Category: Bible

Making It All Real

 

“[The LORD Is My Fortress] I live under the protection of God Most High and stay in the shadow of God All-Powerful.”

 Psalm 91:1 CEV

We must grasp this down deep.  He shelters us in a place that no one can reach.  He is a rock of a fortress, and evil will never penetrate him.  Our position is wonderful, and we rejoice in it, and yet a shield has been put into place that will never waver.  We are the “apple of his eye” and we stand very much protected.

The entirety of Psalm 91 is a confidence builder.  But it does so without us grasping truths that are vague or confusing.  It is a Psalm that states reality, without any anesthesia.  When we truly read it, the natural tendency is to be overwhelmed or confused by it.  But that isn’t its real purpose. It is there to communicate “security” in every perspective of life.  I am “safe” and nothing will ever change that.

As we shelter ourselves into his presence, we will end up drawing his “life” directly into our life.  Our blood now flows with his.  Our life, has been transfused or mixed with his.  He has gone the extra mile to make us one with him.  We are “blood brothers.”

Try as you may, you will not ever shake yourself free of this.  If you truly believe in Him, he goes ahead and puts his mark or seal on you.  At this point, you might as well surrender.  You have become his, and he will most definitely take control.

Psalm 91 points out so many issues.  Reading it, we find it takes us to a place where we trust him far beyond anything else.  He begins to comfort us, He soothes us into the very place, that we start bringing a grace that is quite exceptional.

How You Make it Work

Therefore if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any common sharing in the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, 2 then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and of one mind. 3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves

Philippians 2:1-3

 

Being connected to Jesus sets us up for a way so much more then we thought.  Encouragement comes from being comforted.  It makes us stand back in amazement.  We are brought to this wonderful place, and personal growth begins to show exceptional results. 

There are a lot of ‘anys’ that are imbedded in these verses.  They take us to a point of extracting something of eternal value and worth, and then seeing it translated into our lives.  I certainly couldn’t come up with this on my own.

We grab this basic fact, we are just devoid of anything of real value.  We simply do not have the roots that will sink down into these wonderful things.  Our connection into Him however, puts us into a completely different place.  We discover we have this incredible ability from drawing out life into our beings.  He sets us up so we extract ‘life’ from our silly, feeble efforts.

We draw so much from the presence of Jesus.  When it’s hooked in, our ‘abundance meter’ kicks us up several notches.  Paul is asking us to draw out significant things from our contact with these things of wonder.  Verse 2 develops for us a sense of unity with our brothers and sisters.  Truth had better deal with us in this way. 

My newfound faith means I must connect with others in a new and a powerfully exceptional basis.  The Gospel had better effect me in this capacity, because, whether we know it or not, faith just doesn’t connect me with God– it connects me to His people.

‘One love, and one spirit and one mind’.  The unity that is to be developed springs from a knowledge of who we really are spiritually.  There is an idea of ‘commonness’, that suggests that we all have a direct unity with each other.  We all are drawing from the same source.  Just the very idea of this should, and could break down barriers and walls that exist.  It seems to be a new awareness of having all our extension cords using all the same electricity.  There is never any shortage, but we do need to consent to being hooked up to the same root.

This realization of the dramatic unity of Christ’s work should bring us to a deepness of the Spirit that has eluded us for generations.  Quite simply, He is the well spring that we all draw from.  Deep down, He is who we connect to, our roots extend to Him.  Baptist, Assembly of God, Anglican, Lutheran, Pentecostal, and Roman Catholic and more.  The big bunch of us have plunged our roots into Jesus.  We all draw from Him, and He imparts to us life that lasts forever.

Humility has become the virtual currency of the Kingdom.  We are issued as much as we need.  But we must act with what we take.  Our brokenness over our self (and our arrogance) must drive us to a gentleness with each other.  We simply don’t have the resources and the intellect to make the decisions that we have been making.  Humility is the wonderful key that will open the doors to the King’s castle.  If you have it, you get in.  But without it, you will go nowhere.

A Gospel That Just May Confuse Us

 

My people have been lost sheep.
      Their shepherds have led them astray
      and turned them loose in the mountains.
   They have lost their way
      and can’t remember how to get back to the sheepfold.                                                  

                                                                                      Jer. 50:6

 

Christians who wander away, or led away away, is a frequent issue with the Lord.  It’s hard to watch someone you love go in a way that brings them pain and destruction.  It hurts doubly when they get turned in the wrong direction.  Jeremiah suggests that there is a personal disobedience as well as a pastoral influence from a shepherd.

Influence from confused shepherds runs rampant through the flock of the Church.  Voices speak and men posture themselves to lure the sheep.  Programs are always percolating and brought out at an opportune time to develop and maintain a momentum and to give the sense of direction and purpose.  This sounds confusing but its not.

The prophet sees and perceives.  There is grief and pain in his words.  He witnesses of a coming judgement.  In our time, the necessity of being ‘pastored‘ has been a less of an issue because of the Holy Spirit’s contact with the believer.  We have the Spirit and His presence.  Now we can turn towards a superintending understanding of the functioning of the Holy Spirit.  But the Holy Spirit doesn’t need our pathetic attempts at pointing out our crudeness and foolishness at the situation.

Jesus Christ loves us, and comes at us through the self-generated issues that could move us to a less then a desirable condition.  But our “pastor” is Jesus, He pastors us through our confusion and sin.  His heart is looking to us.  We are to come to Him, not through a man, but through the presence of God, that envelopes us and adjusts our understanding.

We cannot pretend anymore that our issues of redemption and healing can be understood through anyone else but through the direction of our Lord except Jesus. We do not think that our intervention of a pastor, or healer will bring us any closer.  We connect through Jesus.  He has made himself the only connection of God and myself.

We dare not trust ourselves when it comes at us through so much.  He heals and strengthens through His active and present awareness of us.  We must turn from ‘deceptive noise’ and grab ahold of the promises of an authoritative voice. He rules over us with authority, and a loving voice of guidance.  He comes to us in a very real and definite way.  For He is “one on one” to us in a real recognition to us in our personal connection to the Father.

This needs to become our way that we connect.  We rest in His plan.  Nothing else will placate.  Jesus advances Himself to becoming our Lord and Saviour. We turn to Him to save us, and no one else.

A Question About Discernment and Discipline

Question: 

“What if the “desire to excel” isn’t the motivation in allowing sinners into the church? We invite our unsaved friends (worldlings) to church and hope they repent. Sometimes that takes a long time! Is this intervening or being missional? I understand your point that Believers aren’t to live in continual sin but am foggy about what we do with the sin saturated culture around us. Do we draw away or let them draw near?”

My Response:

“Great question/comment.  Jesus made it clear, with the salt & light analogy that we will be distinctive and visible. We need to learn to accentuate and use that distinctiveness, with talent and forethought. All available effort should be used.

The issue of believers in habitual, continual sin should be approached as ‘church discipline’. This falls on people who we call pastors and elders. 1 Cor. 5 gives this oversight a template to follow. It is a sticky thing to judge someone. When we have to, we don’t want to. (Unless the person is a ‘control freak’.)

The issue of sin in the church is interesting. To have water outside a boat is a good thing, but to have water in the boat is decidedly worse. We are to preserve our distinctiveness, without diminishing our witness. It’s like we are a flock of lambs living in a pigpen. By their very nature the are different. One has a sheep nature, the other a pig’s. There will be at times confusion. But the sheep don’t belong.

To sum it up, there is church discipline for believers, that really needs to be in place. But we are missional people. The world is very much like a pigpen. But I say, let them come in and let the Holy Spirit touch them.”

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This was a recent post and follow-up comment for “Through the Sheep Dip”, posted on September 28, 2010.  The link is located at:  https://brokenbelievers.com/2010/09/28/through-the-sheep-dip/