Sin, Yes, I Really Said That

My bible study magazine has me studying 1John 3:4-9. And I must say I am very uncomfortable with this study. I don’t disagree with what John wrote under God’s  direction. I’m just feeling the guilt and conviction with it’s confrontation. I don’t say the “sin” word anymore. I don’t make emphatic statements about what is right and wrong anymore. I guess it’s our culture and the “politically correct” nature of our society.


Everyone who practices sin also practices lawlessness; and sin is lawlessness. You know that He appeared in order to take away sins; and in Him there is no sin. No one who abides in Him sins; no one who sins has seen Him or knows Him. Little children, make sure no one deceives you; the one who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous; the one who practices sin is of the devil; for the devil has sinned from the beginning. The Son of God appeared for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil. No one who is born of God practices sin, because His seed abides in him; and he cannot sin, because he is born of God. The one who practices sin is of the devil; for the devil has sinned from the beginning. The Son of God appeared for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil. 


This passage in the Bible is all so black and white. It’s all so either/or. No gray. No sometimes or most times. You are a child of God or you are of the Devil.

If I have sin or disobedience to God’s word as a habit or practice in my life I’m really not acting as a child of God but a follower of Satan. And, oh my, that’s a little harsh. And the word “sin”, I’m not comfortable just throwing that word around.

The Apostle John certainly has no problem with this cut and dry definition. He unblushingly calls it like it is. No sugar coating from him. Oh no. This makes me squirm and have to take a look at my daily practices.

What am I practicing on a daily basis? What is my life pattern? What are my habit sins?

Thankfully Jesus is the sin destroyer. He breaks the power of cancelled sin as Charles Wesley so elegantly wrote in his wonderful hymn. He came for this very purpose. He changes daily sin habits as we follow Him instead of the Devil. He births us as His child.

I’ll still struggle with sin but because I’m a child of God I don’t have to make it a practice. The Holy Spirit’s constant conviction won’t let me continue without making me very uncomfortable in my sin.

And if I am comfortable with clearly disobeying God daily, I have to take a good long look at just who I am following.

                                                     I made this all about me because
             I’m not comfortable preaching at you but if the life pattern fits, well.………..



                                                                         SIN

                                                                  There, I said it.
             
                                                       Now don't make a habit of it.

Thanksgiving

Here is what another Prince of Preachers says about celebrating Thanksgiving:

“And this is what Thanksgiving should be for us – thanking God for His blessings, both past and in the present. As you gather with family or friends this Thanksgiving (or even if you are alone) pause to thank God for His blessings to you. Remember: He has given you everything you have. The Bible says, ‘Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father’ (James 1:17.)

Even if you are going through hard times, thank God for His presence with you. Most of all, thank Him for Jesus Christ, who gave His life so you could have the greatest gift of all – the gift of eternal life. Have you accepted that gift? If not, make this a day of true thanksgiving by opening your heart and life to Christ.” – Billy Graham

Leave it to Billy Graham, the master of evangelism, to direct our thoughts to the core of thanksgiving. We don’t need to ever forget the primary reason we are thankful.

For God so loved the people of the world

that He gave His Son Jesus Christ

to die for our messed up selves

so that whoever accepts, believes, and receives

his gracious pardon and forgiveness

will be restored to fellowship with the God of creation

forever.

This is Thanksgiving on the grand scale. It goes past families eating together. It even goes past the American Pilgrim historical initiation of the holiday. It goes back to God and what He did for you and me.

Jesus loves me.

Jesus forgives me.

I’m thankful.

His Love Endures Forever

Psalm 136:1-3

Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good,
for his steadfast love and mercy endures forever.
Give thanks to the God of gods,
for his steadfast love and mercy endures forever.
Give thanks to the Lord of lords,
for his steadfast love and mercy endures forever

I can’t think of a better way to enter this American season of Thanksgiving than these verses.

Listen to what Charles H. Spurgeon has to say about these verses:

“Thanks is the least we can offer and this we ought to freely give. The inspired writer of this Psalm (song) calls us to praise Jehovah God for all His goodness to us and all the greatness of His power in blessing us.

We thank our parents,

Let us praise our heavenly Father.

We thank others for gifts we receive,

Let us give thanks to God, the giver of all

‘Give thanks to the Lord for He is good, His mercy endures forever,’ is the sweetest stanza anyone can ever sing. What joy there is in this love and mercy, mercy with Jehovah God, enduring mercy, mercy enduring forever. We are ever needing it, trying it, praying for it, receiving it: therefore let us forever sing it.”

Thank you Pastor Spurgeon, prince of preachers. I couldn’t say it any better.

Give thanks because His love for us endures forever!

Poured on Us (Not Ice Water)

Yes, I have been following “The Ice Water Challenge” on Facebook. Many of my friends have had ice water poured on them. And, OK, I admit it; it’s funny to see their reaction. Even the manly I’m not gonna let it get to me men have screamed and danced around a bit. So ladies we’ll let you do it too and not think any less of you.

We Christians have something being continuously poured on us. In fact it has been poured on us so much and we don’t scream and dance around. We might even take it for granted. It’s time to take a moment and enjoy the stream drenching us. And if we want to scream joyously and dance around it’s OK.

Think about this (No, REALLY THINK ABOUT THIS.):

1 John 3:1

·         See, experience, and be aware of !

·         the wonderful, greater than we can understand !

·         agape love !

·         the creator of the universe, our Father !

·         has poured and lavished on us !

·         that He would treat us as His dear children and call us by that name !

·         this place as His child is assured; it defines us; it is what we are !!!

(I know, overuse of exclamation marks. But I’m really really excited!)

And this is being poured on us continually. We are being saturated with love from God every minute of the day. This knowledge makes me want to praise and scream joyously and dance around. But I won’t do it in front of you. Sorry, I know you want to see me do it.

We should, however, live a little more joyously. We should live up to our heritage as a child of God. We should let His love define us.

God’s love

Is being continuously

Poured

On us

Until He Comes

The Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”  For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.         1 Corinthians 11:24-26

This was the passage of scripture My Pastor Wade used last Sunday as we celebrated communion or The Lord’s Supper. I say celebrated because this time we actually celebrated at this breaking of bread ordinance of the church.

Other times we were instructed to focus on His death and what it means to Christians. And there is nothing wrong with that. It brings me to humble tears to remember that Jesus would do this for me so that I can have a relationship eternally with God.

But My Pastor Wade had us focus on the end of verse 26. “Until He comes” This is victory. This is the promise of the ultimate victory over sin in the world. I have victory over sin now but, let’s face it; we live in a broken world. No matter how we go through life there will be disappointments, pain, tragic accidents, wars and unease throughout the world, death, persecution, and on and on with things that challenge our victorious stance.

Someday Jesus will settle it for good. Until then we will continue to remember how He gave us forgiveness and victory over personal sin by His death, burial, and resurrection. Then one Day He will come to relieve this world of forces that physically and emotionally tear us apart. This will be the final victory. “Until He comes, until He comes, until He comes”

Since Sunday I have been acutely aware of prayer request people have given to me. And I have prayed with a renewed victory. Yes, we will have the need to seek and ask our Christians friends to pray vigilantly for the reminders of our broken world and how it heartbreakingly affects us. We will seek God’s merciful hand. We will seek His comfort and peace. We will seek His protection. We will seek His healing. We will come with broken hearts. We will ask, “Why me? Why my family?”  We will urgently make our request. The renewed victory is …..until He comes.

 No More Night  Words & music by Walt Harrah

The timeless theme, Earth and Heaven will pass away. 
It's not a dream; God will make all things new that day. 
Gone is the curse from which I stumbled and fell.
Evil is banished to eternal hell.

No more night. No more pain.
No more tears. Never crying again. 
And praises to the great "I AM." 
We will live in the light of the risen Lamb.

Until He Comes (It’s my new battle cry.)

Trust Test

A couple of weeks ago I wrote about the peace of God guarding my heart and mind as I trust Him. Well, this week was my test of trust in this promise from God. When the doctor calls at 6:30 PM and leaves a message to call the next day you get to spend a whole night wondering what could be wrong.

Then with several miss-communications and a possible surgery thrown in for good measure, I was left with the choice to stand by The Word or eat my words. 

I must say that the trust issue was thrown at me several times. Thankfully and shakily, I put the guard of God’s peace over my heart and especially my mind. And I didn’t try to think of all the diseases I could have. It turned out that the doctor had a good diagnosis for me but I think that it was all a design to see if I will really stand by what the Bible says.

King David of the Old Testament wrote a lot about trusting in God’s protective hand in the Psalms. He was pursued by armies of the King who were commanded to kill him. When he said he trusted in God to protect him, he really did have to trust. He had enemies that threatened his life daily so he had to trust daily.

In Psalm 9:10 David wrote; “Those who know Your name trust You, O Lord, because you have never deserted those who seek your help.

It means:

·         Those who clearly understand  from experience

·         And know God by everything we can know about His character and reputation

·         Trust and submit with confident security for our well-being according to His plan

·         In a Holy God who is in charge of overseeing our lives

·         Because we know that He has never ever failed us, never ever let go of us, and never ever left anything undone

·         So we can urgently inquire and search for His protection in all situations

That is a confident trust. That is the trust we should have as we go through our lives encountering all kinds of what we would call “enemies.”

And sometimes we will get the little trust test. We don’t have to be blindfolded and fall backwards into the hands of mere co-workers. We get to fall into the hands of the God of creation who is holding everything together and still cares about each of us individually.

I passed the trust test this time.

If I stay submitted to His care

I can pass the test the next time too.

Like David, I trust the Lord God who has never ever let go of me.

All Of This Brings You Glory

I have been going along in life pretty secure that I’m supposed to glorify God. It is the chief end of man – To glorify God and enjoy Him forever. I learned that and agree with that creed.

But I was a little “iffy” on what exactly that meant carried out in my daily life. I can find scriptures that glorify God, I can sing songs that glorify God, and I can pray prayers that Glorify God. I just didn’t know how to carry out my day glorifying God without the things I just listed. How does one make toast and glorify God? How does one go through a work day glorifying God? Do I sleep glorifying God? I don’t mean to sound trite and sarcastic. Really, I don’t.  I don’t want to make light of my chief end. I just wasn’t very clear on how to produce the product even though I knew what the product should be. I knew how to do it but not how to be it.

This all was brought about by a chance observation by My Pastor Wade in one of his sermons and a song we are learning for our choir Christmas presentation. My Pastor Wade said we should be teaching this catechism to our children. One of our Christmas songs (In The Highest by David Moffitt, Sue C. Smith, and Krissy Nordhoff) states:

God of wonder, God of light,

King who welcomes shepherds in,

You have cried the tears we cry, and You have walked where we have been.

Battered by this world of woe, we come weak and we come scarred,

Clinging to this simple hope that You will take us as we are.

And all of this brings You glory.

Cry? Walking? Battered? Weak? Scarred? This brings Glory to God? And how will we teach our children to cope with these things as they glorify God?

 So off to my research library I went.

The great missionary, Andrew Murray, wrote, “How can we glorify God? We cannot add to His glory or bring Him new glory. But we can simply allow His glory to shine through us by yielding ourselves to Him, that His glory may manifest itself in us and through us to the world.”

OK, I daily, hourly, minutely (is that a word?) submit to the heavenly Father’s plan for me. I yield to His will not mine. I get that. That clears up the dailiness of glorifying God. That’s gonna be tough to do but it is required. His glory should shine through us to the watching world.

1 Corinthians 6:20 For you were bought with a price (*Christ Jesus paid it with His earthly life): therefore (*honor, value, and submit to Him as God, Savior, and Lord) glorify Him in your body, and in your spirit (*with all of your substance), which are God’s. (*a command, not an option)

*The comments are mine.

John MacArthur says, “That’s the meaning of existence. God made us because He wanted to display His glory. We are display windows from which God wants to reveal His glory to the world as they pass by us.”

(I can explain that to kids. We are a window. When people look in our window they should see God in all of His Glory. So we must keep our window clean. I can even visually illustrate this. Whew.)

We are to live with conscious and even unconscious commitment to being His display window. When people watch us living our lives, they recognize that we are pointing to a God we trust absolutely and believe in wholeheartedly.

So we live, walk, cry, laugh, fall down, get up, sing, make toast, work, and play.

And all of this is aimed at glorifying God.

And all of this brings Him Glory.