Tag Archives: God’s glory

THE GOSPEL OF LUKE – HEAVEN INVADED EARTH

Bible Study, ,

HEAVEN INVADED EARTH

“There were sheepherders camping in the neighbourhood. They had set night watches over their sheep. Suddenly God’s angel stood among them and God’s glory blazed around them. They were terrified. The angel said, ‘Don’t be afraid. I’m here to announce a great and joyful event that is meant for everybody worldwide. A Saviour has just been born in David’s town, a Saviour who is Messiah and Master. This is what you’re to look for: a baby wrapped in a blanket and lying in a manger.’

“At once the angel was joined by a huge angelic choir singing God’s praises.                        ‘Glory to God in the heavenly heights,                                                                                              Peace to all men and women on earth who please Him.'” Luke 2:8-14.

Why these shepherds? Why not Herod in his palace? Why not the ubiquitous Pharisees?

Why did the angel choir not rouse these important people from their sleep to tell them the marvellous news? After all, weren’t the religious people eagerly awaiting their Messiah? Why not the whole city of Jerusalem?

Imagine the front page article in the morning Jerusalem Herald? “Alien being announces birth of a Messiah! Last night an alien appeared to a group of shepherds on the hills outside Bethlehem with the story that a special child has been born in the town. Apparently this child, according to the angel, is alleged to be the long-awaited Messiah. A vast crowd of similar beings appeared to confirm the story with an eerie song in praise to God; so reported the shepherds.”

In keeping with the baby’s birth in a kitchen cum animal shelter, the only people to witness the angelic announcement were shepherds, men who did the most menial and despised job in Israel. Why? Think of it this way: Had the announcement been made to the wealthiest and most important people in Israel, everyone else would have been excluded. Tell the shepherds and, automatically, every class and level of society would be in.

Who else witnessed this other-worldly event? Apparently no one at this stage. No one else went running to the “maternity ward” to have a look at this new-born. In the middle of the night, while everyone else in Bethlehem was asleep, a group of shepherds and a young couple gazed in amazement at the sleeping child and wondered what the future held.

That’s how God works. The angels couldn’t keep their mouths shut in that holy moment. They exploded in an anthem of celebration, but only the shepherds witnessed the outburst. Then everything went quiet again. The little family was left to get on with the business of daily living and the parents the task of raising this boy to be an ordinary Jewish boy who had to grow up and learn like every other Jewish boy.

Luke doesn’t mention the drama of the visit of Persian astrologers who read the story in the star, and the subsequent escape to Egypt two years later. That was left for Matthew to fill in according to the purpose for his story.

A strange mixture of the natural and supernatural in this amazing event! A pregnant woman goes into labour far from home and gives birth to a baby boy in a borrowed shelter.  An invasion of angelic messengers announces the birth to an unlikely audience, a group of sleepy shepherds accompanying their sheep on a nearby hillside.

Their story? ‘This ordinary child is no ordinary child! He’s actually God’s Son. How can you be sure? Check it out for yourself. You’ll find Him in the downstairs room of the hostel in Bethlehem, not in the maternity ward at the local hospital. He doesn’t even have baby clothes on. All they had to wrap Him in was a blanket. The crib Joseph made for Him is back home in Nazareth, so they put Him in a feed trough.’

That’s how heaven invaded earth!

God Spoke And Still Speaks

Bible Study, , , ,

GOD SPOKE AND STILL SPEAKS

In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days He has spoken to us by His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, and through whom He also made the universe. The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of His being, sustaining all things by His powerful word. After He had provided purification for sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. So He became as much superior to the angels as the name He has inherited is superior to theirs. (Heb. 1: 1-4)

The letter to the Hebrews is a treasure; it contains many gems of truth to encourage us. At the same time, it is a thoroughly Hebrew book, steeped in the traditions of the Old Testament and giving us many insights into its religious thought and practice. What was the intention of the writer, and why did he write it?

We know that Jesus was a Jew, born into a pious Jewish family and raised as the eldest son of Joseph and Mary, a young couple who were faithful to their responsibilities as Jewish parents and who gave their Son every opportunity to became a faithful Jew Himself.

But Jesus was much more than the eldest son in a Jewish family. He was also uniquely the Son of God. His upbringing in a human family served its purpose for a season, but had to give way to His greater person and purpose as the Son of God. He did not come into being at His conception in the womb of Mary. That was the beginning of His mission on earth, but before He came to earth He was always God.

God has always spoken. Creation is His silent voice (Psa. 19: 1-4) and still speaks an eloquent testimony to His power and divine nature. (Rom. 1: 20) He also spoke through His chosen vessels, the prophets. Who were they? They were ordinary humans who were chosen and called into a unique relationship with Him. They were His messengers to His people and to the surrounding nations who needed to hear God’s warnings.

The prophets were God’s confidantes. He shared His secrets with them. (Amos 3: 7)He told what would happen before it happened so that His word would be proved true. He took them into His confidence so that they could pray His purposes into being as His partners and representatives on the earth. They were to declare His word to His people as warnings and encouragement to keep His people on track with Him. (Jer. 23: 22) It was their responsibility to heed His word and stay with Him in the fulfilment of His purposes.

The prophets were also God’s representatives to the kings. They accompanied the kings on their journey as rulers of His people. They were beside them in times of crisis, giving them God’s instructions, directing them through times of trouble, rebuking and correcting them when they lost their way, and teaching them the word of God so that they would rule wisely according to God’s ways.

But the prophets were only men. Their ability to represent God to the people was limited by their humanity. God’s plan was to send a representative to the earth who was an exact replica of Himself. In the fullness of time, He sent His Son (Gal. 4: 4) who was exactly like Him, ‘the radiance of His glory’ to speak for God and as God. As His obedient and submissive Son, Jesus had the authority to speak what the Father spoke because He was in perfect harmony with the Father.

He spoke for the Father in His words and actions, but most eloquently through His death through which He made atonement for the sin of the world and reconciled the human race which was alienated through sin, to the Father.

Jewish Christians were having second thoughts about leaving their Jewish religion and trusting in Jesus as their Messiah because of persecution. The Jews were tolerated and left to pursue their religion in peace but Christians, whom the Jews rejected as well as the Roman government, were hated because they challenged the emperor’s claim to deity.

The writer to the Hebrews informed them that to do that was to deny who Jesus was and what He had done and to leave the plan of God unfinished if they rejected their Messiah. Jesus is God’s last word – because He is God’s Son. God speaks through Him as the completion of everything He has to say. If they rejected Him, God the Father had nothing more to say and likewise, to us.

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.

 

Fearless Confidence

Prayer, , ,

FEARLESS CONFIDENCE

“A wonderful harmony in prayer: ‘Strong God, you made heaven and earth and sea and everything in them. By the Holy Spirit you spoke through the mouth of your servant and our father, David.

“Why the big noise, nations?
Why the mean plots, people?
Earth’s leaders push for position,
Potentates meet for summit talks,
The God-deniers, the Messiah-defiers!”

For in fact, they did meet — Herod and Pontius Pilate with nations and peoples, even Israel itself — met in this very city to plot against your holy servant Jesus, the one you made Messiah, to carry out the plans you long ago set in motion.

“And now they’re at it again! Take care of their threats and give your servants fearless confidence in preaching you Message as you stretch out your hand to us in healings and miracles and wonders done in the name of your holy servant Jesus.'” Acts 4:24b-30 (The Message).

What a prayer! Doesn’t sound quite like the sort of prayer God’s people would pray today, does it? We would pray something like this: “O God, we are under attack! The devil is attacking us. We bind you, Satan, in the name of Jesus. We take authority over you. You have no power over us so take your hands off us. O God, please get us out of this. In the name of Jesus, amen.”

Prayer is a window into our hearts. When people pray together, they get to know one another pretty well. Compare our kind of praying with the prayer of those early disciples. We pray out of despair. Our focus is more often on the problem than it is on God. We rehearse the problem and beg God to intervene to get us out of it.

Remember Joshua at Ai? He was whining at God because Israel had been defeated and some of their men killed. He thought it was God’s fault for not supporting them. God’s response? “Stop praying! Get up! Israel has sinned.”

There is something reciprocal about our prayers and God’s responses. Israel’s defeat was the result of Achan’s disobedience, and prayer was not the solution. The value of Joshua’s prayer lay in God’s response — stop praying and do something about the sin in the camp. Perhaps we need to heed the lesson when we are praying about situations in our own countries.

The believers in this incident had it right. They did not interpret persecution as Satan’s work against them. They viewed it as God’s opportunity to get more glory for Himself by showing His power against the backdrop of puny human opposition. The psalm they quoted contrasted the worst that human power can do with God’s response to the rebellion of men and nations. “I have installed my king on Zion, my holy hill…” Psalm 2:6 (NIV).

Their plea was not, “God, get them off our backs,” but “God, let’s do it even more.” What a spirit! They were less concerned about their own comfort and safety than they were about getting the job done. They knew that God was supporting them as they supported him in His intention to make His Son known.

We in the western world need to recapture the attitude of those first followers of Jesus who were so captivated by Him that they disregarded themselves in their partnership with God to establish His rule on earth. They knew that God would take care of their business if they took care of His.

Great Gifts – Great Responsibilities

Christian Life, , , ,

GREAT GIFTS – GREAT RESPONSIBILITIES

“‘The servant who knows what his master wants and ignores it, or insolently does whatever he pleases, will be thoroughly thrashed. But if he does a poor job through ignorance, he’ll get off with a slap on the hand. Great gifts mean great responsibilities; greater gifts, greater responsibilities.'” Luke 12:47-48 (The Message).

There is something terribly wrong in the world today. God is glaringly absent, ignored or treated as though He does not exist. Read a glossy magazine, listen to the radio, watch the TV; it’s all the same. People’s gifts and talents are flaunted as if they were solely responsible for acquiring them.

No-one can use the excuse that he or she does not know where they got their gifts because the Bible assures us that everyone knows God. Romans 1:20, 21 – “For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities – His eternal power and divine nature – have been clearly seen, having been understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. For although they knew God, they neither glorified Him as God nor gave thanks to Him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened.”

Everyone has been entrusted with something to manage for the Master until He returns, some more and some less, but the attitude is often that these gifts are for us to exploit for our own benefit and advantage. Whether it be beauty, art, music, drama, or any less visible ability, the motive is the same, either money or fame or both. Whatever the reason, it’s all about ‘me’. It’s the ‘evil eye’ at work again, the greedy and selfish nature in control.

There are at least three things that this way of thinking either forgets or ignores: God’s glory, God’s purpose and our future destiny. The manager in Jesus’ story is a glaring example. He was either deliberately rebellious, or irresponsibly ignorant. Neither is an excuse for failing to carry out the master’s requirements. His selfishness cancelled out wisdom. He was living for the moment and forgetting that the master would return.

Tragically, because self dominates, his attitude was even more serious; the greater the gift, the greater the garnering of wealth and popularity for himself. But God looks at it differently; the greater the gift, the greater the responsibility. God gives us gifts firstly so that we can show Him off. Every gift, talent and ability we have is to be honed and used as a witness to what kind of God He is. God is infinitely beautiful, kind and generous and one of the ways He reveals His beauty is through us.

Secondly, God gives us gifts to get the work of His kingdom done on earth. There are a myriad ways in which the things He enables us to do bring, reveal and explain His government on earth. In God’s system there is order, harmony, purpose, beauty, generosity, mercy, compassion, etc., and these are accomplished through the gifts He has given us. To use them to enhance ourselves is to abuse them and to abort His plan on earth.

Thirdly, there is no way God will let us get away with rebellion or irresponsibility. Jesus will come back. He has promised. He will call us to account. He said so. His justice will be absolutely just because He gives us the choice regarding our future. Whatever we choose in this life He will confirm in the next. Our Romans passage makes it very clear. “Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, He gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done.” Romans 1:28 (NIV).

And so Jesus’ warning is a serious one. The ‘thrashing’ unfaithful managers receive will be eternal and so will be the loss, too terrible to imagine, including the loss of the very position He had destined us to occupy in His eternal dominion had we been faithful.