Monthly Archives: January 2015

The Gospel In A Nutshell

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THE GOSPEL IN A NUTSHELL

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In His great mercy He has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you who, through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time (1 Peter 1: 3-5).

Peter wasted no time in launching into his message to the believers scattered across Asia Minor. Talk about the gospel in a nutshell! And he did it so well!

These were people with no Bible except perhaps an odd copy of the Old Testament Scriptures if there was a synagogue nearby – and then they would have been denied access to it anyway. It is very unlikely that any of them would have possessed their own copy. They had to rely on what they had been taught and on good memories to boot.

They were surrounded by idolatry, Jewish fanaticism and roving false teachers whose influence would have crowded in on them as well. How were they to survive against such odds? Letters! Their very own Scriptures! Although the apostles didn’t know it at the time, they were writing Scripture. Every precious letter with its message of Jesus and explanations about their faith and how to live it daily in a hostile world was to be supernaturally preserved for the church down the ages and they were the first to read them.

Peter had already made it clear to them that they were much more than sinners saved by grace. Although they might have been nothing in the eyes of the world, they were everything to God. He took a great deal of trouble to rescue them out of the world and He was not about to abandon them through indifference or neglect. Hounded by their enemies though they might be, they were secure in God for time and eternity.

It was a timely message, to be sure. Perhaps some of them would have been tempted to dump this Jesus-thing and go back to their old lives. Had this message not brought them a packet of trouble? Was it worth the suffering? Wouldn’t it be better just to go back to the way they lived before the apostles came and put this heavy on them?

Peter was emphatic. ‘You need to understand what this is all about before you make a rash decision like that. This faith in Jesus is so much bigger than the here and now. You have to take the long look. This is about you and God, and eternity and an inheritance far more wonderful than you can ever imagine. Why would you want to give that up just to dodge a few hardships now?’

Salvation is a God-thing from beginning to end. It was through God’s mercy that they had been given new birth. What did that mean? Their birth in Adam brought with it a natural rebellion and enmity against God. They had to start all over again to be acceptable to God, but there was no way they could do anything to change their sinful nature. God did it, not because He felt sorry for them but because of His mercy. Without His intervention they were doomed. He cancelled their past and gave them a new start through Jesus.

God’s salvation is huge, all-embracing and soaked in His goodness. He didn’t just forgive our sins so that we would no longer be a stench to Him. He drenched us in His kindness. Can you get a hold of that? A living hope! No matter what people do to us because they hate God, they can never extinguish the hope we have that when our physical lives are over here – and they can cut them short if they want to – that’s only the beginning. Jesus’ resurrection guaranteed that.

An inheritance! That’s huge too. If you are heir to your father’s estate, you will only get what he has and what he can give you – and that may not be very much. But to be an heir of God! That’s different. God sums up His will in two words – ‘all things’.

He that overcometh shall inherit all things . . . (Rev.21: 7 – KJV).

What are these ‘all things’? Everything God has promised (Heb. 6:12); His nature (2 Peter 1: 4); the kingdom of heaven (Matt. 5: 3); the earth (Matt. 5:5); everything that Jesus inherits (Rom. 8: 17). What more could we want? The possibilities are overwhelming.

‘So don’t give up when the going gets tough,’ he counselled them. ‘You have too much to lose.’

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

 

Peter, An Apostle

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PETER, AN APOSTLE

Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to God’s elect, exiles scattered throughout the provinces of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia, who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through the sanctifying work of the Spirit, to be obedient to Jesus Christ and sprinkled with His blood: Grace and peace be yours in abundance (1 Peter 1: 1-2).

Who wrote this letter, Peter or Paul? It sounds a lot like Paul, doesn’t it? But it wasn’t Paul; it was Peter, the fisherman.

When we read these letters, we read them as inspired writings rather than as letters written by human beings who must have been in contact with one another and influenced one another in many ways. These men were apostles and leaders in the early church. They had a profound influence on the believers and would have spent time together whenever they could so that they would speak with one voice.

Peter had been with Jesus for more than three years. Paul had his three years in the desert of Arabia, communing and learning the message he was to take to the world from the Holy Spirit whom Jesus promised, would lead him into all truth. They learned from the same Master and taught the same message wherever they went.

To whom did Peter write this letter? To believers scattered throughout Asia Minor, modern-day Turkey. How can one write a letter to people scattered all over the place? Perhaps Peter made many copies and had one of his compatriots drop them off as they travelled from place to place. We can send e-mails anywhere simultaneously simply by adding an address to our list of addressees and pressing ‘send’. In a flash through technology we use but do not understand, our recipients can read our letter within seconds.

Peter’s way of communicating was tedious and took many months to reach his readers but his message was permanent, preserved on material that has survived thousands of years. What happens to our messages on computer? They disappear as fast as they were sent simply by pressing ‘delete’. Unfortunately, we often dismiss God’s word from our minds as quickly as we delete our e-mails from our computers, instead of saving them on the ‘hard drive’ of our hearts.

Peter’s greeting was in itself a short but profound summary of his message to these scattered believers:

Who were they? They were God’s elect, unknown and unnamed people as far as the world was concerned but, as far as God was concerned, known and chosen to belong to Him before the world was even created. From the world’s perspective they were exiles, aliens, rejected by the world, refugees living in foreign lands, not belonging anywhere in this world but, nevertheless, citizens of the heavenly kingdom, their true homeland.

What a contrast! Rejected by the world but belonging to God. Their identity was not rooted in the world’s favour. What did it matter if the world did not want them? They were God’s chosen, chosen by Him and identified with Him. That made them secure for time and eternity. And it was a God-thing from beginning to end. Why? The triune God is involved in their election.

Firstly, God the Father was behind the choice of every individual who made up the elect. They did not happen to be in His kingdom by chance. They did not stumble into it by accident. They were there by the Father’s choice and for a purpose.

Secondly, the Holy Spirit was involved in their election. He made it all happen. He wooed and won the heart of every person who was called ‘elect’. He drew them to Jesus, opened the eyes of their understanding, brought them to faith and set them apart for God.

Thirdly, Jesus was also involved in their election. He was the object of their faith and the reason for their salvation. It was through His blood that they were forgiven, cleansed and made fit to be citizens of God’s kingdom and members of His family. It was for obedience to Him that they were chosen and called. This was ultimately the evidence and the outcome of their election.

If you are a citizen of God’s kingdom, you are also ‘elect’ of God, unknown and unwanted by the world, but belonging to God and set apart for him.

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

 

Finally . . .

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FINALLY . . .

Our dear friend, Luke the doctor, and Demas, send greetings. Give my greetings to the brothers and sisters at Laodicea, and to Nympha and the church at her house. After this letter has been read to you, see that it is also read in the church of the Laodiceans and that you in turn, read the letter from Laodicea. Tell Archippus: ‘See to it that you complete the ministry you have received in the Lord.’

I, Paul, write this greeting in my own hand. Remember my chains. Grace be with you (Col. 4:14-18).

Two more names appear in Paul’s list of greetings that are of interest to us. Luke, the doctor was often Paul’s travelling companion but he seemed to come and go. There were times in his narrative of Paul’s travels that he speaks of ‘we’ as though he were with Paul. Did he travel with him as his personal physician or as a dear friend? We don’t know. Perhaps both. He was a familiar figure who brought comfort to Paul especially in his imprisonment.

The other name is that of Demas. Why is he familiar to us? Because of Paul’s chilling words to Timothy from his final imprisonment in Rome:

Do your best to come to me quickly, for Demas, because he has loved this world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica (2 Tim. 4: 9).

In the previous verses, Paul spoke of John Mark who had been a deserter but had returned and had become helpful to him (Only Luke is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, because he is helpful to me in my ministry (2 Timothy 4: 11). Demas was also a deserter but there is no record of his ever returning. John Mark, the disappointment had become John Mark the helpful. Demas, once helpful, was now useless because he had chosen the world.

‘Demas . . . he has loved this world’, five little words but the implications are huge. What is the problem with loving the world? God so loved the world that He gave His only Son.

Demas loved the world too, but there was something sinister in Paul’s lament because it was an expression of sorrow for his desertion to the world, not of commendation for his ministry to the world.

Apostle John was aware of the danger of loving the world in the way that Demas loved the world.

Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in him. For everything in the world – the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but whoever does the will of God lives forever (1 John 2:15-17).

Loving the world as Demas did, implies identifying with the evil world system and fully participating in all of its evil ways. To love the world in this way is to negate what Jesus did for us through His death.

He has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son He loves (Col. 1: 13).

According to Jesus, we are in the world but not of the world. We still live in the world but we are not part of its rebellious attitudes and activities. We are here for a different reason. As Jesus was in the world, so are we – representing the Father and calling His lost sons and daughters to come home.

If we love the world as Demas loved the world, we have lost our perspective. The problem with the world as it is now is that it is transient and so are our earthly lives. The world will not remain forever in its present state. Everything in it that is contrary to God’s perfect will is destined to be destroyed by fire. Those who are of the world, participating in its rebellion and enjoying its sin, will go with it into eternal judgment.

Thus Paul’s grief was very real because he knew the implications of Demas’s desertion. He has stepped backwards from eternal life to eternal death and there was no going back.

It is impossible for those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, who have shared in the Holy Spirit, who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the coming age and who have fallen away, to be brought back to repentance. To their loss they are crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting Him to public disgrace (Heb. 6: 3-6).

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

 

Epaphras – Faithful Prayer Warrior

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EPAPHRAS – FAITHFUL PRAYER WARRIOR

Epaphras, who is one of you and a servant of Christ Jesus, sends greetings. He is always wrestling in prayer for you, that you may stand firm in all the will of God, mature and fully assured. I vouch for him that he is always working for hard for you and for those in Laodicea and Hierapolis (Col. 4: 12-13).

Epaphras – this is the second time his name was mentioned in Paul’s letter to the Colossians. Who was this man?

Paul described him as a ‘dear fellow servant’ and a ‘faithful minister of Christ on our behalf.’ Paul took his responsibility to fulfil his commission so seriously that he regarded Epaphras’s ministry in Colossae as being carried out on his behalf. Paul was only one man. It was impossible for him to take the message of Christ to every city, town and village in the Roman Empire. Therefore, every person who shared the gospel of Jesus with others did it for him – being an extension of his ministry wherever they went.

Epaphras was Paul’s mouthpiece in Colossae and, through his faithful witness, a church was born there. But Paul still regarded it his responsibility to teach the people and warn them not to fall for the heresy of the Gnostics which threatened to lure them away from their pure faith in Christ.

As a faithful minister to them, Epaphras went to Paul in Rome when the alarm bells began to ring. He needed Paul’s understanding of the gospel and his ability to explain it clearly to the church to help him deal with this threat among his beloved church family members.

Epaphras took his role as leader so seriously that he also worked hard in his prayer closet for them. He was neither prepared to allow error to steal them away from Christ, nor would he allow them to fall away through the fear of persecution. These two threats were very real in the infant church. They were a small band of vulnerable people who were at the mercy of ruthless opponents of Jesus and His message from two quarters – the unbelieving Jews and the Roman government.

Both Paul and Epaphras had no means of protecting these people except through prayer and to prayer they turned to enlist the aid of the greatest power on earth. Night and day Paul prayed for the churches all over the empire, and night and day Epaphras prayed for the Colossians. Paul described his prayer as ‘wrestling’. With whom was he wrestling? Surely not with God because God was on his side.

Epaphras understood that the enemy of their souls was a liar. The devil would use every trick in the book to deceive believers and to lure them away from faith in Jesus when their circumstances seemed as though He had abandoned them. Fear was the great enemy of faith and Epaphras knew how easily they could be overcome by fear.

He was also aware of another equally dangerous enemy – the enemy within. The old sinful nature was always lurking in the shadows, waiting to trip them up in unguarded moments. Through guilt and shame, they might shrink from the Father who loved them and, instead of running to Him for pardon and reconciliation when they fell into temptation, they might pull away and become reabsorbed into the world system which pandered to their evil desires.

And so, the faithful prayer warrior wrestled in prayer, building a wall of protection around and within his people through his intercession for them. It was not that he could add anything to what Jesus has done on the cross. Jesus has unmasked and defeated the devil and rendered him powerless to deceive them but he was still around, trying to obscure the truth with his lies.

What did Epaphras pray? Did he ask God to keep them safe from their persecutors? No! Was he concerned about their earthly circumstances? No! Did he ask God to keep them from sickness and trouble? No! What was his greatest desire for them? Paul spelt it out so that his readers – and that includes us – would know what was most important for them and for us. To the Colossians he wrote, ‘that you may stand firm in all the will of God, mature and fully assured.’

Above all the earthly comforts and conveniences they craved, one thing mattered above everything else, that they would be so secure in God, who He is and who they were in Him that nothing would be able to lure them away from dependence upon and obedience to Him. As for them, so with us also.

Imagine how different the church of the Lord Jesus Christ would be if, firstly, its leaders, instead of seeking fame and fortune for themselves, would wrestle in prayer for its members. Secondly, if their prayers were answered, the church would be a body of people standing firm in all the will of God, mature and fully assured. What then?

We need many an ‘Epaphras’ to wrestle in prayer before the church ever becomes an instrument of transformation in a messed up world.

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

 

Fellow Workers

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FELLOW WORKERS

My fellow prisoner, Aristarchus, sends you his greetings, as does Mark, the cousin of Barnabas. (You have received instructions about him; if he comes, welcome him). Jesus, who is called Justus, also sends greetings. These are the only Jews among my co-workers for the kingdom of God, and they have proved a comfort to me (Col. 4: 10-11)

Aristarchus, Mark and Justus – only three Jews among the many people that Paul had won to Christ! It’s no wonder Paul said that they were a comfort to him! He grieved for his own people because they were stubborn in their unbelief and in their rejection of Jesus Christ as their Messiah. Yet Paul was comforted by the few Jews who had believed, and were ready to suffer for Christ as Aristarchus proved by being in prison alongside Paul for his faith in Jesus.

One of the names among the Jewish believers Paul mentioned is of special interest. At the beginning of his second missionary journey, Paul had a fall-out with Barnabas over John Mark because Mark had deserted them after only a short time as a fellow traveller on their first missionary journey.  What was the issue? Mark was Barnabas’s cousin. It was Barnabas who decided to take him along with them after they were appointed by the Holy Spirit to take the gospel to the world.

Was this another ‘Abraham and Lot’ situation? God told Abraham to leave his homeland and his family and go to the land He would show him. Abraham left his home, but he took his nephew, Lot, with him which proved to be a wrong move. Lot cause him many problems in the land of Canaan which he would have avoided had he only obeyed God fully.

The Holy Spirit chose Paul and Barnabas for missionary work, which did not include Mark. Barnabas decided to take him along – a decision which later resulted in a split between them because of Mark’s desertion when they left the island of Cyprus. Paul was unwilling to risk taking him along again (Acts 15; 36-40); they had a sharp disagreement and they parted company.

Yet in this letter Paul singled Mark out for special mention. Firstly, he was among the Jewish believers who were with Paul at the time of his writing, and who brought comfort to him in his imprisonment. Secondly, it seems that the rift had been healed between Mark and Paul, and that John Mark had become a faithful believer instead of a deserter.

Perhaps Barnabas’s confidence in Mark had influenced him to put his roots down into Christ. Barnabas was that kind of a man. After Paul’s conversion, it was Barnabas who gave him the benefit of the doubt when the apostles in Jerusalem were suspicious of him. After all, was he not the arch-persecutor of the believers, and the reason many of them had suffered and even died for their faith in Jesus?

Barnabas was a generous man. He vouched for Paul when the others would have nothing to do with him and his confidence in him was rewarded. Paul turned out to be what Barnabas expected – a true and faithful man of God.

Now Paul speaks of Mark with warmth as one of those who brought him comfort. Was it Barnabas’s acceptance of Mark in spite of his failure that influenced Paul to give him another chance? With Barnabas as his example, at some point Paul reconciled with both Barnabas and Mark and also gave Mark a second chance – and he was not disappointed.

We can learn a valuable lesson from this incident. Paul was ready to dump Mark because of his failure but Barnabas was not. It was Barnabas’s generous attitude, not Paul’s judgmental behaviour, which won Mark and brought him back to become a dear brother to Paul and faithful servant of Jesus.

What if Barnabas had also judged and rejected him? What would have become of him? Would he have ever been written in God’s story as a Jewish believer who brought comfort to Paul and who was to be welcomed by the church in Colossae? I don’t think so!

It pays to be generous is our love for and confidence in our fellow believers because we never know, in the end, what a difference it might make to someone who has taken a wrong turn and needs to be brought back.

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.