Tag Archives: works

BREAD FROM HEAVEN

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BREAD FROM HEAVEN

“Then they asked Him, ‘What must we do to do the works God requires?’ Jesus answered, ‘The work of God is this: to believe in the One He has sent.’ So they asked Him, ‘What sign, then, will you give so that we may see it and believe you? What will you do? Our ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written: “He gave them bread from heaven to eat.”‘

“Jesus said to them, ‘Very truly I tell you, it is not Moses who has given you bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is the bread that comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.’

“‘Sir,’ they said, ‘always give us this bread.'” John 6:28-34.

These people were well influenced by their religious leaders and still thought and operated in the natural.

Jesus had just challenged them, ‘Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life which the Son of Man will give you.’ John 6:27a. Their response was, ‘What must we do…?’ thinking that there was something extra that they must add to their already burdensome performance to guarantee them an eternal existence beyond the grave.

Jesus’ response took them back to the simple requirement He had persistently told them which they did not seem to hear or understand. It was not about works but about faith in Him that opened the door to what He called “life”. The people clung to Moses as their model because he was the agent through whom God did mighty miracles in the wilderness and delivered them from the Egyptians.

Despite their ancestors’ grumbling against Moses and their disobedience and unbelief towards God and His miraculous interventions, God’s people still saw these mighty miracles as the sign that it was God who was with them and who led them to the Promised Land.

According to them, it was Moses who had given them the manna which sustained them for forty years in the wilderness. He didn’t multiply a few barley loaves to feed a few thousand. He gave them an abundance of manna every morning which fed millions! That was Moses’ sign that it was God who was doing it. ‘What can you do, Jesus, to better that?’

Already their unbelief was working overtime! Why did they follow Him across the lake in the first place, and then back to Capernaum when they didn’t find Him where He had been the day before? Was it because He was feeding their souls with the living bread — His word? No! He had already diagnosed their motive — a free meal at God’s expense! They were certainly “working” for that bread.

Providing manna for millions of people every day was a small miracle compared with the greater miracle of God coming in person to provide “bread” that would sustain them forever, but they could not see it. The life He offered them was not simply an extra-long biological life on the earth but a supernatural quality of life in union with Him that freed them from the fear, guilt and shame that drove them to hide from God because of their sin.

The “bread” of which Jesus spoke was a symbol of the bread, Himself through His word, that would nourish and sustain their spirits in an unbreakable connection with Himself. Since He would do away with the barrier of sin which had disconnected them from God and left them unprotected against the judgment of God, they would reconciled to God. They would be able to live in fellowship with Him without the sacrifices and mediators they were forced to go through now.

Once again, their response revealed their misunderstanding of His offer. The Samaritan woman thought He was offering her a supply of water that would relieve her of the burden of carrying water from the well every day. They thought that He would give them bread, like the manna, which simply fell from heaven and saved them the labour of having to bake their daily supply.

Since their minds were locked into the natural, as we shall see, their unbelief mirrored the unbelief of their ancestors and they forfeited the opportunity to receive this “bread” and enter the fullness of the life Jesus offered.

Have you “eaten” this bread? Have you confessed with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believed in your heart that God raised Him from the dead? If you have, you will be saved.

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.

FAITH IS THE KEY

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FAITH IS THE KEY

“‘I have testimony weightier than that of John. For the works that the Father has given me to finish – the  very works that I am doing – testify that the Father has sent me. And the Father who sent me has Himself testified concerning me. You have never heard His voice nor seen His form, nor does His word dwell in you, for you do not believe the one He sent. You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you have eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life.'” John 5:36-40 (NIV).

Jesus and the religious leaders stood on opposite sides of an impenetrable wall. The heart of Jesus yearned for them to see the light and recognize that He was speaking the truth when He declared that the works He did and the witness of the Father pointed to one thing – that He was the Son of God. Their desperate efforts to protect their power and influence over the people and their prejudice against Him because they hated His love for all people, blinded their eyes to His identity.

Again and again, they demanded, ‘Who are you?’ but then rejected the evidence before their eyes because they stubbornly refused to believe His word. In the end, it was not about their inability to understand. It was about their refusal to believe because they had another agenda. Had God or an angel personally come to explain the truth to them, they would still have refused to believe.

These men were professional students of the Word. They had memorised and studied the entire Old Testament from childhood and could flawlessly recite any part of it. Tanach was in their heads but not in their hearts because their understanding and interpretation of the Word was fixed by their “yoke”, their way of interpreting and applying the Word. They followed the yoke of their rabbis, Shammai and Hillel, and the ancient rabbis who went before them, the men who determined how the Scriptures were to be understood.

Although the common people recognized the overriding authority of Jesus, the religious leaders did not, and despised them for following and listening to Him. Not even the testimony of the highly revered prophet, John, could convince them that Jesus was the Messiah. They were in bed with the Romans and enjoyed their protection as long as they kept the people under their thumbs. They did not want anyone to rock their boat, especially this “softie” who had the common people eating out of His hand.

The scribes and Pharisees’ study of the Scriptures was purely academic, to reinforce their power over the people, not because they were looking for the truth about the Messiah. The evidence was there before their eyes and available to anyone who had the will to believe, but for these men, the truth was safely hidden until they unlocked it with the key of faith.

It was out of these altercations with the religious leaders that some of the richest revelation of Jesus and His relationship with the Father came. His opponents might not have chosen to believe His word, but for those who do, we have the assurance and the witness that Jesus was no fake but truly the Son of God for, as Nicodemus testified, no one can do these things unless God is with him.

How does Jesus’ testimony sit with us? It actually has more to do with choice than with fact. Like the Pharisees we can choose to reject His word, or we can choose to believe and then have the witness in our spirits that what He said and what He promised is true. The world says, “Seeing is believing,” but that is the way of the sceptic. The Bible says, “Believing is seeing,” and that is the way of the Father.

Faith must take the first step, based on the evidence, and the confirmation will follow. Faith puts into action what we know to be true, and God responds by fulfilling His word. We all fall into one of two categories, those who choose to believe or those who choose not to believe, and the outcome depends on our choice.

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.

HANDCRAFTED BY THE MASTER

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HANDCRAFTED BY THE MASTER

For it is by grace you have been saved through faith – and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast.  For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do (Eph. 2: 8-10).

What a different picture from the one Paul painted in the previous verses! We are no longer dead and stinking but alive to God and objects of His grace and favour. How sad that religion drives many branches of so-called Christianity. What do I mean by “religion”? Religion flourishes by rules and ritual. Religion is a “do-it-yourself” attempt to reach God or to satisfy the perceived demands of a god.

Even believers in Jesus often erroneously think that their response to what God has done for them is to “work for God”. But God’s word tells a very different story. God sent His Son into the world to rescue us from the plight sin put us in, not for our sake but for His sake. He wanted a family of sons and daughters bound to Him by love, not a group of slaves bound to Him by fear.

He did everything necessary to bring us back to His original plan because of His mercy. We did nothing to deserve His grace and we can do nothing to earn it. He did it for Himself so that the minions who rebelled against Him would be confronted with the truth – God is love.

Humans find it difficult to accept a free gift so great that it transfers us out of the devil’s clutches and places us in the hands and under the care of a gracious Father. We would rather attempt to repay God for His kindness in some futile way which does not impress God at all. God is not a tit-for-tat God like the gods of the heathen. If you do this for Him, He will do that for you. Everything He did to save us from self-destruction, He did for Himself, and He gives is to us as a free gift of His grace.

But that does not mean that we simply take everything and give nothing back. As sons and daughters of God, there is a response He requires of us, but it is not a response of repaying our debt. It is the response of the children of God who adore their Father and serve Him out of love and gratitude.

A study of the gospels will reveal that there are five characteristics of a true son which Jesus mirrored in His life on earth.

  1. A son loves his father

A religious leader once asked Jesus, “Which is the greatest commandment?” to which Jesus replied, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength.” Love for God is the atmosphere in which a son of daughter lives.

  1. A son trusts his father

If there is no trust between a father and his child, he then lives like a slave in fear. Love and trust are the basis of the other three characteristics of a son or daughter.

  1. A son submits to his father

Jesus is the perfect model of a submissive son. Even when He faced His greatest battle in the Garden of Gethsemane, He submitted to the Father’s will, and not with gritted teeth but with love and trust.

During the days of Jesus’ life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with fervent cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission. Hebrews 5:7

  1. A son obeys the father

A son does not grudgingly obey or give in to the father under compulsion. Obedience is the hallmark of love. Jesus said to His disciples, “If you love me, you will do what I command you.”

Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered 9 and, once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him 1 Hebrews 5:8-10

  1. A son serves his father

This is not the service of a servant but the service of partnership, doing the Father’s will with Him to fulfil the Father’s greater purpose of establishing His kingdom on earth.

The good works of which Paul speaks are not random acts of kindness because we feel sorry for people in need. They are the integrated actions of God’s people which reveal His character to an ungodly world. When we live in harmony and fellowship with the Father, He will reveal His will to us and enable us to carry out His plans in partnership with Him to bring a wayward family back to Himself.

Whatever it involves in the way of acts of compassion and kindness towards others, God wants to reveal Himself through us so that those who have been deceived by the devil into hating God, will see Him in us and turn to Him in faith.

Paul said that we are God’s masterpiece, handcrafted by Him to carry out His will on earth by doing what He planned for us to do long before we were born.

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.

Have you read my first book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

ISBN: Softcover – 978-1-4828-0512-3,                                                                              eBook 978-4828-0511-6

Available on www.amazon.com in paperback, e-book or Kindle version, on www.takealot.com  or order directly from the publisher at www.partridgepublishing.com.

My second book, Learning to be a Disciple – The Way of the Master (Copyright © 2015, Partridge Publishing), a companion volume to Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart, has been released in paperback and digital format on www.amazon.com.

 

Greater Works

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GREATER WORKS 

“Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these because I am going to the Father. And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. You may ask anything in my name and I will do it.” John 14:12-14 NIV.

At face value there was nothing unusual about Jesus’ statement that His disciples would do greater things than He was doing. This was what was expected of the disciples of rabbis who had authority. They would take their disciples beyond where they were.

But there was something more than what was expected of the ordinary disciples of a rabbi with authority. This was Jesus speaking, not just any rabbi. “Going to the Father” had greater implications than just dying and was the key to the “greater things”.

1. Going to the Father meant that He was returning to the one who sent Him. Jesus was on a mission to the earth. He did not come into existence at His conception.

“He was with God in the beginning” John 1:2 NIV.

2. He had come from the Father to accomplish something and He was returning to the Father because He had completed what He had come to do.

“Therefore, when Christ came into the world, He said: ‘Sacrifice and offering you did not desire, but a body you prepared for me; with burn offerings and sin offerings you were not pleased. Then I said, ‘Here I am — it is written about me in the scroll — I have come to do your will, my God'” Hebrews 10:5-7 NIV.

3. The Father had sent Him to the earth to reveal Him to His people. He had become distorted in the minds of His people through centuries of rabbinic study and interpretation which had overlaid their ancient Scriptures with layers and layers of rules and additions until He was no longer recognizable as the God who revealed Himself to His people through the prophets.

“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 also He made the universe. The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of His being…” Hebrews 1:1-3a NIV.

4. He came to restore what was broken at the Fall. Adam and Eve broke the unity between themselves and God through their disobedience, and brought the whole universe into disrepair. They incurred an unpayable debt which Jesus came to pay to restore them to unity and fellowship with the Father so that they could fulfil the Father’s will.

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here! All this is from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation.” 2 Corinthians 5:17-18 NIV.

“For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.” Romans 8:20, 21 NIV.

5. He came to create a body (the church) of which He is the head, to reproduce Himself on the earth and to bring heaven to earth by the way they live. Through His death which provides forgiveness of sins and reconciliation to the Father, He is building a family of sons and daughters who are just like Him to represent Him to the world and to do the works He did and much more.

How can we do greater things than He did? Perhaps not greater in nature but greater in volume because, wherever His children are, He is by His Spirit in them and He is able to spread His message of God’s kingdom by multiplying Himself through them across the entire globe.

By Their Works

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BY THEIR WORKS 

“‘If He called them “gods”, to whom the Word of God came — and Scripture cannot be set aside — what about the one whom the Father set apart as His very own and sent into the world? Why then do you accuse me of blasphemy because I said, ‘I am God’s Son?’ Do not believe me unless I do the works of my Father.’

“‘But if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I in the Father.’ Again they tried to seize Him, but He escaped their grasp.” John 10:35-39 NIV.

There is only one way to recognise the nature of a tree — by its fruit. There is no doubt that an apple tree is an apple tree when it bears apples or an orange tree is an orange tree when it bears oranges, though it may look like a lemon tree or some other citrus tree.

The Pharisees refused to accept Jesus’ claim to be the Son of God because they insisted that the works He did, although He did the things that reflected the nature of His Father, were evil because He did them on the Sabbath, as though it were the day, not the nature of the deed that made His miracles evil!

Unfortunately for them, their very accusation revealed the nature of their “tree”. Their fruit was so rotten that they called evil good and good evil. Jesus warned, “‘Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ferocious wolves. By their fruit you will recognise them.'” Matthew 7:15, 16a NIV.

If the fruit of Jesus’ life matched the nature of His Father, then He must surely be His Son, since a son contains the genes and perpetuates his father’s nature into the next generation. In Psalm 82:6, God called the Israelites ‘gods’ because they were to reveal the nature of their God to the world as His sons, His gracious, compassionate, slow-to-anger and abounding-in-love-and-faithfulness nature, yet the Pharisees were anything but like the God they claimed as their Father.

Jesus set great store on works because works reveal the nature of the person just as fruit reveals the nature of a tree. In his letter, James picks up on this theme, showing his readers that a true believer is identified by his works as Abraham was by his. To the Hebrew mind there was no such thing as believing without acting on that belief. Believing in Jesus was meaningless unless it issued in obedience to Him.

The Apostle Paul, in his letters to the Romans and Galatians, contended for faith apart from works as a way of salvation. The Judaisers — a Jewish sect of believers in Jesus — insisted that Gentiles be circumcised first before they could become believers. To Paul that meant that the death of Jesus was insufficient to reconcile a wayward son to the Father and that was unthinkable. Yes, the death of Jesus is sufficient to deal with our sin and to restore us to fellowship with the Father. There is nothing we can do to add to the sufficiency of His work on the cross.

James, on the other hand, recognised that good works — tsidaqah, which isfulfilling our duty to God by sharing our resources with people less fortunate than us, caring for the alien, the widow and the orphan and helping the weak and oppressed — are a fruit of our confession of faith in Jesus. We reveal our oneness with Him when we do what He did just as He revealed His oneness with the Father by doing what the Father wanted Him to do.

For all their big talk, the Pharisees and religious leaders made it glaringly obvious that they were of their father, the devil, because they were doing his works, not the works of the Father. “‘You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies.'”  John 8:44 NIV.

That is quite an indictment!

 

How important it is to show our connection with Jesus by doing what He did and living like He lived, just as He lived out His connection with the Father by the way He treated people. It is not what we say that reveals our connection but the way we live. Let’s make sure that our fruit is the fruit of the Spirit and not the deeds of the flesh.

 

We are known by our works, not our words!