Christ's Power to Save to the Uttermost

"Therefore He is also able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them. For such a High Priest was fitting for us, who    is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and has become higher than the heavens;  who does not need daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifices, first for His own sins and then for the people’s, for this He did once for all when He offered up Himself. (Hebrews 7:25-27 NKJV)" 

I have often thanked God for saving me from the sin that separated me from Him. Sin that would have consumed my life if I had no Savior. Sin that results in death, eternal death. Yes, I and many who know our Lord Jesus cannot thank God enough for saving us from sin through His Son Jesus Christ.

As we reflect on salvation in Christ, let us take an even closer look at what it means to be saved out of our sin. We have come to understand what it means...at least in part...but have we come to understand what power has now been granted to those who have received His Spirit as a result of that salvation? For those who have received Christ's sure promise of the Spirit of Truth, our ever-present indwelling Helper...there is even more to understand about what it means to have been saved out of our sin.

Much of my life, I have thanked God for saving me from my PAST sin.  Many of God's children have come to that point of worthy gratitude, for we once stood in our past sin without the curse being removed...a place separated from God. We are right to thank and praise Him for saving us from those specific past sins. But as we grow in knowledge and depth of insight into God's Word, we learn that not only have we been saved from past, specific sins, but that we are saved from SIN, that is the sinful nature that once ruled our bodies. We come to understand that on our best day, where we did far more good than bad, that at the end of that day, we were still sinful because the sin nature of Adam had been transmitted to us upon birth, for we are descended from Adam. We come to realize that as a human born after the fall of man, a disease is now carried by the entire human species that takes life away from every one who was otherwise created in the image of a holy God...and Christ's finished work on the cross has now provided the one and only way to be cured from that disease we know as sin. We come to know that the specific sins that our consciences were so preoccupied with (a blessed conviction) are the symptoms of the much deeper disease. Treating the symptom may make the patient feel better for a time, but if the patient is to live...and not just live but have life to the full!...he must be completely healed of the disease. We come to realize that even when the sinful symptoms have been suppressed, that the disease of our sin nature remained. The proof of this is the very next day when we once again sinned in a specific manner...demonstrating the symptoms once again of this dreadful and cursed disease.

This is a turning point for any Christ follower--the recognition that Christ has not only come to take away our bad records and blemishes, our sins of the past, but He has won the victory of destroying our very sinful nature and the Evil behind it. For every 1 pharmaceutical medication that cures a disease, there are probably tens or hundreds that treat disease, proof that a disease is much harder to cure than to simply treat. Is the same not true of our sin?!  Oh how we strive to treat our sin! But our Father has administered the cure. How many times have we focused our finite human strength on conquering a specific sin or sinful habit? Only to find ourselves soon struggling with sin in another area, or even repeating sins that we thought we once conquered? Have you not experienced this yourself? I suspect that any measure of introspection will lead to this discovery for the regenerated in Christ. Why is it not enough? Why do we continue to fight sin? Because we have tried to conquer in our strength instead of the strength granted by our Lord through His ever-present Spirit. Because in those times when we have worked in our strength to conquer a specific sin, we have been lured into treating a symptom instead of curing the root of the disease. The Evil One is content to tempt and plague the child of God with the next available sin. He is not overwhelmed by us, walking in our strength alone, sending all of our troops and forces, so to speak, to fight one division of His army of temptation...for it gives Him an open attack on the unguarded areas. Hear this vital truth of the spiritual battle: The Holy Spirit has been sent to be enough. The Holy Spirit is not a scarce resource. The Holy Spirit never makes a decision to send some of His energy to fight one battle at the expense of another--our God is infinite! When we invite our Lord to be our everything, only then do we have the ability to conquer our enemy at the root, and to conquer the sin nature that so tenaciously tries to cling to our flesh. We require a Savior who can save to the uttermost, to the core. We require a Savior who does not simply clean us off every time we sin, His power limited to things we've done in the past...a perpetual eraser. Perhaps you and I have thought of our Lord Jesus as such. No, our Lord has the power to save us from the very disease of sin, and from the Evil One. 

Back to the question: Why do we continue to fight sin? If I sinned today, why have my efforts not yielded a total conquering of the sin nature such that the specific sins have ceased? One reason: I am not fully yielded to the Spirit of The Lord, I am not yet fully crucified and identified with Christ. Oh to be fully yielded to the Spirit of Truth, in whom there is only righteousness and no deceit! Oh to be walking in the Spirit, truly praying without ceasing! Oh to love our Lord such that we had only the desire to obey His commands and worship Him! Oh to be fully surrendered to the cross of Christ, such that our entire self identity has died a gruesome death, leaving behind only an identity in Christ! That day is coming for all who have received the Promised One, being sealed for the day of salvation. That day is coming. But if just now you have sinned, let that spur you onward to seek The Lord all the more. To proclaim once again that you are His and His alone. That you are chosen and accepted, cleansed by the blood of the Lamb, once a slave to sin, now a slave to righteousness (Rom 6:16-18)! And therefore you have only 1 master and no other master can claim you: you are Christ's. Though you and your Savior be besieged by Evil, though the battle grows fierce, though you suffer harm and feelings of shame--you cannot be separated from Christ! Our Kingdom stands! The battle is won! "Though the righteous falls seven times, they rise again" (Prov 24:16). This is the power of our Lord granted to those who have been saved by Christ. And not only that, we carry within us the Power not to sin, which is the only true measure of being saved from sin--that we would "go and sin no more" (John 8:11). If we do not hold that power to go and sin no more, than we have only partial salvation, only saved from sins past, but not from the nature of sin that would cause us to sin again. Oh, but we have Christ who does indeed save to the uttermost.

We have carried the Holy Spirit in us since we received Him willingly, yet we have sinned since then. Why? The self is not yet fully conquered, fully surrendered, fully crucified with Christ. And how gracious is our Lord to send us His Spirit to live in communion with us, though we are still not fully sanctified to Him?! If man had conceived of a plan of salvation, surely he would have determined that the Spirit of God could only be granted to those who were fully worthy of perfection. But who would ever qualify? Truthfully, we need God to meet that qualification. Perhaps man would have then decided that instead, upon receiving the Holy Spirit, that the temple must then never be defiled again. That either he no longer had the capacity to sin or if he did sin, he would lose the Spirit of God. We know by observation that the first assertion is not true, for we have retained the capacity to sin after receiving Christ! Even the Apostle Paul cries out in his distress over this truth (Rom 7:14-8:2). And the second assertion that the Spirit would remove Himself from any vessel not still perfect would leave us hopeless...and once again we see perhaps the best scriptural example in the Apostle Paul, for he surely retained the Spirit such that he was empowered to write scripture to tell on himself and his ongoing battle with the flesh.

No, man could not conceive of this plan of salvation on his own. This is a divine master plan. That our perfect God would willingly come to aid us, who are plagued with disease and not fully sanctified to Himself. That He would seal us with the promise of full sanctification and unity. And that He would provide us the power not to sin though granting us such an intimate union with the Spirit that He is said to live within us. Coming to a conclusion, regardless of specific theology regarding salvation and the Holy Spirit, for the sincere in repentance and crying out to God for salvation through Jesus Christ, there is an overwhelming and blessed implication: We have been saved from sin. Not just a sin or sins, but SIN. Not just our pasts, but our futures! Do not misunderstand this: This is not a license to willingly sin knowing that The Lord will, in the future, cleanse us of our future sins after they have been committed (he would still only be an eraser in that case)...this is the opposite...that He has empowered us not to sin, to go and sin no more. He has given us the assurance of being saved from ever sinning again...but He has done it in a way that allows us to reciprocate and be co-laborers with Him. He has not made us robots or forced us not to sin, but instead, through His Spirit, He has empowered us with the strength to defeat the full sinful nature that once reigned over our bodies and to defeat the Evil One altogether.

As Christ-followers, we have each received the full armor of God (Eph 6). We have received the power and divine tools to completely conquer the enemy. But too many of us have taken the armor God has given us and placed it neatly on display in our rooms. We admire it, we may kiss it goodnight and good morning, we may take pride in it and tell our friends so that they can admire it, but too many of us refuse to wield it. I encourage you as Paul did, to PUT ON your armor. It is yours, given to you by our Lord. This is what it means to have received the Power to never sin again AND to choose to use it.

He has empowered us, but we must embrace Him, taking up our cross daily. We must learn to fully surrender to Him. We must learn what it means to truly love Him. So as we give thanks to God for saving us out of sin, let us remember to thank Him for giving us access to the Power to go and sin no more and for saving us from the curse of sinful flesh to the very uttermost. And because of that blessed grace, nothing shall separate us from the love of Christ (Rom 8:35-38). Amen.

Flesh and Spirit: Evidence of a Raging War

This is meant to be a partial examination of the war between the flesh and the Spirit, and I hope that at a minimum it leads you to ask deep questions of yourself and of God, and to search the Word for those answers.

(Written Saturday)

Today was softball day with my Sunday School class.  We play in a league through our church and have a great time, win or lose.  After every game, we always go somewhere to eat lunch together.  At lunch today, a few of my friends and teammates engaged in a conversation that accidentally drove to the heart of the war between flesh and Spirit.

One of my teammates had gotten upset during the game and thrown the bat in frustration at the fence…a seemingly benign outlet of less-than-controlled anger; however, unfortunately, the bat came a little too close for comfort to an opposing player.  The throwing of the bat was quite intentional...it being anywhere near another human being, quite unintentional.  Nevertheless, he had to leave the game and was full of godly conviction immediately after the incident, seeking out the opposing players, officials, and all of our team to own up to his mistake and apologize.  It was great to see everyone forgive and restore him immediately, and I love my brother in Christ today more than ever.

Later at lunch, one of my friends mentioned the scriptural truth that “out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks” (Matt 12:34, Luke 6:45), asserting that whatever things he or anyone utters is a direct reflection of what is inside of us.  We may not want the ugliness of sin to be inside of us, but our mouths give us away.  He therefore concluded that when people say, “I didn’t mean that,” when referring to an action or word spoken, they are incorrect…for in the moment, they did mean it, for their heart meant it, because out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks.  Interesting train of thought that I could neither reject, nor wholly accept.  And my response erked me slightly and made me perk up and search deeper as to why.  Additionally, my teammate who had thrown the bat used his experience from a couple hours earlier to counter the argument, asserting that he by no means meant to hit the opposing player or to throw the bat whatsoever in any display of anger.  He found within himself, in that situation or any other, that the person he believes himself to be is not in tune with those actions and therefore, he could say accurately, “I didn’t mean that,” when referring to an action or word spoken…the opposite contention of my other friend.

As we debated and chimed in, never reaching a satisfying conclusion, it dawned on me that the Word of God speaks exactly to this point.  It is found in Rom 7 and 8, and it must be read slowly, hanging on every word and clause, in order to understand clearly (at least for me, reading it quickly easily leads to getting a little lost and running in a circle):

Rom 7:15-23 - “For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do. 16 If, then, I do what I will not to do, I agree with the law that it is good. 17 But now, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me. 18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find. 19 For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice. 20 Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me.
21 I find then a law, that evil is present with me, the one who wills to do good. 22 For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man. 23 But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.”

In this passage, Paul stunningly and transparently reveals his own personal struggle with sin, an ever present battle, a violently raging war within him.  If this is true of Paul, is it not also true of us and anyone who calls Christ Lord and Savior, being indwelled by the Holy Spirit?

In this passage, I do not want to miss many of the critical truths.  Firstly, Paul astutely recognizes something within him at his core that agrees with God in good (v. 16).  Secondly, he quickly claims this part of him to be his truest self, asserting that it is not him in his truest identity that carries out the sinful act, but instead the sin that dwells within him carries it out (v. 17).  Next, he mentions that the portion of him that is flesh contains nothing good, and that it is distinctively and utterly separate from the part of him that is good, which is the ability “to will” anything contrary to that corrupted flesh (v. 18).  Also, in v. 18, he concedes that within this conflict, he finds no solution on how to conquer the flesh with the will and do what he knows is good, of God, and his deepest desire. 

Going further, verse 21 is perhaps the most insightful because of its careful construction.  Mentioned first is a law…that evil is present within him—the one who wills to do good.  Notice that in this construction, the one who wills to do good is the self.  He has identified and separated his truest self as the part of him that wills to do good, and the evil portion (the flesh) as the imposter, residing simultaneously, but being the counterfeit “self,” and therefore not the self at all.  He reveals next that the “inward man” is his true identity (v. 22), the portion that delights in the law of God.  And finally, the “members”—that is, the flesh—is at war with the “mind”—that is, the inward man, the true identity—and that he is in a certain captivity to this struggle for the time being.

Within this complex communication of ideas is an overwhelming and unmistakable truth: we carry within us as humans on earth, this side of Heaven, warring identities—the flesh versus the Spirit.  Only in the assertion that I am a complex being—made up of multiple parts, distinctively and utterly separate from each other, yet intertwined…flesh and Spirit—only in this view of myself can I claim all that Paul has claimed here.  And once we have fully embraced this truth, we can easily see why both contentions of my friends are true in a sense: “out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks,” and when my mouth speaks sin it is because I myself have fallen to the evil that resides “in my members,” but also “I didn’t mean that” because the truest meaning of the word “I” is my real identity, which is in Christ and the Holy Spirit alone.

Please do not misunderstand me: this is not a cop-out.  “Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? 2 Certainly not! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it?” (Rom 6:1b-2)  The point of all of this is to come to realization of 1. Our true identity as Christ followers is Him alone, made possible by Him alone, and therefore “there is no condemnation” for those of us who are His, and 2. We are being attacked, invaded, and even overwhelmed on a daily basis and therefore, we must fight actively against this law of evil within our present bodies.

Finally, lest we become discouraged, we are affirmed again in chapter 8 of victory and our unassailable identities in the Spirit of Christ, our Lord.  And the power of the passage and exclamation point is what follows next:

Rom 7:24-8:2 – “O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 I thank God—through Jesus Christ our Lord! 

8:1 There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death.”

We would be right to conclude that Paul has revealed that we can easily lose this war and that as long as we live, we will fight it.  Additionally, according to v. 18, we are powerless to be victorious at all in our own strength.  But as we read on in this passage as we have done and hold it up in the light of the Word in its entirety, we see much more clearly that we are “more than conquerors” in Christ (Rom 8:37). 

As long as you and I live on this earth and not in Heaven, we will never cease for evil to reside side-by-side with the Spirit within us, a conflict so violent that without the hand of God to hold us together, it would tear us into a million pieces.  Thus we feel the tension, the conflict, making us cry out in anguish as we sin yet again…and we even have a hard time knowing if we are truly evil or good.  Ah, but the Word is equally as clear about the final outcome, for we know that the law of the Spirit is stronger than the law of evil in the flesh. 

Rom 8:9-11 – “But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His. 10 And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. 11 But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.”

Until our flesh has died and raised up again in Jesus Christ, that flesh will war against the Spirit.  But that’s just it: “Until!”  For the “Until” is not yet present, but is presently coming!  We are assured of victory!  Only because Christ has been raised after death, his flesh united with Spirit as the firstfruits of all to come who believe in Him (1 Cor 15:20,23)…only in that do we have hope of being raised to eternal life.  For in this living body, the war rages, the law of evil within me fights on…but in death of the body, yet alive in the Spirit, we have the assured hope of resurrection to eternal life, a plainly asserted claim of truth in v. 11 of chapter 8.

I hope that through this study, you are encouraged of your true identity if you call Jesus Lord and Savior.  Your identity is the Holy Spirit within you.  Your enemy is the evil that resides in your flesh.  And every day you live in the fiercest battle zone taking direct hits, for we have willingly accepted this battle by receiving a new identity in Christ.  Before knowing Christ and receiving the indwelling Spirit, we had a single, fleshly identity, being fully captive to evil.  But upon receiving Christ in the Spirit, we have immediately declared civil war on the flesh, to the death.  And in this, we have been assured victory at the completion of our lives, such that in final death, we are given full eternal life, according to the covenant promise of our Father God through Christ.  If you believe this, you have already won; though you must still fight the raging battle to the day of your death and wonderful entry into the eternal rest and peace of Heaven.  May we each embrace these truths and be transformed by the renewing of our minds this very day (Rom 12:1).  Amen.

The Power of Redemption - Part 1

When is the last time that you looked at your life and were overwhelmed by the following attribute of God: Redeemer.

Redemption is the reclaiming as good, something that was bad. It is a reversal in esteem. We watch an athlete make a mistake that might cost the team the game, then later we see the same athlete make a play that wins the game for the team and we say, “He redeemed himself!” Yes he did. But what about the times when we just can’t redeem ourselves? What if the game was already over…the deal sealed…helpless to change the outcome ourselves? This is our plight as sinners, for our sinfulness, no matter how infrequent or distant past, has sealed our fates to be eternally separated from God (likely, it is more frequent and not-so distant past). That is, until God made a way through His Son Jesus Christ. Therefore, redemption is in the center of our relationship as sinners with a holy God.

Redemption is more than just forgiveness of sins. It’s more than being saved. It starts there but doesn’t finish there—what follows salvation and forgiveness of sins makes redemption doubly powerful. Think of it—the very same human, the same life, even the very consequences of sin—being made the very things that glorify God and bring joy to the one who was once downtrodden and separated from God by that sin. Not that sin is to be glorified as the cause to the observed effect: glory to God and joy in the heart of the sinner in a life-path once guided by the consequence of sin. No, if it stopped with sin as the only cause to the observed effect, then the end result would be Hell and it would feel as though the life that followed sin’s consequences was Hell creeping into the sinner’s earthly life. This is the life of the unrepentant sinner apart from God.

Upon sinning, our lives immediately change. We fall out of God’s preferred will, which was such splendid intimate relationship with Him, free from the smallest spot of sin. If upon sinning we were to fall to a lesser path and live the life of consequences without the element of redemption entering in, our lives would be an ever-increasing fall into despair and departure from God’s good plans for our lives. But when the same sinner confesses Jesus Christ as their Savior, a truly remarkable thing happens.

Christ is our Savior first, and also our Redeemer. This means that once we have sinned and departed from His path, He not only saves us from Hell, but He restores us to right relationship with Him. The paths our lives take from that moment onward suddenly have purpose that they didn’t have without Him. And remarkably, the consequences that flow from our now blotted out sins become the very things that glorify God.

Here is a personal example. I was once involved in a long-term relationship that we expected to result in marriage. Somewhere in the middle we strayed and the poison of sin in its various forms choked righteous pursuit of God out. The relationship ended with two emotionally shaken people, left in the wake of sinful, self-centered attitudes of children of God who forgot what it was to be set apart for His purpose. If you’ve ever been a part of a relationship that ended because of the mistreatment of each other, you know the feeling of guilt. And if you are a child of God, then the Holy Spirit will convict you of your sin and you will begin to see that you are suffering the consequences in your emotionally shaken state. At this point you may despair of “what could have been, if I’d only followed God!” Indeed. But here is where God’s redemption casts a new hue on the entire portrait of our lives.

(Note on relationships: if you have stopped pursuing God together as #1, there is a serious problem in your relationship. Regardless of what wonderful thing is your focus, even if it is perceived as godly--missions, leadership, family, etc--if pursuit of God falls from your #1 purpose in and of itself, a rift is forming between you and God. I encourage you to recognize it and stop it. For the sake of your earthly relationships, sure, but even more for your relationship with Christ.)

In this example, I expected to be married some years ago. The relationship ended as we lost focus on God, and I later saw the error of my ways. I thought, “now I’m on the plan B path…the aftermath…the life of consequences of sin.” I knew that Jesus was my Savior and that was a comfort. But what about the specifics of my life to come? How could I live, knowing that because of my sin, I forfeited God’s first chosen plan for my life? Well, first of all, I can’t actually make that claim—what God’s chosen plan for my life was or is specifically—but in that moment, this was my feeling (and you may have felt the same way before).

Fast forward 3 years. As a single adult, several opportunities have come my way that could have only happened in the life of singleness. I was introduced to a church small group for singles, of which I later became the leader for 1.5 years—a time of amazing relationship building with both my group members and my Savior. Through one member, I was introduced to another church and their singles ministry, where I was introduced to a mission organization that I went to India with. Through this organization, I have found a new passion and role in God’s kingdom to help rescue, protect, and empower vulnerable children exposed to human trafficking. Additionally, I was given the opportunity to continue to help this organization that brings Christ to a nation that is only 3% Christian (As Our Own, see also blog label "As Our Own"). Furthermore, I now have an amazing network of single men and women that I love, and God continues to use me right where I am…in this “plan B life”…a life that I love and wouldn’t trade for my once perceived “plan A life.” In fact, if these events hadn’t happened, this entire blog probably wouldn’t exist and you wouldn't be reading this—or at least the posts would be very much different. When I trace it all back, every cause and effect as seen by the human eye, I marvel at the power of an amazing attribute of our God—Redeemer. Only by His redeeming power could my life be this rich, this joyous. Only by His redeeming power could my relationship with Him be stronger and fuller. Only by His redeeming power do I now call this my “plan A life!” Not that sin was the right approach—it caused years of pain!—but God is both sovereign and redeeming for those who love Him. Through Christ and Christ alone do I look back with thankfulness, live in present joy, and look forward with eagerness to a life held in the power of redemption. So can you. I pray that you call on Jesus, embrace Him, and experience Him in the same way. Amen.

(continued in "The Power of Redemption - Part 2 - Rejecting Complacency")

Pray It Through - “Lord, I’m asking again…”

Heb 4:15-16 – “For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. 16Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

Have you ever hesitated in God’s presence? Have you ever prayed, confessing your struggles and concerns, but then stopped short of full disclosure? I have.

There are a lot of good reasons that you and I share this experience. I say “good” to mean compelling or logical reasons in the human sense, yet in the end, there is no truly good reason, for we became spiritually deprived in that moment. Deprived of the full power, love, and grace of our beautiful God.

Guilt first keeps us from confessing our every sin and struggle and worry. Just look at the first human encounter of sin in the Garden of Eden to see the “natural” human response to the awareness of sin in God’s presence: “They…hid themselves” (Gen 3:8). They physically hid because of such shame. This feeling of shame or guilt is good in that it demonstrates that we have the righteous wherewithal to recognize sin as sin. Furthermore, Jesus says in Matt 5:4 that “blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.” Have you ever mourned your sin? The healthy outlet for the guilt of sin is spiritual mourning of the separation from God, which is sin, followed by Jesus’ promise of comfort. What a great and gracious outcome!

But going further, I have found myself hesitating in God’s presence when sin isn’t even in question. This is when I am self-conscious of repeatedly asking for the same thing. For you or I, this could be asking for something that we desire in life, or when we have been continuously fighting to overcome temptation, or just keeping our eyes fixed upon Jesus (Heb 12:2), yet we have failed to do so again.

These hesitations can be uniquely different because they are not necessarily sin related, but rather, our hesitation comes from having to once again ask for help. My thoughts are that I should have made more progress by now, but I feel like we’re right back at square one and therefore God must be…disappointed. And I don’t want to disappoint Him. In those moments I want to man up, gear up, armor up, suit up, just get up and conquer those things in God’s name. And I’ve already asked for help like 1000 times. I feel like I need to come back to Him with some progress instead of saying, “Lord I still need your help, I’m struggling…yet again.” You may identify with my sentiment. In fact, these thoughts make a lot of sense, concerning our interaction with those from which we ask for help on earth. How many times could you ask your teacher, professor, or mentor to show you how to do something before they would think you were just un-teachable? How many times could you ask your closest family member for forgiveness for the same wrong-doing before they may think that “you’ll never change?” How many times could you go back to your boss for a project review with no progress, asking again for help to start out on the first steps? In each case, not many times…certainly not as many times as I’ve had to approach God with those exact same requests. We see God as our Teacher, our Mentor, our Father, and even our “Boss,” and we apply what we know about humans in these roles to our perfect God. This of course leads us astray, for we have tried to build a Creator out of the creation. Realizing this, we can more easily understand why this approach is wrong, but we must then apply it to our prayer conversations with Him.

You see, inside, I desire to come back to God with a finished me. I desire to bring before Him a perfect me. I desire to submit myself to Him, a pleasing sacrifice, unblemished and pure. The problem is that of course, I cannot. In fact, I can only become those things by first coming to Him and confessing all my spiritual blemishes, impurities, and imperfections. That includes sin, yes, but it also includes the life-long pursuit of righteousness and purging of selfishness, which does indeed take an entire lifetime—and even an entire lifetime by itself is terribly insufficient because in Christ alone are we made perfect. But we are made perfect indeed (Eph 4:13; Col 1:22, 28). It is why we can come “boldly before His throne” (Heb 4:16). We come humbly, yet confidently before the throne of God and are made pure and perfect by Christ, who is “seated at the right hand of the throne of God” (Heb 12:2). What an amazing instantaneous turnaround.

So what have you been praying to God over and over and over? Don’t stop. Pray it through to completion. Have you not only failed to make progress but even regressed in an area? Then we need Him even more than ever…and He already knows. Until you seek His strength and mercy, you will have neither. But instantly upon seeking Him, you will have both abundantly. Simply seek and find. Ask and receive. Knock and the door will be opened. (Matt 7:7-8, Luke 11:9-10) Have you knocked, entered, then somehow found yourself outside again? Knock again and the door will be opened again. The more honestly and transparently we come, splaying out all that is within our souls to God, the more immediately and gloriously His power of transformation can be realized in you and me. Hold nothing back.

If you’ve had the thought, “well, then it doesn’t matter what I do today, he’ll open the door again,” then you have taken this seriously the wrong way. At that moment, you are only going through the motions of knocking. Let me ask you this: if you show up at my home and hold your hand up in the motion of knocking, never actually knocking in sincerity, never making contact with the door, will I hear you? No, of course I will not, and will therefore not acknowledge you nor let you in. Be careful of “going through the motions.” Make sure you knock with all sincerity, and I assure you God will open His door of love, grace, mercy, healing, and strength wide to you. He has for me. He has for thousands and millions of your neighbors. He has for multitudes upon multitudes since the beginning of time. How do we know this? Start reading the Bible from Matthew 1:1 through John 21:25. It’s the most amazing Truth. I encourage you to read and judge for yourself. But don’t just go through the motions, or you’ll be wasting your time. Read it with the most sincerity you can muster, even as a skeptic. You will find answers. You will have some more questions. Keep digging and you will continue to find new answers and new questions, each bringing you closer to Truth, and along the way you’ll come to realize that there was no greater pursuit in your entire life.

We will be filled

The other day, a friend of mine posted some interesting thoughts on a pertinent topic on her blog: dwelling on the past. The discussion on the blog inspired my own thoughts about the subject and so I've decided to share them here. You can find her blog at http://tishalou-tlt.blogspot.com/.

I have fallen into past dwelling often, as well. I'll use a silly example: after a sporting event (likely basketball, football, or baseball), if I didn't play a perfect game (let's face it...hmmm...that was every game, of course!), I would mull over that one play or plays that I made the slightest of mistakes on. I would replay it over and over in my head...sometimes I would even be up half the night, lying in my bed, wanting to go to sleep, but actually sweating as I saw the play in my head and tried to make the right move...wow, talk about trying to change the past. And I wasn't actually trying to change the past, but I was so fixated on it, that it was all I could see or think about. (visualization actually has a purpose in sports, but this is way off-base from healthy visualization)

That can certainly happen in much more serious situations, as well, and I think many of us have encountered our tendency to do so. What I've found over the years goes back to an old principle that I've heard preachers speak about: have you ever tried to not think about something? Quick, don't think about chocolate..................
don't think about it.............
haha, you're thinking about it! The key to keeping our eyes, ears, and minds off of destructive things (pasts, or present temptations) is not to aim at "not thinking about them," but instead filling your mind with something else. If you dive into a book or flip on the TV, it helps you divert away from what is plaguing your mind temporarily. Going further, sincerely diving into the Word or engaging in fervent prayer is a sure way to divert your thoughts, but with a much greater and lasting result. I would suggest starting your prayer with the very thing you are dwelling on...that past thing...and as you continue to pray, allow your mind to hear God and focus on all those around you that need prayer...and focus on His goodness and pure love. Soon enough, He'll be setting our eyes, hearts, and minds on something much greater--Himself--as well as our present and immediate next step that He wills us to do and to think about.

I think sometimes, earth is like a steady rain...a rain of worldly things, temptations and distractions from God. These rains vary from flooding downpours to light sprinkles, or even to clear, sunny days. But just like the earth and the weather, storms will persist in the coming days and months and years. Ah, but those rains, as well as the sunny days serve a great purpose, don't they? Both are needed for growth, and I think we are exactly the same way. In fact, I know we are exactly the same way, for I have experienced it. I believe there is no coincidence in the innumerable ways that our lives are analogous to such things in all of creation around us--we have the same Creator and we can see His common touch if our eyes are open. I think He loves giving us such "clues," especially when we open our eyes to them.

Additionally, we know we are to be filled by God and His Holy Spirit.

2 Corinthians 4:7:10 -
"But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us. We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed— always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body."

1 Cor 3:16-17 – “Don't you know that you yourselves are God's temple and that God's Spirit lives in you? If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him; for God's temple is sacred, and you are that temple.”

In the previous example of rain storms of the world, we are like glasses, or vessels. An empty vessel will fill up with the nasty rain water, full of the world and its destruction. The key to rejecting the rain is to be filled with something else--the Holy Spirit! Going further, if we leave ourselves exposed haphazardly, though we may be filled, the rain water can still enter in and dilute the good that is in our vessel. Enter the shield of faith and entire armor of God (Ephesians 6:10-18)--covering up the top of us as vesels, so that the Spirit remains pure in us without the diluteness of the world. So never seek to be half full of the Spirit, because then you'll be half full of the world--we don't stay empty, even partially...we will fill with something. We need to seek to be 100% filled with the goodness of God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit!