Tag Archives: condemned

GROWING UP IS FOR REAL

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GROWING UP IS FOR REAL

“Do not destroy the work of God for the sake of food. All food is clean, but it is wrong for a person to eat anything that causes someone else to stumble. It is better not to eat meat or drink wine or to do anything else that will cause your brother or sister to fall.

“So whatever you believe about these things keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the one who does not condemn himself by what he approves. But whoever has doubts is condemned if he eats, because eating is not from faith; and everything that does not come from faith is sin.” Romans 14:20-23.

So there you have it! But, wait a minute. Doesn’t it put me into bondage to other people if I have to consider their weak consciences before I can eat or drink, or do anything that another believer considers sin? It should work both ways. A weaker brother should not judge me if I am free from his scruples but, at the same time, I should not deliberately provoke him by flaunting my freedom in his face.

I have to ask. “Who has the great responsibility?” I have, because my freedom allows me to give away my rights for the sake of his soul. I will not suffer if I abstain from what bothers him when I am in his presence, whereas he will suffer if I refuse to abstain because I am free. If I cause my brother to fall because of my stubborn attitude, I will bear the guilt of turning him away from Christ because I did not love him enough to forgo my right for his sake.

“Blessed,” said Paul, “is the one who does not condemn himself by what he approves.” Blessed (“asher” in Hebrew) implies the Father’s pleasure that comes from making the right choice and doing the right thing because the Father approves of the attitude that considers another above oneself. There is no bondage in that as long as I have the right attitude. There is no place for resentment in my heart as long as I remember that it is Jesus, my Master, whom I serve when I serve others.

This leads Paul to another blanket statement that is a principle of life in God’s kingdom. Life in the kingdom of God is a walk of faith and is governed and directed by our confidence in what God has said. God’s goal for every believer is freedom from everything that hinders our faith in His word and our obedience to Him, which sets us apart as followers of Jesus.

We have many slave-drivers – behaviour patterns, habits, addictions, ways of coping – emotions, all of which interfere with the freedom Jesus bought for us so that we can walk with Him unhindered by these things. We gain our freedom, one step at a time as we learn the truth and submit to it by faith, replacing the things we believe in and do that keep us in bondage with God’s word. Paul called it “renewing our minds” (Romans 12:3).

We are set free when we believe and act upon what Jesus has said.

“To the Jews who had believed Him, Jesus said, ‘If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth and the truth will set you free.'” John 8:31, 32.

Since it is a journey, it happens gradually, not all at once. However, the operative word is faith. To the Jew, to believe something intellectually but not to act on it was a meaningless exercise. Paul said, “If you believe something to be true, even if you are wrong, but do not act on it, is sin.”

We have to trust God enough for ourselves and for our fellow believers that we allow them to walk their own path with the Lord, just as we walk ours. God will reveal truth to us and to them as and when we are able to receive it, remembering that none of us has perfect knowledge of the truth. This is the beauty of our journey – that it is a journey of discovery and a journey from bondage to freedom and God is more interested in the outcome than in the process.

Our task, if we consider ourselves mature believers, is to protect love, preserve unity and promote contentment more than it is to demand our rights. This is really growing up into Christ because He is passionate about unity.

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.

Selective Hearing

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SELECTIVE HEARING

They were on their way up to Jerusalem, with Jesus leading the way, and the disciples were astonished, while those who followed were afraid. Again He took the Twelve aside and told them what was to happen to Him.

‘We are going up to Jerusalem,’ He said, ‘and the Son of Man will be delivered over to the chief priests and the teachers of the law. They will condemn Him to death and will hand Him over to the Gentiles who will mock Him and spit on Him, flog Him and kill Him. Three days later He will rise.’ (Mark 10: 32-34).

How many times had Jesus told the disciples that He was going to suffer and die in Jerusalem? Read his words again. Could He have been more explicit and given them more detail than this? Step by step He told them what would happen to Him in Jerusalem. Surely they would have remembered at least some of His words when it happened.

What was it in His words that either cancelled out what He told them or, alternatively, sparked faith that would not have been fazed by His death? “Three days later He will rise again.’ Every time He spoke of His death, He told them that He would rise again. Since the two events were tied together, they refused to listen to Him because rising again was outside their experience.

O yes, they were with Jesus when He raised a few people from the dead. They had seen it but His words still didn’t penetrate their reluctant brains. They could not process the idea that their Master would be ripped away from them by violent death. Why would anyone want to kill Him? People from all over followed Him. Even then, He had to take them aside from the crowd to remind them of His words to them. Surely their very presence would protect Him from anyone who had evil intent.

They knew that Jesus was not afraid to tell people the truth, even if it offended them, and offend the religious leaders He did. Sometimes they worried that He had gone too far. He seemed to provoke them deliberately, accusing them of being blind guides and whited sepulchres. That kind of talk would not win their favour. Why did He do it? Why didn’t He just leave them alone? These men were powerful and influential. They could turn the Roman authorities against Him in a heartbeat.

What offended the religious authorities even more was His claim to be the Son of God. They just could not stomach those words because to them it was blasphemy. How could a mere man claim to be God? Of course, any other man claiming to be God would have been written off as crazy, but Jesus gave no evidence of being crazy. In fact, just the opposite. Even His mother and brothers thought He had lost it but Jesus ignored them and refused to go home with them so that they could keep an eye on Him.

What was the difference between His claim and any other claim that did not even warrant consideration? Evidence! Jesus kept insisting, ‘Look at the evidence.’ There were at least three witnesses to authenticate His claim – John the Baptist, the Father and His works. For anyone to be proved guilty of a charge, there had to be two or three witnesses. Jesus produced three witnesses to prove that He was guilty of being the Son of God.

But the authorities still dismissed His claim and so did the disciples even though Peter had confessed his conviction, on behalf of the Twelve, that Jesus was the Messiah, the Son of God. But, as far as Jesus was concerned, Peter might not have even bothered to make that confession because he had no idea what it meant.

The Holy Scriptures presented two streams of thought regarding the Messiah; He would be both a king and a Suffering Servant. Since the Suffering Servant did not fit their expectation of what Messiah would do, they dismissed it and refused to listen to His instruction about His impending death.

It was only after His resurrection that it began to make sense to them, and especially when the Holy Spirit fell on them at Pentecost and did what Jesus said He would do – lead them into all truth.

How often we are just like the disciples – uncomprehending and unbelieving until the Holy Spirit opens our eyes to the truth. It’s not just that we can’t understand. We actually don’t want to understand or believe because the truth is too painful to receive. But there is always “resurrection”, and understanding and faith come when we allow the Holy Spirit to interpret life, not according to our expectations but according to the truth.

The presence of Jesus in our pain makes all the difference because only He can make sense of it all. Even if nothing changes, He is there – Emmanuel – and that’s all that really matters.

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.

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