Tag: personal comments

Going Crossless

We are a bucket full of nails,

“Whoever does not take up their cross and follow me is not worthy of me.“

Matt. 10:38

“Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.”

Matt. 16:24

We can so easily process our faith to something respectable and somewhat pleasant.  This is a natural tendency. But the cross has a stigma, we might think we can easily defuse it, rendering it as harmless.  Acceptability is a wonderful thing to the modern day believer.  It is easy to turn from all that would make us different, and grasp a crossless faith. It does seem we conform rather than transform.

Effort is being made right now to twist and nullify your belief in Jesus.  It is a force that works on us, relentlessly.  Satan intends to destroy you. He is frightened by the power of the cross, and the spiritual truth it contains. The cross (and resurrection) destroyed the devil’s kingdom of twisted darkness. He will never recover.

Just as Jesus carried the cross He was to die on, you and I are to follow His example.  Jesus had to go to this place of death, and so are we.  My cross is not purely emblematic or abstract symbolism.  It entails a real death.  I pick it up and go to die.  Crucifixion is the end of me, it all comes down to this final point of termination.

Jesus escorts us to the point of death.  This is to become the framework for a sincere discipleship.  The cross, our cross, brings us to an end.  To be worthy of Jesus is to bear it boldly.  The cross develops into our thinking, and its dynamic pounds us into a spiritual reality.  Jesus intensifies the cross, making it the mark of authenticity of a disciple.

We have no options, if we follow it must be with a cross.  There is absolutely no room for us if we approach Him without it.  The cross transmutes our lives, and transmits a signal that we have complied with Jesus’ wishes.  If we advance at all, it will be through the cross only.

We must deny ourselves.  That denial is an intense working. “I do not know the man” was Peter’s statement against Jesus.  If we deny ourselves, we will take a stand against our own selves, turning against ourselves.  We will be pinned to the mat.

Our focus should be on the cross.  We must infuse it into our lives.  A tea bag will flavor an entire cup.  It turns a cup of boiling water into a wonderful beverage.  The cross that belongs to us will have the same effect.  It will make something where there was nothing.

“All heaven is interested in the cross of Christ, all hell terribly afraid of it, while men are the only beings who more or less ignore its meaning.” 

 Oswald Chambers

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Ten Life Principles Worth Knowing

 

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This list was were found floating out on the internet, and although they are a bit secular most of them have corresponding Christian principles.  I’ve added a comment after each.  I hope that you will read them, and hold on to the good.

I’m not sure who the author of this list was. But kudos to them whoever they are.

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1. You will receive a body. You may like it or hate it, but it’s yours to keep for the entire period. (But don’t forget that you are first a spirit, that just happens to have a body.)

2. You will learn lessons. You are enrolled in a full-time informal school called, “life.” (This is called “discipleship.” Welcome!)

3. There are no mistakes, only lessons. Growth is a process of trial, error, and experimentation. The “failed” experiments are as much a part of the process as the experiments that ultimately “work.”  (Consider the life of Peter, the apostle– he was up and down, but always learning. He was loved by the Lord, very, very much.)

4. Lessons are repeated until they are learned. A lesson will be presented to you in various forms until you have learned it. When you have learned it, you can go on to the next lesson. (The Holy Spirit is a most excellent teacher.)

5. Learning lessons does not end. There’s no part of life that doesn’t contain its lessons. If you’re alive, that means there are still lessons to be learned. (Learn to love people is generally what these lessons are about. But remember, there is a life after this one that is vastly more significant.) 

6. “There” is no better a place than “here.” When your “there” has become a “here”, you will simply obtain another “there” that will again look better than “here.”  (Actually, the best place to be is in the center of God’s will.)

7. Other people are merely mirrors of you. You cannot love or hate something about another person unless it reflects to you something you love or hate about yourself.  (Hmmm. It is true that we have a common humanity, and we learn a ton just by observing human behavior.  And people do mirror our character back to us.)

8. What you make of your life is up to you. You have all the tools and resources you need. What you do with them is up to you. The choice is yours. (Perhaps.  But God directs our steps.  He is supremely in control, but will graciously lend you his tools.)

9. Your answers lie within you. The answers to life’s questions lie within you. All you need to do is look, listen, and trust. (Actually, the Bible is pretty comprehensive in this capacity. Read it to be wise; trust it to be sure.)

10. You will forget all this. (Unfortunately, this is all too true.)

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It is God’s Glory, Not Ours

 So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.

 1 Corinthians 10:31, ESV

We are to make distinctions of all that passes by us.  Making the decisions based on value and content and worth is the correct way to go about deciding what is worthwhile.  The radiance and brilliance are not our way of sounding poetic about something.  It is the real core of essential nature.  It’s like watching a doctor perform a biopsy.  They extract a tiny speck of organ tissue with a long needle.  A biopsy will give the physician a real understanding of what is really happening inside.

The Bible tells us ‘taste and see, that God is good’ [tasty].  This is what real faith does, it reaches out and takes a sample.  Often in a big grocery store the management sets up a card table.  A person attends the table, and offers passing customers samples.  Of course, they do this so you will buy this new product.  (Sausage and cheese samples are my favorites.  I generally try to avoid the cole slaw, as a general rule).

I guess God made us humans with an adventurous and inquisitive nature.  We climb mountains, and eat Korean food.  We have this built in curiosity that leaks out all over the place.  Some really need a taste of danger, or to be creative, or competitive.  The point is this– we are created in God’s image.  And only God is majestic enough, and big enough–  to be enough.

We are learning that all our activity, and all our passion is to contribute and build His Glory.  In order to do this we need to amputate our passivity and stretch out to a muscular faith.  Flabby and flaccid discipleship won’t be able to give God any real glory, or give us any real joy.  We were designed and built specifically to give God immense glory.  There is nothing better to do with our lives.

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Call To All Sons

12624 “For it was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering.”

Hebrews 2:10, ESV

“God is the One who made all things, and all things are for his glory. He wanted to have many children share his glory, so he made the One who leads people to salvation perfect through suffering.”

Hebrews 2:10, NCV

There is complexity embedded in this verse. But that shouldn’t stop us from understanding its scope and meaning, yet there is the compelling question.

How did Christ learn obedience through suffering when he was already perfect?

Christ was human and “tempted in all points as we are and yet perfect and without sin,” and thus Christ was sinless.  The humanity of Jesus can be seen throughout the gospels. He hungered, and he got thirsty. We see him very tired, and sleeping in the back of a boat in a storm, which reveals his humanity. However, “He committed no sin, neither was their deceit found in his mouth” (1 Peter 2:22).

Only humans need to learn obedience. And everyone of us have faltered. Yet he didn’t. He had to learn, but He didn’t fail. As a man, He met every issue and every obstacle with a solid and a profound obedience. He learned how to obey, but without any failure, or fault.

In every person’s life, we are challenged to obey. There are so many twists and turns, and each of us has stumbled. It can be quite painful. We are also learning “obedience through our suffering.” It seems our own trials and suffering are the tutors teaching us about our Father, and His kingdom.

This thought, “bringing many sons to glory” is of significant consideration. It reveals the intent and purpose of Jesus coming and doing all of this. He wanted to open the doors for all those who come to salvation. In a direct way, His intention was to become our escort, or safeguard to make a way for us into the Presence.

The words, “many sons,” shows the breadth and width of His work. It is considerable. The idea of “sons” is just as astonishing. We are not slaves, forced to labor in the quarries or mines. We are sons and daughters, His own children. Eternity is too short of time, I suppose, for us to hold and occupy this kind of glory.

“They strengthened the believers. They encouraged them to continue in the faith, reminding them that we must suffer many hardships to enter the Kingdom of God.”

Acts 14:22, NLT

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