The past few months have been fairly silent on the blog front. I have been busy. But more than that, I have been emotionally drained. Over the past couple months I lost my grandmother and grandfather as well as numerous smaller things that have left me scratching the bottom of the bucket emotionally. It’s not good for your heart’s tank to run low when you are tasked with pouring into the hearts of others.
It is for that reason, perhaps, that I am a little more grateful that Christmas is here. It is a time that I will be able to slow down a little and process the events that my family have recently experienced. More than that, however, Christmas is a time to remember that it was into our emptiness that God came. He wrapped Himself in flesh and lived in our neighborhood. He experienced all of our trials and burdens and then took upon Himself the weight of our shortcomings, failures, and sin. He who had never sinned became sin for us that we might be righteous. He poured Himself out for us.
He still pours into us. As Psalm 23 promises, he is eager to “restore our souls.” He takes us in our weariness and breathes new life into us.
I pray that you have a Merry Christmas, that your stockings are full, and your hearts are renewed.
Our church has been in the sermon series Dare You to Move through the month of November. I have been speaking to our church about hearing from God, choosing to step out in obedience, and holding on to His promise. I have preached these messages with a sense of expectation. I have expected people to step out and make decisions to trust God. What I didn’t expect was to experience this series in such a personal way.
Over the past few weeks, God has been speaking to me about some things that need to happen in my own life and ministry. They are things that I can see that He has been preparing me for. So the words that I spoke to our church a week ago must apply to me as well:
Life change steps of faith happen when conviction seizes the opportunity to move in faith.
I will be talking more specifically about what these things are in the weeks to come. The point of all of this is, however, that my expectation for God to move amongst our church must begin with the expectation for God to move in me.
In the years that I have been a follower of Jesus Christ I have read through the Bible more than once. I read it, whether briefly or at great length, on a daily basis. I, however, continue to stumble upon verses or passages of Scripture that capture my attention. It’s like finding a gold nugget on a familiar path.
This afternoon I was reading and was struck by the following words:
For the eyes of the Lord range throughout the earth to strengthen those whose hearts are fully committed to him. – 2 Chronicles 16:9 (NIV)
The thought that God is looking for people to strengthen encourages me. When you read the Bible it does not take long to see that God is primarily focused on Himself; not us. His primary objective is to display His own glory. He created us for His purpose. He set forward the work of redemption to secure worshipers for Himself. He will bring all things to an end in order to fulfill His glory.
Yet… He is seeking people to strengthen. He is looking for people in which to pour His power and divine resources. He longs to single out people to build up, encourage, and empower.
And what kind of people is He looking for? …”those whose hearts are fully committed to him.” He is not looking for the best dressed, best educated, or even the best behaved. He is looking for those who have set their hearts on Him; those who are passionate about Him.
In other words, God seeks to bless those who are passionately pursuing the same thing He is… His glory. As I meditate on this text, I am reminded that if I set my heart to seek His gifts I will miss His gifts and may altogether miss Him. However, if I set my heart to seek His glory, I will find His gifts but more importantly I will find Him.
I have been thinking a lot lately about some of the celebrity mess ups that have been the talk of the news.
The beginning of the football season saw the reemergence of Micheal Vick. Micheal went to prison a couple of years ago on criminal charges for promoting dog fighting.
A couple nights ago, Kanye West committed a crime of his own. Maybe it wasn’t one worthy of jail time but he has already been tried and convicted in the court of public opinion. Even the President Obama referred to him as a “jack*ss.” When you are called a name like that by the President you’ve performed a major mess-up.
And I have heard judgmental statements about both of them come out of my mouth and the mouths of many professing Christians. But God has convicted me about that and has used both situations to remind me of something huge.
As God’s people, we are to be agents of redemption. It is not our place to push people down after they’ve tripped. We are the ones called to lift people up. We are to desire the best for people. We are to seek the best for people. Even the Micheal Vicks and Kanye Wests of the world. We are called to love them.
What does that love look like from a Biblical perspective?
1 Corinthians 13:4-8
Love is patient,
love is kind.
It does not envy,
it does not boast,
it is not proud.
It is not rude,
it is not self-seeking,
it is not easily angered,
it keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails.
But what does that look like practically? I think the best question is this:
Would you be more excited to see Micheal Vick go to the Super Bowl or jail cell?
Would you rather see Kanye at the Grammy’s or in the gutter?
More than anything I would like to see both men transformed by God and seeking Jesus… but… your answers to the questions above will say much more about the state of your own heart than the guilt of their actions.
I thought this article was too good not to share. Please read and think deeply.
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The Life-Giving Voice of the Son of God
By: David Mathis
Let’s talk about your resurrection from the dead. If Jesus doesn’t come back before your die, then you will be raised someday—believer or non-believer—by Jesus from the dead, either to eternal joy or to eternal misery.
At least six observations about the final judgment can be made from John 5:25-29:
- Jesus raises all the dead. Michael Jackson and Ted Kennedy will be raised from the dead. And Julius Caesar, Judas Iscariot, Isaiah the prophet, Michelangelo, Johann Sebastian Bach, Adolf Hitler, Marilyn Monroe, Kurt Cobain, and Princess Diana. All the dead who have ever lived will be raised from the dead by Jesus. Millions of Chinese and Nigerians and Indonesians and Germans. And you too.
- Jesus raises all the dead by his mighty voice. He upholds the universe by his mere word and one day will raise the dead just by speaking.
- In a sense, the hour of the resurrection has come. Jesus raised Lazarus as a foretaste of the resurrection he will bring about in its fullness someday.
- The power of the Son of God to raise the dead originates in himself as God. It’s not that the Father is a source and the Son is a channel. The Son has life in himself just like the Father has life in himself. Life comes from the Son, not just through the Son.
- Nevertheless, it is crucial that this Son of God also be human<a son of man<in order to be qualified for his role in the judgment. God deems it fitting that human beings be judged by one who knows what it’s like to be human. And not just human, but one who suffered to deliver the rest of us from judgment. There is something suitable that the one who sentences men to heaven or to hell will be a suffering Savior. The judge of all men will be able to look into every eye and say, “I too was tempted. I too suffered.”
- Finally, eternal life and eternal judgment at the last day will be in accord with our deeds—good or evil. Not ‘based on’ our deeds but ‘in accord with’ our deeds. If we are justified by faith, our faith will produce good works. And our good deeds will be the evidence, the confirmation, the verification at the judgment that we were justified by faith alone.
Someday we all will be raised.
