Tag Archives: day

Alive Or Dead, We Are His

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ALIVE OR DEAD, WE ARE HIS

“One person considers one day more sacred than another; another considers every day alike. Each of them should be fully convinced in his own mind. Whoever regards one day as special does so to the Lord. Whoever eats meat does so to the Lord, for they give thanks to God; and whoever abstains, does so to the Lord and gives thanks to God. For none of us lives for ourselves alone, and none of us dies for ourselves alone. If we live, we live for the Lord; and if we die, we die for the Lord. So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord. For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that He might be Lord of both the dead and the living.” Romans 14:5-9.

What a comfort! Belonging is one of the deepest needs of the human heart.

Paul settles many issues with one profound declaration – alive or dead, we belong to God!  Criticising, judging, controlling, despising (or even the opposite, idolising) would have no place in our lives if we kept in mind this profound truth – we belong to the Lord and He alone has charge of us and the right to direct our lives the way He wants us to go. Of course that assumes that we are listening to and obeying His voice!

The point is that being a Christian is much more than “signing on” to a creed or joining a club. It is a commitment to following on obeying Jesus as our Master and Lord. It also means that every other believer belongs to Him as well and it is His right, not ours, to decide what they must do and how they must live. We can safely leave them to Him, because “to their own master, servants stand or fall.” Romans 14:4

Of course this relates to what other Christians believe and do which falls into the category of non-essentials like what to eat and what not to eat, or whether one day is more sacred than another. For them, the more important issue is the matter of conscience. If their conscience is sensitised to doing or not doing what they believe is right but they fail to follow their conscience, to them it is sin.

“…everything that does not come from faith is sin.” Romans 14:23b.

When it comes to deviations from revealed truth which have serious repercussions on our destiny, it is the responsibility of a mature believer to come alongside and gently point the offender in the right direction. However, even then, we cannot force him to respond. He must decide and take the consequences.

“Brothers and sisters, if someone is caught in a sin, you who live by the Spirit should restore that person gently…” Galatians 6:1a.

According to Paul, we who believe in Jesus have an indestructible connection with Him and, since He is Lord, it gives Him the right to direct each person’s life in the way He chooses since each one has a unique destiny in Him. This presupposes that each believer maintains that connection by doing what Jesus commanded:

“Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” John 15:4, 5.

The things that are abhorrent to the Lord; criticising, judging, despising, controlling, would not be an issue if we were to be more careful to maintain our connection with Jesus instead of trying to keep others in line. Confidence in Him must extend to being content to allow Him to be Lord of their lives as well as ours. If we insist on trying to control others, we are in fact telling the Lord that He is incompetent to do the job. How unthinkable is that!

Imagine how much less stress we would have if we left the Lord to take care of the lives and conscience of others instead of trying to keep control of them ourselves! If the other person believes that eating meat is wrong, or worshipping on a Saturday, not a Sunday, is the right thing to do, will he go to hell? Of course not! It all depends on his motive.

Our all-controlling motive should be that Jesus died to pay the debt of sin and I can add nothing to what He did. “It is finished!” says it all. Whatever else is peripheral and irrelevant – bottom line!

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.

 

Offended And Exposed

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OFFENDED AND EXPOSED!

“‘Your father Abraham rejoiced at the thought of seeing my day; he saw it and was glad.’

“‘You are not yet fifty years old,’ they said to Him, ‘and you have seen Abraham!’ ‘Very truly I tell you,’ Jesus answered, ‘before Abraham was born, I AM!’ At this they picked up stones to stone Him, but Jesus hid Himself, slipping away from the Temple grounds.” John 8: 56-59 (NIV).

Jesus was either a madman, speaking words that were the height of blasphemy or…

This conversation, which started off with many of the Jews (his name for the religious leaders) believing in Jesus, and ended with these same believers’ attempting to stone Him for blasphemy, was one of those times when Jesus probed to expose what was really in their hearts.

It turns out that their so-called faith was no faith at all because they refused to believe that He was the Son of God. Jesus said things that were either the words of a crazy man or, if they were true, could only point to His identity as God in the flesh.

He claimed to be the fulfilment of the water and light ceremonies which they celebrated every year at the Feast of Tabernacles; He spoke of His unity with the Father; He said that He had been sent by the Father; that the Father was with Him; that He spoke only what He heard the Father saying; that He would set all those free who believed in Him and held to His teaching; that He existed before Abraham was born and that He was the I AM whose name He revealed from the burning bush!

That tipped them over the edge! Their faith in Him was phoney and their wicked hearts were exposed. Just as Jesus had revealed, they were murderers at heart, just like their father, the devil, and their murderous intention broke out into action. They were thwarted in their attempt to kill Him once again because it was not yet time for Him to die and not in the manner they were using at that moment.

It would have been easy for Jesus to slip away through the crowd. It was the final festival of the Jewish calendar and there would have been thousands of people, locals and visitors thronging the temple courts. He did not wait around to give them the satisfaction of carrying out their murderous action. He simple melted into the crowd and left them to lick their wounds and plan the next move.

Why did Jesus egg them on to reveal their true colours? He was not interested in popularity for its own sake. He did not come to gain membership for a cause. He came to reveal the true nature of the Father and to restore those to fellowship with the Father who would recognize who He was and bow to His authority.

The Jewish leaders who had initially believed in Him had shown that they were not interested in anything other than what they believed and desired. They were not willing to repent (change their minds about what they believed and receive the truth from Jesus). He did not fulfil their expectation and so they dismissed Him as a fake and a blasphemer.

We need to look closely at our own attitudes lest we mirror theirs and disqualify ourselves from being Jesus’ disciples. Eugene Peterson captures the sense of Jesus’ words in his interpretation of Matthew 16:24 in “The Message”:

“Then Jesus went to work on His disciples. ’Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You’re not in the driver’s seat; I am. Don’t run from suffering; embrace it. Follow me and I’ll show you how. Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way to finding your true self. What kind of deal is it to get everything you want but lose yourself? What could you ever trade your soul for?'”

Jesus demands unquestioning obedience to His will and His way. Unless we are prepared to lay aside our own demands and expectations and embrace Him and His way wholeheartedly, we are disqualified from being His disciples no matter what we think.

It’s as simple as that!