Monthly Archives: May 2022

AN INFALLIBLE BANKING SYSTEM

Christian Life, ,

AN INFALLIBLE BANKING SYSTEM

Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven where moth and rust do not destroy and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where you treasure is, there your heart will be also. (Matt. 6: 19-21)

Being generous is a way of making deposits in a heavenly “bank account” – not literal, of course, but ensuring that we are in on God’s economic system by sharing our resources with others. It is a faith partnership with Him built on trust and obedience. God works by giving back to us what we give away. In this way He gets the credit and we get the blessing!

There is no guarantee that our money is safe in an earthly bank or investment. We are subject to the economics of our country and of the world, and the unscrupulous people who manipulate it for their own ends. The only place where God guarantees a safe deposit and a theft-proof return is in the hands of the needy because He underwrites every investment we make.

Our hearts will always follow our treasure. If the bank in which we have invested our money crashed, we would be devastated, but not if it is a bank in which we have made no deposit. Similarly, if we have invested in a heavenly “bank account”, we will have a great interest and commitment to the place where we have put our money for safe-keeping.

Jesus’s counsel to develop an eye of light means to change our focus. The focus of the pagan is on looking after his own needs. Our focus must be on bringing God’s kingdom here by doing His will. He promised to take care of the rest.

So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well. (Matt. 6: 31-33)

When we do what we can to bring God’s rule into our environment, God does what He has pledged to do – He takes care of our physical needs. This comes with the package. It’s as simple as that.

Jesus did not only instruct us to give in order to get in on God’s supply. He also said that the measure we use will determine the measure of God’s supply to us. God works reciprocally with everything. The measure we use to judge others will be the measure used against us. The measure of the mercy we show to others is the measure of mercy we will receive from God. If we refuse to forgive others, God will not forgive us. The measure we use to bless others will be the measure God uses to supply our needs. God is fair. His principle is:

So, in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you. This sums up the Law and the Prophets. (Matt. 7: 12)

Generosity is not about how little we can give to get by, but how much we can give to reflect the heart of God. God does everything in abundance. How many seeds would it take to grow an apple tree? Just one! How many seeds are there in all the apples on one tree? Many hundreds! Just one apple can produce a whole orchard of apple trees. God is generous!

Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. (Luke 6: 38)

Jesus was interested in how, why, and what people put into the offering boxes. He condemned the Pharisees for giving to be noticed, but He was not only watching them. He was also watching someone else – a poor widow who unobtrusively dropped her insignificant offering into the box. Just as much as He read the hearts of the Pharisees, He read her heart.

Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts. But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a fraction of a penny. Calling His disciples, Jesus said, ‘I tell you the truth, this poor woman has put more into the treasury than all the others. They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything – all she had to live on.’ (Mark 12: 41-44)

Jesus, aren’t you being a bit insensitive? Didn’t you say that the left hand should not know what the right hand is doing? Jesus saw something different in the heart of the widow woman. He saw obedience because God said that she must give. He also saw faith because she trusted God to meet her needs, otherwise she would not have given her last resource away. She got what she deserved, a commendation from the mouth of Jesus Himself and, most probably a return on her sacrifice in far greater abundance than what she gave away.

So, in which bank are you depositing your money?

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

MONEY – THE OVERFLOW OF THE HEART

Christian Life, ,

MONEY – THE OVERFLOW OF THE HEART

0 “Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much. 11 So if you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with true riches? 12 And if you have not been trustworthy with someone else’s property, who will give you property of your own?
13 “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.” Luke 16:10-13

Money! Strange, isn’t it, that Jesus spoke more about money and possessions and His disciples’ attitude to them than He did about the subjects we would have thought important to Him as His followers – “spiritual” things like faith and love and prayer. Why did He have so much to say about money? I think He had a good idea about what drives the world and what controls the hearts of people, then. as it does now. Perhaps the problem is not so much money as the love of money which, said Paul, is the root of all kinds of evil.

As disciples of Jesus, we need to have the correct attitude towards our money which arises, first from what is central in our lives; either our love-relationship to God as our Father and the trust that flows from that love, or our doubts and fears about Him which cause us to trust the money we can see rather than the God we can’t see. We become pre-occupied with the things that the pagans run after when we are unsure about our heavenly Father’s trustworthiness towards us as His children.

Consider this chiasm to which we have already referred:

A   No one can serve two masters.

     B   Either he will hate the one and

           C   Love the other, or

           C’  He will be devoted to one and

     B’   Despise the other.           

A’  You cannot serve both God and Money.

(Matt. 6: 24).        

Either money or God will occupy our affection – not both and. Jesus was adamant. It’s not primarily about who or what we serve. It’s about who or what we love. We cannot –it is impossible to – serve God and money.  

Before we can consider the ramifications of our attitude towards money and the way we use it, we must get this one thing straight. Either we love God, or we don’t. Either we trust Him as our heavenly Father, or we don’t. There is no middle road. Our priority love for God or money will direct everything we do with the resources we have been given.

We also need to have the correct disposition. The part that money plays in our lives is determined by our basic disposition. The godless person is essentially selfish and self-serving. He does not recognise the goodness and grace of God in the world around him. He is self-absorbed and cannot see beyond the end of his nose.  His eyes look inward, not outward and he concentrates only on his own wants and needs. In Hebrew thought, this was called “the evil eye” which was diagnosed by its attitude towards money and possessions.

The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If, then, the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness! (Matt. 6: 22-23)

Jesus has rescued us from the dominion (control) of selfishness and greed (darkness) and transferred us into the realm of God’s rule which is generous and full of mercy (the kingdom of light – Col. 1: 13-14). He has given us a new disposition – “the eye of light”.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come. (2 Cor. 5: 17)

The ”eye of light” can see beyond its own needs to the needs of others. It recognises God’s goodness in its own life and participates in His goodness by sharing it with others. It understands that to give is the way to enter the flow of God’s goodness. It builds and strengthens the disposition of light.

Jesus taught His disciples that God does not simply meet our needs when we ask Him. He has put in place a system which ensures that we show the world around us what He is like by being generous to others. God’s resources flow back to us when we use our resources to bless others.

Like our mouths, the way we handle our money is a mirror of our hearts.

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

BOLDNESS OR PRESUMPTION?

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BOLDNESS OR PRESUMPTION?

4 Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. 15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are —yet he did not sin. 16 Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. Hebrews 4:14-16

We cannot conclude our discussion on attitudes without dealing with boldness. What do we mean by boldness? Is it legitimate to be bold in our approach to God in prayer?

First of all, we must distinguish between boldness and presumption. What is the difference and on what are they based? The presumption is based on personal expectations; boldness is based on the character and promises of God. Presumption makes demands because of what I want; boldness is the expression of my confidence in God because of what He has made known and what He wants.

There is no better example in Scripture of a bold prayer than that of Moses. The children of Israel had hardly received God’s covenant at Mount Sinai when they broke it. They demanded a golden calf idol from Aaron so that they could worship it while they waited for Moses to return from the mountain. Despite God’s express command that they should not worship idols, they disregarded Him and launched into an orgy of idolatrous worship at the base of the mountain while Moses was with God receiving His written instructions (Ex. 32: 1-6)

God was enraged and Moses was heartbroken. God threatened to wipe out the entire Israelite nation and start afresh with him (Ex. 32: 7-10). Moses entreated Him not to do it because of His covenant with Abraham – and God relented! (Ex. 32:11-14). Then Moses returned to the camp to find out for himself what was going on. He was furious when he witnessed the extent of their disobedience. He smashed the tablets of stone and called for backup. When the Levites stood with him, he ordered them to kill the renegades. Three thousand people died in the slaughter.

Moses returned to God on the mountain. He knew that the people had broken the covenant and were now subject to the consequences of disobedience. God was no longer under obligation to honour His side of the deal. The outcome for God’s people was unthinkable. He was no longer their God. He refused to go with them (Ex. 33: 2-3).  He would abandon them in the desert because they had rejected His authority over them. They would no longer have His presence and protection. 

Moses got very personal and very bold with God. First, he dug in his heels and insisted, “If you don’t go with us, I’m going nowhere.” (Ex. 33: 12-16). God relented and promised to go with him. It was Moses who pleased God, not his people. It was on these grounds that God relented and promised to continue accompanying them on their journey.

Then Moses, emboldened by God’s response, took his entreaty a step further. “God, since I have found favour with you and you are pleased with me, show me your glory.” (Ex. 33: 18). In an earlier chapter, we learned that kabod means “weight” or “splendour” – that part of God’s character that is the weightiest or most important. Moses was pushing God to reveal something in His character to which he could appeal. He wanted God to renew the covenant with His people so that Moses would have the security of God’s legally binding agreement with them.

God agreed to tell Moses His name – a declaration of His character, and especially that part of His character that was the most prominent and significant in Him – the heaviest part of who He was. This is what He promised:

I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the LORD, in your presence. I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. (Ex. 33: 19)

Did you get that? God declared Himself to be the very thing Moses wanted Him to be – merciful and compassionate towards His people.

On the following day, Moses presented himself on the mountain again with another two tablets of stone. God hid him in the cleft of a rock and passed by, proclaiming:

The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger and abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin . . .  (Ex. 34:6)

It almost as though Moses said to God, “I’ve got you now!” From His own mouth, God had proclaimed His mercy, compassion and love, and His willingness to forgive sin. On those grounds, Moses entreated God to renew the covenant with His people –

Moses bowed to the ground at once and worshipped. ‘O LORD, if I have found favour in your eyes,’ he said, ‘then let the LORD go with us. Although this is a stiff-necked people, forgive our wickedness and our sin, and take us as your inheritance.’ (Ex. 34: 8-9)

and God reciprocated:

Then the LORD said, ‘I am making a covenant with you . . .’ (Ex. 34: 10)

On what grounds could Moses act with such boldness? He had the reassurance from God’s own mouth that He was gracious, merciful, and forgiving. Moses was treading on solid ground because he stood on God’s character and His word.

Jesus Himself invited and applauded boldness. In the hubbub of the people milling around Him, He heard the cry of a blind man and called him. What did he hear?

When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to shout, ‘Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me!’ . . . Jesus stopped and said, ‘Call him.’ . . . ‘What do you want me to do for you?’ Jesus asked him. ‘The blind man said, ‘Rabbi, I want to see. ‘Go,’ said Jesus, ‘your faith has healed you.’ Immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus along the road. (Mark 10: 47; 49a; 51-52)

Boldness is an appeal to the mercy of God. Jesus never ignored a cry for mercy because mercy is who He is. The weight of His glory is revealed in his mercy in this life and will be in a radiance upon which no human eyes can gaze in the life to come. It is only in the life to come that we shall be able to see Him in all the beauty of His glory.

Prayer! Our connection with the Father and the greatest privilege on earth – not to whine and complain and expect God to wait on us like a servant, but to wait on God, to love and be loved, to listen and learn and to obey so that we can get in on what God is doing on the earth to restore everything that is broken and put His rule of righteousness and peace in place.  It starts with us when we are willing to trust and obey Him, and spreads to the world around us wherever the influence of the good news of God’s reign will infiltrate.

Our confidence rests securely in what God has revealed of Himself. We can persevere with humility, boldness, and faith because we stand on the solid ground of His character and His promises. Anything else is presumption and will not hold up in His presence. 

When everything that can be written and can be said about prayer is written and said, prayer is not so much about getting things done, or getting what we want from God as it is about being intimate with God; about getting to know the Father and allowing the Father to know us.

“The most important thing that ever happens in prayer is letting ourselves be loved by God.

                 Be still and know that I am God. (Psa. 46: 10)

“It’s like slipping into a tub of hot water and letting God’s love wash over us, enfold us. Prayer is like sunbathing. When you spend a lot of time in the sun, people notice. They say, “You’ve been to the beach.” You look like you’ve been out in the sun because you’ve got a tan. Prayer – or bathing in the Son of God (Son bathing!) – makes you look different. The awareness of being loved brings a touch of lightness and a tint of brightness, and sometimes, for no apparent reason, a smile plays at the corner of your mouth. Through prayer, you not only know God’s love, but you also realise it; you are in conscious communion with it.”

(Brennan Manning – The Relentless Tenderness of Jesus – ©1986, 2004, Fleming H Revell, Grand Rapids, MI).

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

PRAYER AND OBEDIENCE

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PRAYER AND OBEDIENCE

This leads to our fourth important attitude towards God as we engage with Him in prayer – obedience. God rates obedience above everything else because obedience encompasses all the other right attitudes we need to have towards Him. Obedience is the ultimate evidence of our holy fear of the Lord. Again Jesus is our model.

During the days of Jesus’ life on earth, He offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save Him from death, and He was heard because of His reverent submission. Although He was a son, He learned obedience from what He suffered and, once made perfect, He became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey Him. (Heb. 5: 7-9)

I think this is the one we struggle with the most. Why? Is it because we connect obedience with understanding? Before we act in response to God’s instructions, we demand to know why. We will trust God and do what He requires of us if we know that it makes sense and will turn out right in the end.

Abraham was known as the friend of God. He did not respond to God’s command in that way. What God asked him to do made no sense to him at all, but he obeyed anyway. “Go and burn you son on an altar to me!” How crazy was that, especially when the son he was to sacrifice was the one who was born to an elderly and barren couple after twenty-five years of waiting! “God, do you know what you are asking? Do you know what you are doing?”

Obedience is the mark of one who truly fears God. Abraham obeyed and went without hesitation, willing to obey God to the last drop of Isaac’s blood because he knew what it meant to fear God, a holy fear because he knew God and he trusted Him because he knew that God knew what He was doing and why.

God told Jesus to give Himself over to the religious leaders to torture and crucify. Really? “God, this is your Messiah, your Son. Do you know what you are asking of Him? Do you know what you are doing? This surely has no good in it for Him. What is the point of having Him killed? A dead Son will be of no use to you.” That’s how we humans reason. God is not under any obligation to explain. The reasons may only become clear later when we have done what He asked us to do.

There is one man in the Bible who was given the honour of the title “A man after my own heart.” Imagine that! Despite the many theories preachers put forward about the reason for this honour, the Bible gives us God’s take on it.

He testified concerning him: ‘I have found David, son of Jesse a man after my own heart; he will do everything I want him to do.’ (Acts 13: 22b)

Was David a perfect man? Far from it! He messed up on more than one occasion, but at those times when “he enquired of the Lord,” as he so often did when he needed help from God, he did what God told him to do and he prevailed. He became the greatest of all the kings of Israel and the model of a godly king for both the southern and northern kingdoms.

Despite his failures, David adored God. He longed after Him. He gazed on His beauty in the creation around him and in the tabernacle where he went to worship. God filled David’s horizon; He was his rock; his shelter, his source and his everything. He sang about Him; he worshipped Him; he danced before Him; he celebrated Him; he even complained and mourned over Him when God seemed far away and non-responsive to him, but he never gave up on Him or put Him out of his mind for any longer than a moment.

“A man after my own heart!” That surely fitted David as the one Old Covenant, ordinary, sinful human being who was “stuck” on God, and God loved it! With his limited vision and experience before the cross event, David was just like Jesus. He could not get enough of God.

How much more should we, who have the mercy of God right in our faces, and every opportunity with the Holy Spirit within us, to become like our rabbi, be stuck on God. What greater privilege is there than to do His will and to see Him kingdom come, to deliver people from bondage to sin and to give them brand new lives under His rule?

What if we really feared the Lord because we knew Him and trusted Him? Would we, like the great men of the Bible, be willing to obey Him promptly and without question because we are sure that He would ask nothing of us that were not for our good or His glory?

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

FAITH AND PERSEVERANCE

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FAITH AND PERSEVERANCE

And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him. Hebrews 11:6

If humility is the basis of our approach to God, without faith and perseverance, prayer will achieve nothing. Unlike the pagans, who “pray” to get what they want, God’s children draw near to Him because they are family, and family members are held together by the bonds of love and trust. Children look to their Father because they trust Him. They know Him and they are confident that He will always do what is best for them. They don’t give up because they know that He will keep His promises to them.

Faith is a non-negotiable attitude in our interaction with this God through prayer. Our entire lives as disciples of Jesus are based on confidence in a God we cannot see with our human eyes or hear with our human ears, but we are convinced is real. Jesus stated very simply:

Have faith in God. (Mark 11:22)

Who is this God in whom we are to have faith? If we were to follow the Pharisees’ interpretation of God, we would not have much to go on. We would have to entrust ourselves to a God who is always on the lookout for violations of His commandments. We would be cowering under the weight of our guilt. We would be working very hard to earn His favour by nit-picking over every little rule and regulation. Despite all that, we would still be more focused on our efforts to satisfy Him than on His mercy and grace towards us. We would have more faith in ourselves than in Him. But….

Without faith, it is impossible to please God because anyone who comes to Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him. (Heb.11: 6)

The bottom line is “Who is the God in whom we must have faith?” If our confidence is not rooted in the one true God whom Jesus came to reveal, we have nothing because no other god exists. The Pharisees’ god and every other god are inventions of human imagination. We can see and know who the real God is when we gaze at Jesus because He is the perfect replica and representation of the Father.

The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth . . . No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father’s side, has made Him known. (John 1: 14; 8)

Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father?’ Don’t you believe that I am?

I have revealed you to those you gave me out of the world. (John 17: 6a)

The Scriptures give us overwhelming evidence, both from the mouth of Jesus and from His witnesses, that He is a true and accurate representative of the Father.

Paul wrote:

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. (Col. 1:15),

and the writer to the Hebrews echoed:

The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of His being . . . (Heb. 1: 3a)

This is the God in whom we must have faith, not some being of our own creation. Jesus modelled faith in God. He did not question the Father’s intentions or His instructions because He knew Him. He had a strong and unbreakable link with the Father because He had faith in who He is, and how reliable He is.

As Jesus’s disciples, we are to follow our rabbi, entrusting ourselves to the Father as unquestioningly as He did, relying on Him not just to do what we ask, but relying on Him, full stop, no matter what, because He is God, and we are not.

Another parable illustrates the attitude of perseverance.

Then Jesus told His disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and never give up. (Luke 18: 1)

What do you suppose He meant by “always pray” and “never give up”? Is God so reluctant to answer us that it takes a lot of praying to persuade Him to intervene for us? This story is about a worldly judge who gave in to a widow’s persistence because she would not give up. The story is not about how like the unjust judge God is. It’s about how unlike him He is. The judge finally gave in to the woman and did what she requested because she pestered him day and night and refused to take “no” for an answer. God intervenes speedily because we are His children. The answer to our question is found in Jesus’s final statement:

However, when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth? (Luke 18: 8b)

If the judge finally gave in to get rid of the nagging widow because she persevered, surely God will be far more gracious to us than that because He is our Father, and we trust Him!

Why does God want us to pray and to persevere in prayer? Faith! To build our faith! But why is our faith so important to God? Faith is the invisible link between us and God. It’s about relationship. Our faith in God is more precious to Him than gold. 

These have come (‘all kinds of trials’) so that your faith – of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire – may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honour when Jesus Christ is revealed. (1 Peter 1: 7)

Trust is the basis of any relationship that works. When trust breaks down, the relationship ceases to have any meaning. God is invisible but real. However, for us humans, trust in God is built up over a long period of time and through many trials when we have no other option but to trust Him. Don’t you think that God would orchestrate or allow those trials to develop our faith if it is so precious to Him?

Abraham is an example of one who learned to trust God over many years as God tested him and taught him how to persevere. He waited for twenty-five years for God to give him the son He had promised. Many of us would have given in and given up, but not Abraham. His desire for a son was so strong and his confidence in God’s promise so secure that he refused to give up on God.

By faith Abraham, even though he was past age – and Sarah herself was barren – was enabled to become a father because he considered Him faithful who had made the promise. (Heb. 11: 11)

Perseverance is not stubbornness or presumption. It is committed and persistent trust based on the faithfulness of God. God’s promises are a declaration of intent, but they come into effect in His time and in His way. We have a part to play in the fulfilment of those promises – faith and patience.

We do not want you to become lazy, but to imitate those who through faith and patience inherit what has been promised. (Heb. 6: 12)

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