
now’. It’s not like we couldn’t understand the stuff, or ‘receive it’ into our
ears. It’s just we are way too immature as a corporate people to truly grasp
it. The need is really not more knowledge, its more growth [not numbers,
maturity!]. I remember reading how Dietrich Boenhoffer visited a Christian
university in New York .
After his trip he commented on the surprise he had to see the level of
immaturity in the American church. He would soon become a martyr under Hitlers
3rd Reich. ‘Ye shall weep and lament, the world shall rejoice. Your
sorrow will turn into joy’ Jesus wants us to know that a day of recompense is
coming. We will go thru stuff, but God will bring you out on the other side! We
need both truths to stay balanced. ‘When a woman is in labor, she wants to
abort the process. But after the child is birthed, she forgets all the pain’. A
very important aspect of your calling is to ‘bring forth’ the thing God has
destined you for. There comes a time where you need to pass the test. God is
merciful, he lets you ‘re take’ the test. He brings teachers in who know how
important it is for you to pass. They even will ‘teach to the test’ some will
curve the grade. All types of stuff to get you to the next level. Sooner or
later you gotta pass the test. If you don’t, God will still love you. You can
even attend the graduations of your friends. But at the end of the day you will
have been a spectator in the auditorium as opposed to a graduate on the stage.
It’s better to be on the stage! ‘In me you will have peace, in the world you WILL
HAVE TRIBULATION, be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.’ Jesus promise
isn’t to get us out of the world or the tribulation in it. But to keep us at
peace by having our minds fixed on him. The world runs back and forth [I was
gonna say ‘to and fro’ but that would have been a little to preachy] trying to
extend their lives. Have enough money to retire on. Keep from getting blown up
in a terrorist thing. They really have no peace, no matter how hard they try
they will all die sooner or later. The only peace to be found is in God. To
have the promise of future resurrection and living forever with God is the only
lasting thing you can have. All the money you earn and save will be as useless
as toilet paper in a few years, start living for eternal rewards!
(625) JOHN
17 [radio # 600] Jesus prays to the Father and asks God to ‘glorify him’ with
the glory they had in the beginning. In verse 22 he says he gave this glory to
the church. That’s strange. Scripture says God will not share his glory with
another, yet here he gives it to the disciples. How can that be? Well, as the
Body of Christ we are not ‘another’ we are one with him! He also says ‘I have
given life to those who you gave to me, you have given me power over all flesh.
I have given life to the ones you have chosen’. Here you see the ‘reformed’
part of me. Jesus is not simply offering life to those who want it [though he
does this at other times!] but here he is giving life to those whom the father
chose. You find both of these themes in scripture. Don’t fight it, we can’t
explain it, but praise God, he chose you! [and me]. ‘I have finished the work
which you gave me to do’. What work? He hasn’t gone to the Cross yet. I guess
you can say in a way that the work was finished from the foundation of the world,
and Jesus is saying ‘the course has been determined, I will go!’ But I also see
some truth to ‘the work’ being him revealing the Father to the ‘men which you
gave me out of the world’ the work of the 3 year mission to disciple and train
the 12. God has determined for people to cross paths with you thru out your
life. These are ‘the men’ that God has given you out of the world. It is your
destiny to reveal THE FATHERS NAME unto them! In present models of church
leadership we fail miserably at this. We see ‘the men’ that God has given us as
supporters of our ministries. People whom we try to instill ‘faithfulness
into’. ‘Be faithful to the vision of this house’ and stuff like that. When
these men go their way, we look for ‘new men’ to come and fill the gap. We
basically reveal ‘our name’ to them! Keep in mind that you have a destiny to
cross paths with people thru out your life. You will have ‘finished the fathers
work’ if by the time you part ways, they have seen and come to know HIM. ‘I
have given them the words which thou gavest me’ Give people the words that God
is speaking. Don’t fall into the trap of communicating only that which benefits
the ‘vision’ of your ministry. We often communicate that which brings the
crowds in. If we teach something and the offerings go down, we have a tendency
to not teach it again! There is so much pressure in modern ministry to tailor
the message to the hearer. Speak the things God is saying. Talk on social
justice issues. Not only on the popular ones, it’s ‘in’ to be against racial
profiling, but how about the truth on quotas and affirmative action? Speak
truth in all areas. Speak the words that God wants communicated. You have a
destiny to cross paths with people, avoid the temptation to speak with the goal
of being accepted. You know, saying things that you know are popular. Speak
truth to power! ‘Father, I will that they be with me where I am. That they may
behold my glory’ Is he talking heaven only? Remember how Jesus said the
Comforter will come and manifest and dwell in those who believe and keep his
words? Jesus is speaking in terms of community here. Organic ‘local church’.
Where 2 or more are, there is he ‘in the midst’. Jesus wants us to be where he
is, Jesus told the Greeks earlier in this gospel ‘If they want to see me, they
can meet me at the Cross’ [a grain of wheat falling into the ground and dying].
I think Jesus is speaking of meeting him in true discipleship and union with
him and the father. The reality of the New birth and Jesus dwelling in us by
the Spirit. Let’s end with Jesus desire for oneness and unity. In the beginning
of this chapter Jesus said all who know the father thru the son have life [a
big group of believers!] he also wants all of us to be one. This ‘oneness’ is
actually a present reality in Spirit, though it is not fully functional and
‘seen’ yet in the world. Jesus wants it to be ‘seen’. This is how the world
will know that he was sent by God! Let’s strive for this unity in Christ. I
know there are so many divisions in the Body of Christ it isn’t funny. Some
people miss read my own belief on this when they see how we reprove lots of
stuff in the church. I don’t reprove from the standpoint of ‘we are right and
you are wrong’ more from the standpoint of ‘we are all striving to be what the
father wants, lets be honest and open with one another. Let’s reprove because
we care for each other and don’t want the other to ‘fall off the cliff’. Lets
do all we do with the purpose of true unity in mind. I don’t care how afraid
you are of ‘the one world church’, but whether you like it or not, you are part
of Gods ‘one world church’.
(627) JOHN
18 (radio # 601) Jesus is betrayed in the garden. John follows Jesus all the
way to the judgment, Peter stops short at the door. Why does John record this?
Is he being self serving? He is the only gospel writer that tells you this [If
I remember?] I think there is a purpose. Jesus already taught the principle of
‘whoever tries to save his life will lose it, but he that is wiling to give it
up will save it’. All the others fled out of self preservation. John stayed.
All the others will eventually die martyrs deaths, except for John! He will
wind up on some island in his old age writing this tremendous prophetic vision
[Revelation]. Truly he that was willing to give his life up outlasted them all!
Actually if you read the last chapter of John this becomes an issue. Jesus
tells Peter ‘if I will that John lives until I come, what is that to thee’?
Then a rumor gets started over John not dieing until the 2nd coming!
Hey, I wonder what they thought as they were all getting martyred one by one.
Each time another disciple dies, they must have been thinking ‘hey, Johns still
here, maybe he will live till Jesus comes’? The high priest asks Jesus of his
doctrine AND disciples. Both Paul and Jesus had ‘doctrine and disciples’. Paul
was a theologian on the run! Getting let down in baskets from city walls. Being
stoned and put in prison. Paul was writing theology under crisis. Jesus and
Paul weren’t some ivory tower theologians speculating on the latest fad in
theology. They were ‘doing the stuff’. I want to challenge all my preacher
friends, do you have doctrine and disciples?
Let’s end this chapter in a little controversy. In verse 31 it says ‘the
Jews’. Verses 35 ‘thine own nation AND the chief priests’. Verses 36 ‘delivered
to the Jews’. Verses 38 ‘unto the Jews’. I want you to see how the scripture
makes it clear that BOTH the leaders and the Nation of Israel rejected Messiah!
Jesus in this chapter says he IS THE KING OF THE JEWS! Peter’s sermons in the
book of Acts accuse the Jews as a whole group of rejecting Jesus, not just a
‘conspiracy of the leaders and Rome’ [as John Hagee is teaching]. I don’t want
to be anti Semitic, some have actually accused John’s gospel of being anti
Semitic. Hey, John himself was a Jew! The point is God has great plans for
Israel as a Nation. Read Romans. But it is also a fact that ‘the Jews’ as a
people group missed their Messiah. This chapter makes it pretty clear! Also
when Peter cuts off the guys ear, Jesus says ‘stop, we are not here to fight.
Shall I not drink the cup which my father gave me’? Paul will later teach that
his own sufferings were ‘filling up the sufferings of Christ’s Body’ this would
be heretical if it weren’t in the bible! Paul and the other early believers
understood the calling to suffer along with the ‘being full’ part. I have heard
the ‘being full’ verse used out of context a lot! Paul does says ‘I have
learned to be content in any condition [state] both having a lot and a little’.
I have heard preachers say ‘see, Paul knew how to be rich as well as broke’ no
he didn’t! He was never rich. He knew how to have all his needs met [full] and
to lack [times of suffering and imprisonment where he couldn’t get the basic
stuff to do what he needed to do to carry on the mission]. Jesus says to Peter
‘shall I avoid the cup’? I think the modern American church has answered ‘yes’.
I was reading the voice of the martyrs magazine yesterday. How so many
believers are suffering and dieing for the faith. In Revelation it says it was
the prayers of the martyrs that carried the day. Boy will we be embarrassed at
the judgment when we find out it was the prayers of our martyred brothers and
sisters who died in our day who really were changing things. And at the same
time we were confessing money verses all the way to the bank!
(630) JOHN
19 (radio # 602) The reality of redemption! I want to stress the fact that
Jesus actually dieing on the Cross and really shedding his Blood for us is what
saves us. No spiritualizing here! Over the years I have seen and read how
believers in an attempt to ‘see’ the deep truths of God will sometimes fudge on
the real Blood of Christ redeeming us. Let’s make it clear, the New Testament
teaches that it was the real Blood of Jesus and his death on the Cross that
saves man. Now, were there spiritual aspects to it? Sure. But don’t
‘spiritualize’ the death and real shedding of Blood. Like the recent reproof we
did on some who taught that Jesus was not the Messiah, so here we warn that his
Blood really saves. I remember reading one of the founders of the Word of faith
movement, E.W. Kenyon. He would eventually teach that the ‘death of Jesus
[physically] didn’t touch the sin issue’ he would then teach that it was the
‘spiritual death’ that saved us. Then teach that Jesus was the ‘first born
again man’ who was separated from God and ‘born again’. The New Testament
teaches Jesus was ‘the first begotten from the dead’ meaning the first to rise
from the dead to never die again. Not the first person to ‘be born again’!
Later on you would have another famous Word of Faith brother teach the same
thing. I don't know why we have to always ‘see deeper’ than the plain truth? I
guess it offends the natural mind to believe that Jesus physical death and separation
from the father actually redeems man. I do believe Jesus ‘went to hell’ I don't
teach the ‘hell’ being a separate place called ‘paradise’ that was really like
heaven. It would seem strange for David in Psalms to say ‘thou wilt not leave
my soul in hell [paradise] nor suffer thy Holy one to see corruption’. It just
seems to fit as being ‘hell’, not ‘paradise. But I also believe it was the real
death of Jesus on the cross that saves us. He really died and really shed his
Blood and it was really finished when he said ‘it is finished’. Jesus will also
say to John ‘behold your mother’ and tell Mary to go home and live with John
after his death. Catholic apologists use this to defend their belief in the
perpetual virginity of Mary. They say ‘if Mary had other natural kids, then it
would have been offensive in Jewish culture for Mary to not have gone and lived
with them’ good point. But heck, I defend our Catholic brothers an awful lot.
Let me defend the Protestants a little. It is also possible that Jesus strong
teaching on putting the spiritual family before the natural one might have
played a role here. This could be the beginnings of the strong family mindset
that you will see playing out later in the book of Acts. True believers living
and sharing as strong [or even stronger!] than natural families. Also we
already taught how Jesus knew that John would outlive the others. Even Jesus
brother James, one of the lead apostles at Jerusalem will be martyred. Maybe
Jesus knew [maybe!] that committing Mary over to Johns care was a more long
term thing than handing her over to his brothers? We also see Nicodemus openly
follow Jesus in this chapter. He is the first of the Pharisees to confess
Christ openly. Later in the book of Acts we will see ‘Pharisees who believe’ but
most times leaders are the last to repent and change positions. Why? Well some
of it has to do with the whole persona of leadership. With this calling comes a
type of character that says ‘I preached it, any one who disagrees is simply
persecution’. While there are times when this is true, there are also times
where God calls leadership to new levels. Some get it on it early [Nicodemus]
others later! [some never!] Be part of the early group. I forgot to mention we
also see the Jews appeal to ‘King Caesar’ as opposed to King Jesus. They will
tell Pilate ‘we have no King but Caesar’. They hated Caesar. The whole Jewish
nation were treated like 2nd class citizens under Roman rule, sure
they benefited from ‘Pax Romana’ [the peace of Rome] but they hated to be
living under an occupying govt. Jesus told them earlier in this gospel ‘you
refuse my testimony of who I am, yet you will accept the testimony of another’s
name’ some feel this is a reference to anti Christ. I think it fits in good
right here!
(634) JOHN
20 (radio # 603) THE GREAT VICTORY OF
THE SON OF GOD. In this chapter we finalize the witness of Jesus from his
father. All along he claimed to be the Messiah, here it is truly proven! The
resurrection of Jesus Christ from the grave is an historical fact! If you were
to try and disprove this fact [many have] you would find more historical
evidence backing up the reality of the Son of God than any other person. If you
believe in Lincoln, Clinton, Washington or any other historical figure, than
for sure you must believe in the Christ! He has so much more proof than all the
others. John will say at the end of this chapter ‘Jesus did more signs than
these, but these are recorded that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ,
the Son of God, and that by believing you might have life thru his name’. John
tells us that the miracles [signs] that Jesus did were proof of his
Messiahship. I hate to have to bring this up again, but being we are reading
this during the controversy [12-07] let me say it. In John Hagee’s book ‘in
defense of Israel’ John teaches that Jesus was not the Messiah to Israel
because God didn’t give him the power to do signs like Moses did. That Jesus
told them ‘no sign will be given to you but the sign of the prophet Jonah’.
Then in an unbelievable fashion John will teach that because of this, Jesus was
not the Messiah. It is almost unbelievable to hear him teach this. Many
Messianic groups have come out and openly rebuked Hagee for this. These are the
same Jewish groups that you would think would be on his side. They also see the
danger of preaching a doctrine that says ‘Jesus was not the Messiah because he
refused to do signs’. Peter in Acts will actually preach sermons that say ‘God
approved of his Son by giving him the Holy Spirit to do miraculous signs in
front of you’. The ‘sign of the prophet Jonah’ was not Jesus telling Israel
‘you will get no signs from me’, like Hagee teaches. He said ‘the sign of
Jonah’ was that Jonah went to the gentiles [Nineveh] to preach and not to
Israel. Therefore the sign was Jesus telling Israel ‘I am not your Messiah, I
am going to the gentiles.’ This is not what the ‘sign of Jonah’ means. The sign
of Jonah was ‘as Jonah was in the belly of the whale 3 days and 3 nights, so
shall the Son of man be in the heart of the earth [buried] for 3 days and
nights’. The sign of Jonah was the death and resurrection of Jesus! Jesus was
saying to Israel ‘I have been doing many signs already [raising the dead,
opening blind eyes. All the signs that they were rejecting!] And in the ‘sign
of Jonah’ statement Jesus was saying ‘this will be the ultimate sign, until you
believe in this sign [the resurrection] your eyes will be blinded to all the
other signs’. Hagee actually says ‘if God wanted Jesus to be the Messiah to
Israel, why didn’t God give Jesus the ability to do signs like Moses’. He did!
Moses even says ‘the Lord your God will raise up a prophet LIKE UNTO ME,
whoever doesn’t hear him will be destroyed’. Peter says God did signs among you
[Israel] to testify that he was the Messiah. The writer of this gospel [John]
says ‘these signs have been recorded SO YOU WOULD BELIEVE THAT JESUS IS THE
MESSIAH [CHRIST]’. John [the Apostle] will later write in his letter ‘who is
anti Christ? He that denies that Jesus is the Messiah [Christ] is anti Christ’.
So here we see that Jesus was proven to be the messiah by the miracles he did.
The greatest one being his resurrection from the dead!
(673) JOHN
21 (radio # 604) wow, I have been
putting this off for a while! If you go back a few months you will see that I
never finished this study. Jesus finds the disciples went back to fishing. As
they near the shore he yells ‘did you guys catch anything’? No! They reply.
‘Cast your net on the other side’. Sure enough they fill the net! Notice
something, there is another account where Jesus says ‘cast the nets’ and in
that story they only cast ‘one net’. Why? Fishing was a tough business. After
pulling in and cleaning all the commercial nets it is not easy to ‘cast them
all back out for one last try’. So in that story Peter sort of says ‘Oh fine
Jesus, will humor you’ and he cast ONE net. What happened? The net broke! [I
think I am remembering right? If not this story will still have some meaning].
Here Jesus says ‘cast it’ they do and he fills it. The point is prepare for the
capacity that he wants to give you! If he says ‘nets’ [multiple] do ‘nets’.
Don’t think ‘fill the building’ here. Think in terms of harvest. The ‘fill the
building’ could be part of it, but I think there’s more. Let the Lord direct
your ‘casting’. Don’t focus on ‘my church in my city’ only. You often see these
appeals on church web sites. It is not uncommon to find a web site on the other
side of the world saying ‘come visit our Sunday meeting’. For heavens sake, if
you have a web site [interNET] use it to cast to a broad region. Actually teach
and interact with the thing! All the ‘virtual community’ are a real community
of people. Don’t take a possible few million potential readers and say ‘come
visit my building’. Geez! Get the word out! As the disciples get to shore they
realize its Jesus and Peter jumps out and leaves the brothers to bring in the
nets. Thanks a lot! But oh wait, then Jesus says ‘bring the fish’ and Peter
runs down and grabs the net right at the end! Sort of like what Saturday night
live used to say about Bill Clinton. He was a nice guy, the type who would
offer to help you move the furniture, but when you let your side down you
realize he wasn’t really lifting! Peter was a little ‘showboat’ here. Leaders,
be careful about arranging your ‘ministries’ around your personas. Are the
majority of the funds being spent on broadcasting your gift and image to
people? This is not primarily New Testament ministry! Peter tells Jesus 3 time
‘you know I love you’. Most of you are familiar with this story. Jesus says ‘do
you love me’ 3 times to Peter. In the Greek Jesus used the 3 different words
for love. But don’t lose the context. Scripture does say Peter was grieved that
Jesus asked him this 3 TIMES. Peter understood that Jesus wasn’t asking him 3
different things one time each! Maybe Jesus was allowing Peter to work in his
own mind for the 3 times he publicly denied him? Maybe we need to say out loud
‘I LOVE JESUS’ to reaffirm to ourselves that if we really weren’t sincere why
in the world would we even be doing these things! It’s easy to question all
your motives, especially after reading this site! For the most part all you
Pastors and leaders I relate to, you guys are real ‘players’. If you didn’t
really love the Lord most of you wouldn’t be doing the stuff you are doing, I
commend you! In verse 18 Jesus basically tells Peter ‘I am going to give you
one more chance. You feel terrible about not dieing for the cause. Your denials
of me were done out of fear of loosing your life. The church is going to enter
a period of great persecution, many will die for the faith. When you get old
Peter you will stretch forth your hands and be martyred’. It’s almost like
Jesus said to him ‘don’t worry, I am giving you another chance at it’. I think
this scenario is very possible, he doesn’t tell the others they will die like
this. As we conclude John’s gospel, let’s recap some stuff. I said earlier that
Johns gospel could be called the ‘gospel of sovereignty’. I believe Jesus
taught Predestination in this gospel. At least he hits on this doctrine more in
this gospel than the others. I think you could also call it ‘the gospel of
belief’. There are more statements on those who believe having eternal life
than in any other gospel. I think we should not take this lightly. It is common
in Christian circles to add a bunch of stuff to the gospel. Many evangelicals
preach a type of altar call that says ‘if you think simple belief in Jesus is
going to save you, well you got another thing coming’. But simple belief in Jesus
does ‘save you’ [Actually Jesus saves you!]. There is a recent resurgence in
Reformed theology going on in the Evangelical church. Good stuff on Orthodoxy
and Eastern roots also. Studying Patristics. We need to be careful that we
don’t stray from the simple offer of eternal life to those who believe! It is
all too easy to ‘fall in love’ with a sort of romanticism with all things
Orthodox and mix sacerdotalism in with justification by faith! This gospel
falls down heavily on the justification by faith side! [I know my Catholic
friends will say ‘hey, chapter 6 says this is my Body!’ I don’t want to re
teach it here. Go back and read chapter 6 on this study]. So thank God that he
so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in
him would not perish but have Everlasting life!
(1372) JOHN 17:1-7 Jesus said his hour has come, ‘glorify me
with the glory which I had with you before the world was. I have manifested
your name [who you are] to the men that you gave to me, they were your men and
you gave them to me. They have received the words that you gave me, and they
know for sure that the things that I taught them came from you.’ There is an
element in Christian ministry/teaching when the rubber meets the road, after a
period of time people either say ‘you know, I believe what he is saying is
accurate’ or when you say ‘enough, I really can’t take this anymore’. Now Jesus
will also tell us later in the chapter ‘I have kept the men you gave me, but
Judas had to fall away for the scriptures to be fulfilled’ Jesus also dealt
with the pain of losing one of his guys. A while back I read an article about a
famous evangelical in the UK, he made some waves by referring to the Mother of
Jesus in a sort of Catholic way [I forget the exact wording] but he got some
heat over it. While trying to defend his new view of becoming more open to the
Catholic Church, he said ‘I am as sure about this as I was about the truth of
the prosperity movement’ not too comforting for me. The point though is Protestants
have a tendency to journey thru the Christian life in sort of a haphazard way,
we often see a certain viewpoint about some doctrine [whether true or not] and
that becomes what we teach the people, then we see another thing and that
becomes the next road. Too often the individualism of the Protestant way of
approaching Gods kingdom has us ‘revealing to them the next new thing coming
down the pike’ as opposed to saying with Jesus ‘I have manifested thy name unto
the men which you gave me’. We have all been put here with a predetermined
purpose from God, we can’t say ‘glorify me with the glory which I had with you
[father] before the world was’ but we can say ‘father, carry out the purpose
that you gave to me before the world was, that eternal purpose that you
destined me for, before I ever existed’ we need to grasp a better hold on the
purpose of God for our lives. We need to stop following people, even good
intentioned people, thru all their ups and downs and highs and lows of new
experiences and teachings; in Ephesians Paul said the purpose of us being ‘a
body/community’ was so we could be built up and not be tossed around by every
whim and new doctrine that people come up with. The ‘Body’ imagery speaks of
the people of God as a worldwide community, a living corporate being whom God
indwells. When we hear and grow with the ‘whole church- of all time’ then we do
well, when we follow too closely individual men/teachers we spend too much time
going up and down.
(1373) JOHN 17:8-14 Jesus says he has given the words that
the father gave to him, to his men. He is preparing to be ‘no more in the
world’ but these are in the world, and I am glorified in/thru them. Jesus saw
his mission thru the paradigm of having faithfully deposited Gods truth into
the people that the father ‘gave him’. This group of men were planned by the
father to have been impacted thru his life, Jesus did not see them thru the
lens of ‘these men are here to promote/support my calling’ sort of like God
gave them to him in order for them to help him reach some type of goal or
personal achievement in life. Instead he realized that thru serving them and
laying down his life for them, that thru these acts he would be
‘glorified/honored thru them’. That is the people of God would carry on the legacy
of Jesus after he was gone, they too would be ‘sent out into the world, even as
the father sent me into the world’. He would entrust to them Divine realities
and they would pass these truths along to those who the father ‘gave to them’
[Paul- I do all things for the elects sakes]. I want to encourage/challenge our
leaders today- do you primarily see the people around you [whether church
members or simple friendships in the kingdom] as people God has brought to you
in order to help you achieve your mission? That is are they simply assets to
‘the ministry/church’? It’s easy to fall into these mindsets, and it’s not
wrong to see God as bringing relationships into your life for the purpose of a
great goal, but I think it would be better if we saw these things thru the
mindset of Jesus; he knew that his life being poured out as a sacrifice would
impact his followers in such a way that for generations to come the ‘words that
the father gave to him’ would continue thru the lives of his friends. Don’t be
too consumed with the material aspects of the here and now [facilities,
finances, etc.] they will all pass away, but those that do the will of God will
abide forever.
(1382) IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE WORD; AND THE WORD WAS WITH
GOD, AND THE WORD WAS GOD- John 1:1 Jesus is called ‘The Word’, the Greek word
for ‘word’ is Logos. In the first century this word was common among the
philosophers, it stood for a sort of overriding principle that would explain
and bring together all the fields of science and learning, the same obsession
of Einstein in his search for a unified theory. The philosophers believed that
there had to be some type of base principle of truth that would bring together
all the other fields of wisdom and learning. In essence John was saying ‘This
is it, we have found the Logos- the answer to everything- his name is Jesus!’
It’s always difficult to teach these types of verses, they are fraught with
only seeing one aspect of what God is saying, and then dividing lines are drawn
between the Christian camps. I was having a conversation yesterday with a
person who was asking questions about a Muslim friend who used to be a
Christian. The Muslim said that he wanted a religion that he could understand,
that God is the only God and Jesus is not God. I explained the best I could and
shared this verse and a few others, but I also explained that various
‘Christian’ groups have argued over the way to express the deity of Jesus for
centuries. There are groups that say ‘Yes, Jesus is the redeemer, he is Gods
Son, but only God is God’. From the catholic bishop Arius in the 4th
century all the way up to the Unitarians in Boston in the 20th
century, people have debated the language we use. I explained to my friend that
the bible clearly does teach us that Jesus is God, but I do see how people have
problems with the language. But I told my friend that for a person to use the
difficulty over the Trinity to embrace Islam is going way too far in my view. I
mean the fact that someone has a problem with the wording of the Trinity
should not mean you abandon all the
realities of redemption and Christianity and embrace a movement that was started by a ‘prophet’ who killed
and murdered and had ‘many women’, I mean no other prophets ever had a track
record like that! As we read the rest of John chapter 1 we see how John the
Baptist says he came to bear witness, to give a record of Jesus, the ‘Lamb of
God’. The religious leaders come to John and ask him ‘who are you, we need an
answer to bring back to the authorities, the movers and shakers of our day’
John says ‘I am the voice of one man crying in the wilderness, get ready, the
lord is on his way’. John quoted Isaiah 40, he is also said to be the prophetic
voice that Malachi spoke about- the Elijah that was to come. Johns only significance
was in the fact that he was chosen by God to trumpet the reality of the
Messiah, his purpose was not about him or his prophetic gifts, his purpose was
to proclaim the last true prophet [in the sense of Hebrew messengers who came
down the line- see Hebrews chapter 1] and John the Baptist said ‘this is the
one, the one whom the Spirit descended on- he’s going to baptize you guys with
the Spirit’ [and fire!]. John testified that Jesus was the end of the line for
promised Messiahs, he was the ONE. Why look we for another?
(1384) YOU’RE NO EINSTEIN! A few weeks back my wife was
getting on me for looking like a homeless guy, she tells me ‘John, why don’t
you cut your hair- at least brush it’ and I responded ‘Einstein let his hair
grow out’- the response ‘your no Einstein’. Humility is one of those gifts that
just keeps on giving. Okay, seriously I have become a little messy these last
few years. I am feeling okay physically though I realize all things are not
well. About a year [actually a few years] ago I noticed some physical signs
that probably needed to be checked out, but I had just lost my health insurance
and finally went on line and did the best with what I had. At the same time
there were days where I would get off of work and barely be able to walk [back
problems] and would go to the homeless mission to see the brothers and some of
them are in there 20’s, doing much better than me, and yet they are on Social
Security, getting medical stuff for free, and I couldn’t even get the darn VA
clinic to check me out! [I was in the navy, and my wife also. Tried but failed
to get approved for the clinic]. So I guess after a while you get frustrated.
Okay, in John chapter 2 Jesus turns the water into wine. The governor of the
wedding drinks it and says ‘wow, most people serve the best stuff first, and
after everyone is feeling good- then he sets out the cheap stuff. But you have
saved the best for last’. Of course we know this is a story that speaks about
the New Covenant in Jesus Blood being better than the old, but the point I want
to make is this governor testified about Jesus and he didn’t even know it.
Later on after the leaders draw up their personal opinions of him, they will
not give him the credit for ‘the good wine’ they will find all sorts of reasons
to demean him, but those who simply got a taste of the wine said ‘wow, that’s
some of the best ever’. Do you [I] have a tendency to reject the ‘wine’ because
we have already pre judged the source? Have people ever approached you and said
‘hey, did you hear that brothers teaching, it’s really good’ and yet you felt
offended because ‘that brother’ might have hit a nerve or 2 along the way.
Jesus turned the water into wine, not just any wine, but some of the best stuff
on the planet. Many wouldn’t access it because they were offended by his
straight forward approach- they even said of John the Baptist that he had
strange eating habits [locusts!] and looked a little shabby [camels hair
wardrobe]. Don’t let the personal animosities keep you from the good wine, people
are going to drink it whether you like it or not, might as well get in on it
while there’s still some time left.
(1385) JOHN 4- Jesus does the unthinkable, he travels thru a
bad side of town- Samaria. If you read our Kings study you will remember the history
of the region, by the time of Jesus day they were considered the ‘dogs’ of
society. Now Jesus meets the woman at the well and they engage is this
intriguing conversation, she brings up the debate over where the true place of
worship should be- do we meet in the church building or the house? Ah, Jesus
says ‘woman, the time is coming and it is even here now when the true
worshippers of God will do it in spirit and truth’. It really wasn’t a matter
of ‘where’. Okay, she gets into this religious discussion with this strange
person in the middle of her busy day, she really doesn’t have time to get into
the whole thing. But for some reason she’s drawn to this person, he seems to
have insight that is rare for the day. Jesus tells her ‘if you knew who it was
that you were talking to, you would have asked for water and I would have given
you water that once a person drinks from they will never thirst again’. Okay,
another one of those strange sayings, but she’s running out of time, she needs
to finish her business at the well at get back to town. What the heck, she says
‘Okay, give me the water’ well, first we have to deal with a few things-
remember I’m looking for sprit and truth, brutal honesty about your life and
situation. This isn’t an encounter with some ‘wealth coach’ for heaven’s sake!
Here we go ‘call your husband’ what? What a strange question to interject at
this point-okay, she knows how to answer questions about her past in a way that
makes it sound like everything is all right, when we all know it’s not. She
says ‘I have no husband’ got ya now. Jesus tells her ‘you have spoken the
truth’ the man your living with now is not your husband, and you have been
divorced 5 times already, so yes, you ‘have no husband’. Okay, this is where
the rubber meets the road, this is what Jesus was getting at when he told her
that worship is not about ‘where’ but about truth and honesty when confronted
by God. At this point many walk away and stay offended for life, but she was
thirsty enough to allow the confrontation/offense to happen. ‘Well, I know that
the Messiah is going to come some day, and when he comes he will tell us all
things’! It was really a shot at Jesus ‘sure, you know SOME STUFF about me, but
the real Messiah knows everything!’ Jesus says ‘I that speak unto you am he’.
At that point the disciples returned with the food, they are shocked that Jesus
is engaging this woman, they must be thinking ‘thank God the Pharisees aren’t
here for this one’ I mean they were always looking for an excuse to discredit
him. Well the woman goes back into town and tells all the other ‘mongrels’
about Jesus, he is invited to the town and spends 2 days and this truly is the
first great ‘gentile/Samaritan’ outreach of the first century. In our day there
is much debate about the how and way to ‘do church’ much of what is missing
from the conversation is the ‘spirit and truth’ aspect. I have noticed that
when a famous preacher falls into some public sin, that when they make the
rounds [Larry King, etc.] there is much interest. People want to know that the
things that they have struggled with are also things that we all deal with. The
‘spirit and truth’ aspect is often missing from our modern practice of
Christianity. This woman allowed the confrontation to happen; it needed to happen
for her to get to the next step where she would believe that Jesus was the
Messiah. She truly found the water that she asked for.
(1386) DROP THE BED [AND GIVE ME THE WINGS] - I was reading
a news story about a Dominoes guy who was robbed; the brothers who robbed him
found out he had no money on him, so one of them said ‘just give me the wings’,
now that’s a brother that I could go easy on if I was on the jury. Recently I
made a few comments on line dealing with the Emergent movement and stuff, all
things I have written on before. Though I have been both critical and at times
supportive of certain aspects of the movement, I felt some who also made
comments were not leaving enough ‘room’ [grace] for the author of the book
being critiqued. In John chapter 5 Jesus heals the guy at the pool of Bethesda
and he tells him ‘take up your bed and walk’- take up my bed! That’s the reason
I have not been able to get healed by making it into the water after the angel
troubles the water, I mean if I could walk I wouldn’t be in this dilemma. The
poor brother didn’t realize that he was talking straight to the source ‘forget
about the angel thing, I am the Messiah man! Take up the bed now’ the man
walks. Now that’s a real miracle, something that we could all be happy about, right?
Not. The religious folk saw the man and their first response was ‘who in the
heck told you to carry that darn bed on the Sabbath’? They immediately saw the
perceived violation of their religious point of view, the bible says ‘they
sought to kill him’. What! The same 10 commandments that speak about keeping
the Sabbath has a little bit to say about killing people too. Sometimes we as
believers [defenders of the faith] need to be able to look past the things we
perceive as wrong- now there are times where we take a stand and say ‘enough is
enough’ but there are also times where we need to ask ourselves if we are just
looking for some guy carrying his bed- the person who seems to be violating one
of our ideas. There is a difference between true rejecters of Jesus, and people
who believe in Jesus but are coming at stuff from a different point of view. To
shoot a pizza delivery boy in a robbery is a serious crime, to say ‘give me the
wings’ I don’t know.
(1387) FOR THE FATHER HAS LIFE IN HIMSELF, AND HAS GIVEN TO
THE SON TO HAVE LIFE IN HIMSELF; AND HAS GIVEN HIM AUTHORITIY TO EXECUTE
JUDGMENT ALSO- In John chapter 5 one of the statements that irks the religious
leaders is Jesus calling God his father- thus making himself equal with God.
Those who doubt the deity of Christ should look at the way the religious
leaders viewed him, they knew that he claimed equality with God. In some of the
recent musings on the liberal ideas of ‘the evolution of God’ [those who see
the church evolving in her view of God as time goes by] I want to say a few
things. First, the incarnation is Gods way of saying ‘yes, your view of me was
limited, the very fact that the incarnation is the full revealing of myself to
man, shows that man never had the complete [full] view of me yet’. So in a
sense, yes, our view of God ‘evolved’ [so to speak] from the wrathful God of
the Old Testament to the merciful God of the New Testament. Now, are these
contrary views of God? No. Are they views like some in the early days of the
church taught- that the God of the Old Testament was a different God than the
God of the New [Marcion and other Gnostic cults]? No. But our view of God from
the Old Testament is a view of Gods holiness and judgment apart from the grace
of the New Covenant. He is the same God, seen absent the Cross [for the most
part, yet we do see Gods attribute of mercy even in the Old Testament]. Now,
without getting off track too much, in the New Testament we are told that Jesus
is the complete picture of God to us; Colossians says that ALL the fullness of
the God head dwelt in Jesus bodily. We never had this fleshly reality of God
before- the apostle John will say ‘we handled the word of life’ [1st
Jn]. A few weeks back while watching an apologetic show I mentioned how some of
the staunch apologists were labeling the UPC [united Pentecostal churches] as a
cult because of their unique view of the oneness of God. The apologists at one
point quoted the verse ‘all things were made by him’ referring to Jesus, and
said ‘therefore Jesus is God’ true. But they were trying to combat the UPC
brothers by using this verse, the apologists were using it in a way that said
‘see, Jesus created everything too, just like it says about God’ sort of in a
disconnected way. In John 1 we read that in the beginning was the word and the
word was with God and the word was God. In Genesis we read that God ‘spoke’ all
things into existence. Jesus in the New Testament is called ‘the word of God’
to try and simplify it, when Colossians says ‘all things were made by him’ it
does not mean that Jesus created things separately from God, it means God spoke
and that ‘the vehicle’ of creation was the Son. The act of God’s word [also
called Jesus] going forth created all things. God did not create separately
from the Son, or the Son from the father. I really loathe teaching this stuff
because church history is filled with names that get tagged on all the various
views of explaining the oneness of God while at the same time upholding the
reality of the Trinity. The main point today is mans view of God did ‘evolve’
in a sense, it became fully revealed in Jesus. Now the liberal view of the
evolution of God is something different than this, but I wanted to make clear
that if the only view of God is seen thru the Old Testament, than yes we are
not ‘fully’ seeing God, the full view comes thru Jesus. We reject the Marcion
idea of 2 different Gods, the Gnostic belief that the God of the Old Testament
was the God of matter and thus an evil God, while the God of the new testament
is the spirit God- this is true heresy, but as Christians we accept the
incarnation as the complete picture and revelation of God to man. This in no
way negates the wrath of God [eternal judgment] but it tempers it with mercy.
(1388) 1, 2 MANY BISHOPS? In John chapter 6 Jesus is
confronting the religious leaders, they are always appealing to some ancient
hero of the faith [Moses, Abraham] and they are doing it in a way that violates
the supremacy of Jesus. Jesus tells them ‘look, you guys are always appealing
to the writings of Moses, if you really believed in the guy you would have also
believed in me- he wrote about me!’ In ‘blog world’ there has been a scuffle
over an overseas church that many have labeled as a cult. On the site ‘religion
news blog’ they have been doing an expose’. The church is led by a man who
calls himself a Bishop and one of his satellite churches had a Pastor walk out
and split the church. The coverage of the ministry that I have read seems to
place them in the prosperity/apostolic covering type movement. I have written
on this before and have always felt that there were too many independent
churches-ministries claiming ‘apostolic authority’ and these well intentioned
people have crossed the line when it comes to the freedom of the individual believer's
conscience. Many are famous for rebuking ‘the maverick spirit’ while at the
same time they seem to be totally mavericks themselves! In the above case I
think the religious site went too far in calling them a cult. I have read from
this site in the past and they are run by fine Catholic Christians, but they
are too quick to holler ‘cult’. I personally do not recommend these types of
church movements, but avoid the cult label. I also read an article a while back
written by a leader in one of the more historic churches, they were rebuking
the rapid spread of these types of churches thru out the world. The leader said
they were sprouting up like wild fire, all with their self proclaimed bishops,
who were basically starting their own independent churches and everyone in the
organization is ordaining everyone else as a bishop, the leader saw this as a
major problem. What exactly does the bible teach about this? The words for
‘bishop, overseer and elder’ in the bible seem to speak of the same office.
Though different Greek words are used, most scholars agree that they seem to be
used interchangeably. One thing we know for sure is in the New Testament there
were no Bishops in the sense of an ecclesiastical authority over a number of
churches. This developed over time and my purpose here is not to get into the
whys and how’s this happened, I am not ‘anti clergy’ in that I reject the
modern role today [in the historic churches]. Does the bible have any office
that does show an extra local authority? Yes, the apostle Paul had a very
effective oversight ministry to most of the churches we read about in the New
Testament. So the idea of a church planting ministry to have a number of
‘satellite churches’ is okay. The Catholic Church has Bishops in the Cathedral
cities who oversee the entire region. I live In Corpus Christi; the cathedral
for this south Texas region for the Catholics is located in my city. San
Antonio has another region. While living in New Jersey, Saint Patrick’s was the
Cathedral in N.Y. that covered the region. So you have different views and out
workings of how bishops work. The thing I would warn about is when these
bishops [the independent ones] seem to teach a strong type of ‘covering’
authority over people. Many of these movements [sometimes referred to as the
shepherding, discipleship movement] teach a controlling type spirit that has
the main apostle as the person that the community submits to, but it is done in
a way that violates the freedom that we see in the New Testament. The religious
folk of Jesus day were enamored with Moses, to the point where they were never
fully able to move on to Jesus as being the true authority figure that they
would submit to, I think we could all learn from their mistake.
(1390) THE EXCLUSIVITY OF JESUS CHRIST- John chapter 8
begins with the woman caught in adultery, Jesus refuses to judge her but also
tells her to go and sin no more. Then we launch into a conversation between
Jesus and the religious leaders. Basically they claim belief in God and tell
Jesus that he is their father. Jesus replies that if they do not believe that
he is the Messiah, then in reality they do not have God as their father- he
flat out tells them that satan is the father of those who claim belief in God
while not accepting and honoring the Son. This chapter is important for the
pluralistic society we live in today. How should believers approach other
faiths that claim belief in God, but do not accept Jesus as the Messiah? First,
we should respect the various beliefs/religions of others people groups. Now
when I say ‘respect’ I mean we should give people room to form their own
beliefs while at the same time challenging them with the truth claims of
Christianity. We should not leave the impression ‘well, we all believe in the
same God, so what’s the difference whether or not you believe in Christ’ well
frankly the difference is between heaven or hell! The point being Jesus is
‘exclusive’ in the sense that you can’t really have God as your father without
having Jesus as your savior. He can’t just be ‘one of the prophets in a long
line of prophets’ no, he alone is the God man! God became flesh and dwelt among
us thru the Son, Jesus said if you don’t hear his words, believe that he is the
one sent from the father, then you don’t have God as your father. Jesus is
‘inclusive’ in the sense that he even accepted the woman taken in adultery,
something the so called ‘God believers’ would not do. The religious acceptance
of belief in God, absent the reality of Jesus, treats women and others with
disdain [wearing veils, etc.] those who ‘have God’ and the Son, are truly the
liberators of society. The world might accuse the church of being arrogant and
believing in exceptionalism, but in the end we have the only answer to the
human sin problem, that which G.K. Chesterton called the only Christian
doctrine that has 100% empirical evidence of being true! Truly Jesus is the
answer to fallen man, let’s not be ashamed of that fact.
(1391) NO MAS [SA]! Back in the 70’s us boxing fans were
treated to one of those so called ‘super fights’ you know, a matchup between
greats. Roberto Duran faced Sugar Ray Leonard. A few rounds into the fight
Duran got so frustrated that he walked out of the ring while chanting ‘NO MAS’.
Yesterday a Democratic congressman from N.Y. - by the name of Massa- resigned
his seat and went on the war path against his own party. It seems like he has a
history of making racy comments to other men, but his excuse for being rail
roaded is that he voted against Obama Care. It’s quite sad, he is making the
rounds [today he’ll be on Beck] and he’s describing all these encounters with
the administrations men, he says they approached him in the showers at the gym,
wearing nothing, and he describes Rahm Emanuel’s ‘tush’. He seems like he can’t
escape language that pits him up against other men, while nude! All of this
wouldn’t be so tragic if it weren’t happening to the most ethical congress in
U.S. history! Plus, it really stains N.Y. politics, I bet Spitzer and Patterson
can’t even sleep at night. Okay, in John chapter 9 Jesus heals a man that was
blind from birth, the disciples ask him ‘who did sin, this man or his parents,
that caused this man’s plight’? Jesus said neither, but this happened so the
works of God could be manifested in him. This might be the most important verse
in the chapter. This man and his family lived many years with the insinuation
that they must have been children of a lesser God, sure their neighbors didn’t
come right out and say it, but you could sure feel the underlying accusation.
Now, the news makes it to the religious crowd and they find out he was healed
on the Sabbath, a big no no, a real ‘No Mas’ moment. They question the man and
his family, they can’t escape the fact that this is a real miracle, so they try
and convince the man that he should thank God for the miracle, but this Jesus
is not authentic. The more they question him, the more he becomes a vocal
advocate for Jesus. Finally at one point the religious leaders get fed up and
they say ‘who are you to teach us anything, YOU WERE ALL TOGETHER BORIN IN
SIN!’ There it is, that underlying accusation that he always felt from the
religious crowd- you know, the group who always had their act together, they
prided themselves in their upper class status ‘thank God that I am not like
this beggar’ type of thing. But now, at the moment of truth, they blurt it out
‘Look at you, your whole life has been a testimony of your utter worthlessness,
sure we never said it openly, but we always felt that way’ so the truth came
out. I had a good friend a few years ago, New York Tony, he was a homeless
brother that came from my home turf, never knew him from the north, but ran
into him while making the rounds. Tony was a good friend, hooked on Coke and
Crack, but a hard worker and Army vet. Tony used to always question why he was
like the way he was, he was adopted and he thought maybe his real mom passed
something off to him- was he like this because of what he did, or what his
parents did? In the religious world we often create mindsets that say to people
‘surely if you were right with God, these things wouldn’t have happened to you’
we often violate the mandate from James ‘Don’t despise the poor’. At the end of
the chapter Jesus tells the man that he came into the world to make the blind
see, and the ‘seers’ blind. The religious leaders would find no help until they
got to the end of their rope, the point where they could say ‘No Mas’ to the
road they were on, but instead they said to Jesus ‘No Mas’.
(1392) CAN A DEVIL OPEN THE EYES OF THE BLIND? In John 10
Jesus defends his deity in sort of a strange way; he says ‘if those to whom the
word of God came are called “gods” how much more shall it be said of him whom
the father hath sent and sanctified, that he is called the Son of God’. Jesus
is quoting Psalms 82, as far as I can tell this is the only attempt that Jesus
makes to justify his deity thru scripture. He has said things like ‘before
Abraham was, I AM’ and ‘how could David call the Messiah his Lord, if he is the
Son of David’ all statements that speak of his deity, but this quote from
Psalms 82 seems to be a direct reference
to him claiming deity [Son ship] based on a verse that calls us ‘gods’. Over
the years this verse has been used by certain camps to teach dominion theology,
but I think they missed the point. The Psalm itself is a rebuttal to the
religious leaders of Jesus day, it argues for the defense of the poor, the
doing of justice- it is the ministry of Jesus in a nutshell, a strong reproof
against those who refused to do justice and defend the poor and needy. I mean
Jesus healed the crippled guy and all they could do was critique him for
violating their view of the Sabbath. In this chapter they say ‘can a devil open
the eyes of the blind’? Jesus purposely healed these people on the Sabbath, I
mean there really were 6 other days to do these healings, why keep doing it on
the Sabbath? I think he was sticking it in their faces, causing them to have to
rethink their religious views. He was showing them the reality behind the law
‘the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath’ the rebuke of psalms 82
‘do justice and quit using the law as some religious measurement of class and
status’. Contrary to popular opinion, Jesus didn’t heal every sick person he
met- I know the bible says ‘he healed them all- he went around healing all who
were oppressed of the devil’ but this does not mean every person on the planet.
I mean at the pool of Bethesda he healed only one, I mean that pool was like a
hospice, people who were ready to die were showing up for one last miracle, yet
Jesus healed only one. But these outstanding cases were proofs that just
wouldn’t go away. The religious leaders kept going back to those events in
their minds ‘can a devil do this’? The father testified of the authenticity of
the Son by doing these miracles, Jesus even says ‘look, if you don’t believe me
because you think my doctrine and claims are wrong, then at least believe for
the actual works that I’ve done’ no matter how hard they tried, they couldn’t
deny the reality of those few outstanding miracles-‘can a devil really do
this’? No.
(1393) POLITICAL EXPEDIENCY- in John chapter 11 Jesus raises
Lazarus from the dead. The news gets back to the religious leaders and they say
‘If this keeps going on, we will lose our influence with the people and the
Roman authorities will come and take away our position’ and one of their own,
the high priest Caiaphas, says ‘Don’t you guys understand that it is expedient
that one should die for the nation, instead of the whole nation suffering’ and
John says ‘this spake he by the Spirit, being he was the high priest he was
prophesying of Jesus death’. Okay, did the brother realize what he was saying?
I doubt it. But he was stating a political reality of the time, that this
railroading of Jesus would play a cathartic role for the political times that
they were in. I finally watched the interview with the disgraced congressman,
Eric Massa. He went on Beck and the whole thing is really a fiasco. Beck was
hoping to expose the hidden conspiracies of the administration, instead Massa
confessed to tickling his navy bunkmates! The sad thing is, as I listened to
Beck, he really believes in many of the conspiracy theories he espouses. It
doesn’t help that the president, as well meaning and pluralistic as he is, puts
people to work for him that have held fringe beliefs. This allows the Becks of
the world to find these hidden treasures [UTUBE] and lo and behold, we have one
of his people praising Mau Se Tung, or signing a 911 petition that claims Bush was
in on it. What purpose do the Becks of the world [or to be fair, the MSNBC
crowd] play? I see them as sort of a cathartic for the people who also hold to
their views, it seems to be a necessary evil that allows people to vent, a sort
of political necessity if you will. I saw Patrick Kennedy, son of the late Ted
Kennedy, rebuking the media for their coverage of Massa, while at the same time
they have forgotten about the seriousness of the war in Afghanistan and the
money and cost of lives on both sides, he was mad and raging on the floor.
Though I am not a fan of Kennedy, yet I believe he spoke much truth. I thinks
its appalling that the media has dropped the ball on this, every so often a
story or so will leak out, a bunch of accidental deaths that our govt. denies
being involved with, then a month or so passes and a small report comes out
‘yes, we did accidently kill 40 people’ what? The media seems to not hold the
current president accountable in these things. They play sides to the point
where real atrocities are glossed over. How many more stories on Sarah Palin’s
daughter will they do? They trodded out the ex boyfriend onto the main media
outlets to share their dirty laundry. They gave a forum to a disgruntled kid
who posed for playgirl, and they keep on doing this stuff. I mean this is the
daughter of a ‘private’ citizen for heaven’s sake. How much coverage did they
give to the ‘partner’ of Joe Biden’s daughter who made a sex tape with her? How
often have you heard the story? How many stories on Chelsea Clintons sex life?
MSNBC is just as bad as Beck when they do these things to a girl dealing with
all the situations that life can throw at you, and yet from letterman to Chris
Matthews to the major news outlets, they have all been guilty of this double standard.
Caiaphas saw the writing on the wall, he wasn’t worried about the fact that
what he was prophesying was that a corrupt system was going to railroad someone
thru a kangaroo court and execute an innocent man, he was simply calculating
the political balances of the day ‘will this help or hurt our cause’ type of a
thing. They should have been more worried about losing their souls, then their
seats in congress.
(1394) THE TEXAS SCHOOL BOOK DEPOSITORY? In John 12 the
Greeks come to Jesus disciples and want a meeting with Jesus, the Greeks are
those who prided themselves in their wisdom. Jesus basically brushes them off
and refuses to cow tow to the elites. He responds ‘unless a grain of wheat
falls into the ground and dies, it abides alone’ in essence- you guys ‘abide
alone’ [no meeting with me] until you take up the Cross and follow me. This
week [yesterday] the news has been reporting the Texas school book story.
Basically every few years Texas school board members go thru the process of
what the books for the state should include; basic guidelines and stuff. Texas
is the nation’s number one purchaser of textbooks, so the theory is if Texas
‘conservatives’ get their way, then the rest of the nation gets stuck having to
buy books that are tainted with backwoods idiots who imposed their views on the
rest of the ‘Greek’ [intellectual world]. Do our schoolbooks in general steer
away from the religious history and statements of many of the founding fathers?
Yes. Do our schoolbooks in general avoid/edit out religious statements from
their coverage of the founding documents. Yes. Why? There is a basic mistake
made by many of the publishers of schoolbooks that say ‘if we show religious
content, then we are violating the separation of church and state idea’. The problem
with this approach is they have left out
a large portion of history while trying
to produce a product that will be accepted in both ‘liberal’ and conservative
states. If you read the founding documents in their entirety [Mayflower
Compact, etc.] they read like a ‘church covenant’ that any Christian community
could adopt. Yet when the history books show quotes and portions of the
documents, they never quote these sections, why? Because of what I just showed
you. This has happened time and time again over many years until we have gotten
to the point where many public school children are really not learning an
accurate history of the country. The well meaning [but grossly misinformed]
opponents simply do not know this. They see the struggle as one between ‘those
darn Christian ignoramuses’ versus the enlightened crowd, they are really the
ones who have no idea what they are talking about. Now, are we- quote ‘a
Christian nation’? Not really. At least not in the way that some Protestant
preachers claim. During the founding of our country you had the mindset of the
European enlightenment affecting much of western society. Lines were being
drawn that pitted a humanist form of belief in God [Deism] against the
classical Christian view. Some of our founding fathers did adhere to a Deistic
view. Deism said ‘we do not need tradition or religion to inform us of human
value and dignity, we can hold to these principles by virtue of our human
nobility and intelligence’ that is they believed these truths to be self evident,
sort of like the current theme from some of the more popular atheists ‘do good
for goodness sake’ [which by the way, fails in the long run- too much to
explain right now]. Now, with this background, when our founding documents say
‘we hold these truths to be SELF EVIDENT’ this term smacks of the fact that
some of our fathers did indeed reject the classical Christian view. So what
does this show us? That some of the founders purposefully included language
that would veer away from the Christian view. But you will never understand or
learn this simple thing that I just showed you, if we continue to expunge from
the record all the religious statements and views of the fathers! So the point
is, when these so called enlightened ones try and approach teaching from a
biased view, a view that they often don’t realize is biased, they do more harm
than good to their cause. The Greeks said ‘we are willing to hear Jesus, let’s
set up an appointment’ they went further than most of the liberals on the Texas
school board.
(1395) GLTB community [might have left a letter out?] Last
night I caught an interview on CNN with a transgender person. Tonight they will
be doing a special on him called ‘my name was Stephen’ he has ‘transitioned’
and is now living as a woman. Then the next show [Anderson Cooper] interviewed
Chas [former Chastity] Bono, the daughter of Sony and Cher who also is
transgender. A few years ago I saw a documentary on a phenomenon where people
had this compulsion, sometimes from as long as they can remember, to want to
rid themselves of a limb. The interesting thing was many of these people came
from various backgrounds and had no idea that others too grappled with ‘this
feeling’. Eventually a community formed around them to affirm them and tell
them there really is nothing wrong with them, after all many others have
struggled with the same feelings from their youth, so it must be an identity
thing. During the show they interviewed family members who dealt with the fact
that many of their loved ones went thru with these desires and found ways to
get their limbs amputated [freezing them to the point where the ER had no
choice but to amputate the limb]. One person who finally gave in to ‘who he
really was’ found out that after the first amputation, yes he felt a sense of
relief, sort of like ‘well, I was told by many others that it was the answer to
my problem, so I did it’ he was later interviewed and described how he
eventually sought counseling and he now realizes that both his desires, and the
good intentions of others who tried to affirm his desires, were actually very
damaging. Others felt affirmed in their acceptance of his desires, but they
really did not realize that their acceptance and encouraging was actually
harmful. He said that after the first amputation, some time elapsed and he
began having a desire to amputate another limb. He thanks God that a good
counselor treated this disorder and he is happy he stopped at limb one. In the
interview with the transgender person it showed how he went for many years without
any inkling of wanting to go from man to woman, then one day he watched a show
and they espoused this belief as the answer to some people’s problems. This
idea stuck in his head and through the process of time he acted on it. His son
and wife dealt with it the best they could, but it no doubt affected his entire
life. They went thru the whole procedure of surgeries and hormone treatments
and dealing with severe depression [and a high suicide rate] that many of these
people deal with, and yet the whole flavor of the show was geared towards
saying it was societies fault [church, morals] that has caused these people to
feel unwanted. There was really no thought given to the possibility that these
decisions, acting out on years of feelings, might in the long run solve nothing
and actually lead to more problems. In so many words the psychologist who was
also interviewed admitted that the depression rate is almost 100 % after the
‘transition’ is made. How should we as believers respond? In John 13 Jesus is with
his men at the last supper, he takes a towel and begins to wash the disciples
feet, Peter gets upset ‘No way Jesus, I won’t let you wash my feet’! Jesus says
‘Peter, if you don’t let me wash you, you have no part with me’. Then Peter
says ‘fine, give me an entire bath’ and Jesus says he really only needs to
admit that sometimes in life we need foot washings, not entire body makeovers!
Some in the progressive church are trying honestly to deal with these issues by
saying ‘they don’t need a foot washing, that’s the way God made them’ they are
trying to be affirming towards people with struggles, but in the long run this
affirmation will not work. Imagine trying that with the brother who kept
‘feeling’ that it was right to amputate his limbs! Jesus shows us that all
people get defiled in life, whether a person’s struggle is with a sexual
identity issue, or a heterosexual issue, we all have times where we need to go
to Jesus for cleansing. It might very well be that some of our brothers and
sisters in Christ will struggle and stumble in life with these things. We
should help them ‘get clean’ even if it’s a life time struggle. But to espouse
the idea of the world that says the answer is to affirm them in their sin, this
is neither helpful to them nor the biblical thing to do. When the religious
conservatives brought the woman in adultery to Jesus, Jesus received the woman;
he accepted and did not reject her. He also told her to sin no more, he
empowered her not by saying the lifestyle she was living was okay, but by
telling her ‘yes, I love you, and this lifestyle you think is fulfilling you is
not- you must let me wash you from it’. I know these issues are hot button
issues, and I know many well meaning Christians are presently trying to work
thru these issues, but the fact is many who have been told ‘to keep resisting
this desire, to not give in to it is living a lie’, they are being misled. They
are told year after year that to give in to whatever temptation they are facing
would be the answer, this simply is not true. Many will eventfully find the
same struggles all over again [remove another limb?] and finally realize that
in life there are times when yes, our feet get dirty- we might fall and
struggle for many years, but Jesus said you could still have a part with him,
if you let him wash your feet- if you keep coming back, 70 times 7, he will
keep working with you. The tragic thing is many of these precious people are
told that this struggle, to keep trying to overcome, is not being open and
honest, they are told this at times by the church. My brethren, we ought not to
do these things.
(1397) IN MY FATHERS HOUSE ARE MANY MANSIONS- Yesterday I read an article by an Arab
believer who grew up in a Muslim country. He shared how over the years he has
learned how to dialogue respectively with Muslims and how important it was to
share the Christian faith with respect, I really liked the tone. Jesus said ‘I
have other sheep which are not of this fold, I must gather them too’. In
context he is telling Israel that he too will gather Gentiles into the kingdom.
I also read a verse [?] the other day that spoke to me about leaving the door
open when dialoging with various groups. One of things that has surprised me
since I started blogging is the Arab brothers [Christians] who have contacted
me over the years and have been excited about our site. Many of them are
pastors and are really laying their lives on the line to bring the gospel to
Muslims. I do realize that my stance on natural Israel as well as how the
western world should treat Muslims/Arabs is part of the reason why fellow Arab
believers have been drawn to our site. For the most part I believe the church
should put the gospel of Jesus above all ethnic/political concerns- when
preaching the gospel we need to avoid getting into geopolitical wars or wars in
general! Many believers in Palestine who are Arab face persecution from fellow
countrymen who are Muslim, as well as persecution from Israel. These believers
generally do not get support from believers from the U.S., instead when
American believers go over there to interact, we usually are there to support
natural Israel and to see how well the future ‘temple’ plans are going, and
stuff like that. The Arab believers feel neglected by this attitude, some have
actually said ‘why don’t you care for us, don’t you understand that we have
been persecuted at times by Israel’? They feel confused and rejected when they
read in the bible how Christians should love and care for one another, and then
they see western believers taking sides in natural conflicts. Jesus said his
house had many rooms, the people of God [Gods house] are diverse and come from
many varied backgrounds. I do not hold to the thinking that says ‘all religions
are Gods children’ in a pluralistic sense of all monotheistic faiths have the
same faith. But when dealing with other fellow believers in the world [whether
Arab, Jewish, etc.] we should defend our brothers and sisters and side with
them in times of conflict, by ‘siding with them’ I mean we need to speak out in
support of them and call for justice and help when they are in trouble. I do
not advocate ‘siding with people’ when talking about actual warfare- believers
should not be in the business of siding with any conflict when it includes
killing other people [the sides you take as a citizen of a country are a
different matter, I am speaking here as a citizen of Gods kingdom]. I am
grateful for all my Arab friends and pastors who have been in touch with me
over these past few years, I pray for them regularly and have embraced them as
sort of part of the fellowship of brothers that I regularly reach out to. I do
realize that they also enjoy the level of teaching we do [not that we are that
great, but we do share from a broad range of teaching that many individual
pastors might not be able to access on their own]. I thank God that ‘his house’
has many mansions, that Jesus calls sheep from 'other folds’ that we might not
be familiar with, let’s be open to those from other ethnic backgrounds that
share the same faith in Jesus Christ- they are all our brothers and sisters in
the Lord.
(1398) REV. ZEKE- [pastor from India] Brother, I accidently
deleted your email, if you are reading this, email me again and I’ll put your
email on our global section.
Okay, it’s a rare thing for me to take a ministry off of my
blog roll. Once I put someone on our site I feel it would be irresponsible to
drop them for any minor disagreement, or because they might hold differing
views than my own. For the most part I add other web sites because I feel they
add to the diverse conversation in the global church. Having said this, I
recently deleted the site for Charisma Magazine. I originally put them on
because I was blogging on their site and they eventually removed the blog
section, but I felt it was okay to leave them on anyway. But after a period of
time I just couldn’t keep endorsing ‘the level’ of stuff they teach- in all
good conscience I hit the delete button. The other day I thought I’d give them
a visit, on the main article page they had some sister sharing a vision and on
the heading it said ‘I saw snakes wrapped around [something- I forget]’ and I
just felt bad that a major Christian magazine would do stuff like this. In John
14 Jesus says he’s going away and will send ‘another comforter’ this word
speaks about the Spirit coming, one just like Jesus. The disciples ask him how
he will reveal himself to them, and not to the world. Jesus says if we keep his
commandments and do his will, that the Spirit will manifest and come to us- but
the world cannot see him and they will not benefit from his work. Though many
Christians are divided over ‘Charismatic churches’ yet the need for the work of
the Spirit is vital, I personally believe in the gifts of the Spirit and do not
hold to a cessationist view. Over the years as I have read this chapter I have
been inclined to see the promise of Jesus ‘going away and coming again to
receive us’ as actually referring to the Spirits outpouring at Pentecost. This
does not mean I reject a literal physical return of the Lord at the end of the
age, but in context it seems that Jesus was telling the disciples that he would
‘come again and receive them’ in the sense that the Spirit would complete the
ministry of Jesus by sealing them until the day of redemption [Ephesians].
Jesus said those who hear his word and do his will are promised the presence of
the Spirit; truly God is no respecter of persons. There is a movement in the
church today that appeals to the kingdom call of Jesus, versus trying to convince
people of the truth claims of Christianity- to some degree I like this
emphasis, it appeals to other religions in the sense that we are telling people
‘we are not here to change your culture [and make you accept ours] but we are
here offering you the promise of Jesus, if you believe his words and do his
will he will manifest himself to you’. There actually are some in the Muslim
community who are claiming belief in Jesus [not just the ‘Jesus’ of the Koran]
and yet still consider themselves cultural Muslims, this is certainly
interesting. The point today is we need Gods Spirit desperately, though we have
been guilty at times with confusing the work of the Spirit with people having
visions of snakes! Yet we need the Spirit to work, Jesus said he would manifest
himself to those who are keeping his word- a great promise indeed.
(1400) IF I HADN’T DONE WHAT I HAVE DONE AMONG THEM, WORKS
NO ONE HAS EVER DONE, THEY WOULDN’T BE TO BLAME. BUT THEY SAW THE GOD SIGNS AND
HATED ANYWAY… THEY HATED ME FOR NO GOOD REASON- John 15, message bible.
This is the chapter where Jesus tells us he is the vine and
we are the branches; the father is the main gardener. If we remain-abide in him
we will bring forth fruit, if we do not ‘remain in him’ we are cut off and
burned. In Johns other writings [1st John] he speaks about those who
did not remain in the doctrine of Christ, they went out ‘from us, but were
really not with us’. John was speaking of the Gnostic/Docetist groups that
would reject the incarnation of Jesus; these did not ‘remain in him’. Also what
about the immediate circle of disciples that Jesus was speaking to, did any of
them ‘not remain’? Judas would also reject Christ, and Jesus said he too was
not really a part of them from the start. In the above quote Jesus challenges
the religious leaders of the day by doing the works that he did. The religion
of the day viewed God’s will as religious performance, public praying on the
street corners, fasting ‘to be seen’, their mindset was one of public
performance. Jesus put priority on doing acts of justice, reaching out to the
poor, spending time with the down and out, and also rejecting the ‘crowd
pleasing’ mentality of the day. In John’s gospel his brothers tell him ‘go up
to the public feast and show thyself, no man who does these things secretly
will not eventually go public’ they thought there was something strange about
his unwillingness to ‘go public’. I have often found it strange that we as
believers put such a high priority on ‘public meetings-ministry’ to the point where
we really believe that this is the main part of Christianity. A few years back
I visited/stayed with some brothers in Europe, they ran a Christian community
where they all lived and helped each other out [addicts and stuff]. I spent
about a week with them and it was great, I immediately saw the work as a
legitimate expression of ‘local church’ [Ecclesia] I even defended them to
others who were saying ‘they are not church’. During the week I spent with
them, the main leader of the group was just beginning to rent another building
so they could ‘do church’. I went to a few of the meetings and it was okay. The
point being they kind of felt like the public meetings were ‘really church’ and
the actual community was 'Para church’ a very limited view indeed. The same
thing has happened with many well meaning churches/ministries thru out the
years. Jesus put a priority on things that the religious crowd deemed ‘non
legitimate’ they would ask him ‘where are you getting your authority from, who
gave you this authority’? In today’s jargon it might be said ‘who’s covering
are you under, what ‘local church’ has legitimized you’. We often err, not
knowing the scriptures or the power of God. Jesus put such a high priority on
social justice, reaching out to the poor and needy, speaking out for the widow
and oppressed. This same theme runs thru out the entire teaching of the New
Testament. Very little time is spent on the idea of public meetings/ministry.
Yet we have exalted the idea of church and ministry to the point where we see
public performance as the main thing, that’s what we usually regulate our lives
around. Jesus told the religious crowd that he came and did all the things that
Gods kingdom was really about [helped the poor, raised the dead, etc.] Yet they
found fault with him, they fulfilled the scriptures that said ‘they hated me
for no good reason’ do the things we do have good reasons, or are we just
following the crowd?
(1401) GLENN BECK- Okay, this past week Beck stirred up a
controversy by telling people that if their churches use language like ‘social
justice’ that you should leave the church. Beck showed how many of the liberal
movements of the past, both inside and outside the church, used this language
and also were socialist. Is Beck right to warn people about this? 50-50. In
reality most Christian churches [if not all] have some belief about social
justice, that is doing good, being charitable, etc. You also have strains of
theology that touch on these issues [liberation theology, Rev. Wrights church,
etc.] these see the role of the church in setting up systems that would mediate
‘social justice’ programs thru the state- not all Christians accept this
premise. Overall we as believers should value social justice very highly on the
scale of Christian service and belief. Beck seems to mean well, but the poor
brother seems to be a little unhinged at times [like between 4 pm and 5pm every
day or so]. In John 16 Jesus tells his men ‘a time is coming when those who
kill you will think they are serving God’. Here in is a strange thing; out of
all the commands of God, one of the most important ones is not to kill. But
Jesus says that men are so susceptible to the influence of the world that they
can even be convinced that killing other people is ‘doing God’s will’. Now, if
I were to tell you at a young age ‘little Johnny, you will walk the planet for
a few short years [70-80?] one of the most important things you need to avoid,
more than anything else, is don’t kill other people’ got it- I mean how hard
can this be? Yet Jesus says there will come a time when people think killing
other people is ‘doing God’s will’ Huh? Okay as the year’s role by people all
over the world are born and have been taught some version of this natural law,
often given by their own belief system in God. So you have those in Islamic
countries who eventually are shaped by their nations political causes and a
time comes when they blowup other adherents to their own religion and shout
‘God is great’ as they kill themselves and others with them, they think they
are doing ‘God service’. But you also have little Johnny growing up in the
western world, he attends church as a boy, is taught lessons from the bible,
and thru process of time joins the military. He is a good man, means well, and
is taught that God and country go together. He even remembers attending some
patriotic religious rallies over the years. He gets sent off to Afghanistan and
winds up killing a woman with child. He either mistook her for an enemy
combatant, or maybe she violated a safe zone. Either way, the one main command
above all other commands, the thing that you were always told was the main
thing to never do, you wind up doing. You even think that it is your patriotic
duty to do this, yes you think the doing of this act is not only acceptable,
but in a way it is ‘doing God service’. Now, as an ex Navy person, I support
and believe in our military men and women, and in no way equate the act of a
terrorist with that of our people; but what I am trying to show you is that as
we go through life we can become effected by ideologies that are in conflict to
our base principles, we can even do things that violate our most fundamental
ideals, and be convinced that doing it is from God. When dealing with all types
of social justice issues, we need to put Gods will first and foremost, above
all other things. The message of Gods kingdom often runs contrary to the
nations and governmental systems we espouse. When we confuse the two [whether
the Christian patriot who chooses a career that may involve killing people] or
the radical Muslim who confuses Gods will with the advancing of his political
ideas, we need to re-evaluate our motives and think things thru before we
embrace any world kingdom over Gods kingdom. Beck obviously had a point about
the radical liberation theologians and their mixing of liberal politics with
‘church’, but Gods kingdom is all about social justice. Isaiah prophesied of
the Spirit coming upon Jesus- to carry out social justice!
(1402) THIS IS WHAT I WANT YOU TO DO, ASK THE FATHER FOR
WHATEVER IS IN KEEPING WITH THE THINGS I’VE REVEALED TO YOU; ASK IN MY NAME AND
ACCORDING TO MY WILL AND HE WILL GIVE IT TO YOU. YOU’RE JOY WILL BE LIKE A
RIVER OVERFLOWING IT’S BANKS- Jesus, message bible. In John 16 Jesus says the
father will show us the things of the Son ‘all that the father has is mine, and
he will take of mine and show it unto you’. I have been doing a little teaching
on the nature of the church and how we as believers are affected by the way we
‘see church’. For instance in the bible the terms ‘where do you attend church’
‘I am looking for a church to join’ ‘the tithe belongs to the local church’ all
of these modern ways of viewing church are really not found in scripture. In
the bible the gospel of the kingdom is proclaimed, those in the local
communities who believed were baptized and became openly identified with the
Jesus movement. From that time forward these communities of believers would be
referred to as ‘the church’- they were not looking for a church to join, choosing
between a buffet of ‘meeting places’ in their respective locals, no, they were
actually referred to as the church! Of course it’s fine for believers to meet
in buildings and give money to ‘the church’ and all the contemporary things we
usually associate with church, but a part of the ministry of the Spirit is he
takes what is Jesus’ and shows it unto us; he reveals the nature of the church
to us [the church being the Body of Christ, his Body]. Recently I did some
blogging at a Christianity Today article on Scot McKnight’s critique of Brain
McLaren’s latest book. I Like Scot and have read McLaren. One of the critiques
of Brian by Scot [of a previous book] Is Scot felt like McLaren left out
Ecclesiology while talking Kingdom. While I do not defend Brian’s works [too
much rejection of orthodoxy] yet in this area I think Scot may be confusing
contemporary ideas of church [ecclesiology] with the idea of church in
scripture. For instance, many theologians teach that Jesus really had no
‘ecclesiology’ in his teaching [or very little] and that Jesus preached a
Kingdom message that was different than the church, I think this idea is
wrong/limited. It is in the preaching of the reality of the kingdom of God, and
the people of God actually doing kingdom works, it is in this atmosphere that
true church occurs; people are begin called out of the world unto Christ and
these people are becoming the church. It’s really a matter of fully grasping
the nature of the kingdom alongside the reality of what church means in the
bible. Now, I think modern expressions of church are okay. Much of my criticism
of modern church has a lot to do with losing the real message of Jesus in the
bible and having replaced it with a modern success gospel, but there are some
mega church expressions that are utilizing all the modern means of
communicating while at the same time holding true to biblical teaching. Mark
Driscoll pastors Mars Hill church in Seattle, Mark teaches historic reformed
theology in a contemporary setting. So the reality of the church being much
more than we usually understand, does not mean that every modern expression of
meeting in huge buildings should be condemned. The point today is Jesus wants
to reveal to us much more than we have seen up until this part of the journey.
When we ‘see more’ it usually brings with it adjustments and changes that at
times can be difficult; I want to encourage all of our Pastor/Leaders to be
open to the ministry of the Spirit in the area of him revealing to us the
nature of the church, there are many learned men [Kluck, McKnight, Galli, etc.]
who I think are not fully seeing what the more mature Organic church movement
is really saying, we also need to be careful not to write off the historic
church in one fell swoop- both of these extremes do not help the church in the
long run.
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