Tag Archives: preach

From God’s Perspective

Bible Study, , , ,

FROM GOD’S PERSPECTIVE

“But when God, who set me apart from my mother’s womb and called me by His grace, was pleased to reveal His Son in me so that I might preach Him among the Gentiles, my immediate response was not to consult with human beings. I did not go up to Jerusalem to see those who were apostles before I was, but I went into Arabia. Later I returned to Damascus.” Galatians 1:15-17.

Why was Paul giving such a detailed description of his life history? Somewhere along the line it was not only his gospel message that was being attacked but also his credentials as an apostle. After all, he was not one of the Twelve. Who gave him authority to preach what he preached and, what’s more, to call down a curse on anyone who preached anything different from his message?

And what a message! He was actually insisting that people abandon the Law of Moses as a way to be accepted by God, and embrace and worship a human being, and one who had been executed by the Roman authorities, as God because He claimed to be God. That did not sit well with the Jews. On top of that, he was inviting Gentiles to have a share in the covenant God made with Abraham, telling them that they were also Abraham’s offspring if they believed in Jesus.

From a Jewish point of view, what Paul was doing was outrageous. However, although he was a Jew, he had another perspective, one that overrode human opinion. What was God’s side of the story?

First of all, He had a plan. Paul’s early life as a fanatical Pharisee, far from being his chosen way of life, was only an interlude and a preparation for the destiny God had prepared for him before he was born. At the precise moment, Jesus broke into his life in a personal encounter which shook him loose from his presuppositions and set him on course for his life work – introducing the rest of humanity to the God who had already revealed Himself to one group of people.

He had gone about it the wrong way because he did not understand the truth but his encounter with Jesus put him right. God was not fazed by his foolish notions and bad behaviour. He was a product of his times, but He did not leave him to perish in his unbelief. Grace stepped in at the critical moment, opened his eyes and turned him around.

Paul had a lot of unlearning to do. Instead of getting it second-hand from the ones who had spent time with Jesus, he set off by himself to learn first-hand from the Master. Where better to be alone with Him than in the desert of Arabia, where his ancestors had had many an encounter with the pre-incarnate Son during their forty-year sojourn in the wilderness?

Paul spent three years – the same amount of time as the other disciples – learning to be a disciple; his own desert “Bible College”, person-to-person with Jesus. It’s no wonder he was so insistent that he had authority to preach what he preached! No one spends time alone with Jesus for that long without being transformed from the inside out, thoroughly purged of all the old wrong thinking. What you think, you become. Paul became an apostle, called and commissioned, for the rest of his life, to be an ambassador for the kingdom of God and for his King.

Notice how he said, “to reveal His Son in me”. The years in Arabia were much more than a time of changing the way Paul thought. They were also a time for changing his attitudes and responses so that he became a completely new man. He spent three years “contemplating the Lord’s glory.” Jesus did not sit down on a rock beside him and teach him his spiritual ABC. By His Holy Spirit He was in him, revealing and leading him into all truth, making real and becoming to him “Christ in me, the hope of glory.”

When Paul left the “sacred halls of learning”, not in a classroom or lecture hall in an esteemed institution, but under the wide open sky, he carried with him much more than knowledge. He carried in him the presence of the Son of God, both his tutor and his model. It’s no wonder that he was so adamant about the truth of his gospel. The author was resident within him, guiding him and speaking through him so that it was always and only truth that he presented to anyone who would listen.

Acknowledgement

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.

 

Bible School, Jesus Style

Bible Study, , ,

BIBLE SCHOOL, JESUS STYLE

“Jesus now called the Twelve and gave them authority and power to deal with all the demons and cure diseases. He commissioned them to preach the news of God’s kingdom and heal the sick. He said, ‘Don’t load yourselves up with equipment. Keep it simple; you are the equipment. And no luxury inns — get a modest place and be content there until you leave. If you’re not welcomed, leave town. Don’t make a scene. Shrug your shoulders and move on.’

“Commissioned, they left. They travelled from town to town telling the latest news of God, the Message, and curing people everywhere they went.” Luke 9:1-6 (The Message).

Step two of Jesus’ training programme for His disciples was about to begin. Mark outlined His strategy in one simple sentence: “He appointed twelve: that they might be with Him and that He might send them out to preach.” Mark 3:14 (NIV).

He had spent a considerable time modelling His method and His message, with His disciples with Him day and night, watching and listening to Him and getting the feel of the kingdom He was introducing to His people. Although they still had in mind that He had come to deliver them from Rome, perhaps they thought that what He was showing them was part of His strategy to win the people over.

Jesus considered them ready to go out without Him to do what He had been doing. They needed plenty of practice for the day when He left them on their own for good to get on with what He had started. The day would come when He would give them their commission to a life work to go, not just to the towns and villages of Israel but to the whole world to pass on who they were — disciples of Jesus.

His instruction was simple. ‘Don’t weigh yourself down with loads of baggage and equipment.’ This was a partnership between Himself and His disciples. It was His responsibility to see that they were provided for on their journey. They did not have to run “Praise-a-thons” to raise funds or stay in 5-star hotels or travel in Mercedes Benz vehicles. Hudson Taylor, founder of the China Inland Mission, said, ‘God’s work, done in God’s way, will never lack God’s supply.’

They were to rely on the hospitality of the local people. Between the lines, He was giving townspeople the opportunity to have a share in the blessing of partnering with His disciples in the work of the kingdom. If there were those who were inhospitable enough to turn them away, it was not necessary to make a fuss about it. They would be the losers and that would be enough.

Jesus’ strategy was brilliant, bringing people and God together and showing His disciples how to trust Him for their resources by giving people the opportunity to be generous. He promised to meet our needs but He does not do it by tossing money from heaven. It is the generosity of people that creates a current and keeps His resources circulating. This principle works in the natural world too.

The disciples did what He instructed them to do and He did what He promised He would do. He was already beginning to multiply Himself in twelve men who were listening, watching, learning and imitating their Rabbi.

Isn’t it sad that the simple message of Jesus has been covered up with layers of stuff and ritual until it had become unrecognisable? There is nothing wrong with using technology to get the message out as long as the message remains unadulterated with human ideas and interpretations. What Jesus came to do should remain unchanged, however it is delivered.

What did He come to do? He came to show us the Father and to take us to the Father so that we can be reconciled and live as His sons and daughters here on earth. Anything else is not who He is and not what He came to do!

Networking With God

Christian Life, , ,

NETWORKING WITH GOD

He told them: “Take nothing for the journey – no staff, no bag, no bread, no money, no extra tunic…” Luke 9:3

Why did Jesus instruct His disciples not to take extra clothes, provisions or money with them when He sent them out to preach? Was it, since they were on kingdom business, that the King would take responsibility to care for their physical needs – in fulfilment of His promise in Matthew 6:33 – “But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well”?

But God always comes to us through human agents. People do the caring and providing using the resources God provides for them through other people, and so on.

Why not carry their own provisions and money instead of relying on their hosts to provide for them? Was it because they could travel faster and more comfortably unencumbered? But, more than that, there is something about sowing into someone else’s ministry that mysteriously connects us with that person so that their anointing is imparted to us. It becomes a partnership, in a sense, where the giver shares in the harvest of the sower.

Is it about connectedness? Since we are reflections of God’s image, we express our oneness with God and with each other by partnering with those who go, by giving and sharing our resources to make their going possible.

If people refuse to connect by not partnering with those who come to them, they become disconnected from the blessing and anointing of the messengers of the good news. They disqualify themselves from receiving the blessing of Jesus, the Rabbi, in whose dust we walk. By shaking the dust of our feet off that household, are we not saying, “You may have refused to receive the message of the Rabbi, but the door is always open, and so I leave you with my Rabbi’s blessing in the hopes that you will recognise and receive its value and open your heart to receive His blessing”?

It was in this spirit of generosity, both giving and receiving, that the disciples went, and in the going, sowed seeds of truth and left the blessing of their Rabbi wherever they went. They created a network of partners who shared as they listened and received as they gave, so that the disciples’ message blanketed the region where they had been, extending and increasing the influence of their Rabbi’s yoke wherever they went. This is the way the gospel not only changes the lives of individuals but, by networking, it also blankets whole geographical areas with the message and power of God’s grace and weakens the hold of demonic powers over regions.