I was SO convicted!

 I’ve often said that good preachers leave you saying, “What a great sermon!” While great preachers leave you saying, “Wow, what a Christ!”

On that score, some churches have created a culture of guilt. Every sermon preached is judged by how guilty it makes the listeners feel. The more guilty, the better. And if there’s no guilt, the sermon was a dud.In these churches, the guilt is described by the term “conviction.”

Let me illustrate. Jim (25), Bill (28), and Tom (32) are members of one of these churches.

Bill missed Sunday service because of work. On Monday night, he called Jim. Listen to the conversation.

“Hey Jim, bummed that I missed church yesterday. How was it?”

Jim responds, “Dude, it was awesome. I was SOOOO convicted. What a great sermon!”

Bill says, “Oh man, I have to listen to it online.”

Bill calls Tom, “Tom, Jim told me about the sermon yesterday. It sucks that I missed it!”

Tom replies, “The sermon was incredible. I was SO freakin’ convicted!!!”

What’s really going on here is that Jim, Bill, and Tom are addicted to feeling guilty. That’s their motivation for following Jesus Christ.

What they are calling “conviction” is really guilt.

Without a guilt-kick in the pants (which usually boils down to “God is holy, you’re not, so try harder”), their spiritual life would be completely sterile.

Contrast this to a stunning unveiling of Jesus Christ that produces a genuine love for the Lord. And that love becomes the drive and motivation for following and serving Him.

When Christ is unveiled, there is no guilt or condemnation. Sure, there will be times when the Spirit will shine His light on Christ and put His finger on an area of our lives that needs adjustment. Our conscience will be awakened and we’re given the power to adjust it by the Spirit. But that’s not guilt (which is often dubbed “conviction”). That’s the enlightenment of the Holy Spirit.

The Spirit convicts those who don’t know Christ (John 16:8). The Spirit enlightens those who are in Christ.

This is far more than semantics. The revelation of Christ through preaching will produce the freedom of the Spirit, a cleansed conscience, weights lifted (not added), and a heart stirred to love Jesus because of the sighting of His beauty and glory.

This is something radically different from the culture of guilt.

As I argued in Jesus Now, the only people in the world who should NOT live in guilt are Christians. The Christian hangover of guilt and the addiction to it is merely a sign that we haven’t really seen Him who is LIFE and LIBERTY.

- Frank Viola

Why We Can’t Know Why

Various fields of science have taught us that the slightest variation in a sufficiently complex process at one point may cause remarkable variations in that process at another point. The flap of a butterfly wing in one part of the globe can be, under the right conditions, the decisive variable that brings about a hurricane in another part of the globe several months later. (This is called “the butterfly effect.”) To exhaustively explain why a hurricane (or any weather pattern, for that matter) occurs when and where it does, we’d have to know every detail about the past history of the earth—including every flap of every butterfly wing! Of course, we can’t ever approximate this kind of knowledge, which is why weather forecasting will always involve a significant degree of guesswork.

By analogy, this insight may be applied to free decisions. Because love requires choice, humans and angels have the power to affect others for better or worse. Indeed, every decision we make affects other agents in some measure. Sometimes the short-term effects of our choices are apparent, as in the way the decisions of parents immediately affect their children or the way decisions of leaders immediately affect their subjects.

The long-term effects of our decisions are not always obvious, however. They are like ripples created by a rock thrown into a pond. Ripples endure long after the initial splash, and they interact with other ripples (the consequences of other decisions) in ways we could never have anticipated. And in certain circumstances, they may have a “butterfly effect.” They may be the decisive variable that produces significant changes in the pond.

We might think of the overall state of the cosmos at any given moment as the total pattern of ripples made by a constant stream of rocks thrown into a pond. Each ripple interacts with other ripples, creating interference patterns. Every event and every decision of history creates such an interference pattern. This intersection of multitudes of decisions contributes to all subsequent interference patterns.

Each person influences history by using his or her morally responsible say-so, creating ripples that affect other agents. And as the originators and ultimate explanation for their own decisions, individuals bear primary responsibility for the ripples they create. Yet each individual is also influenced by the whole. Decisions others have made affect their lives, and these people were themselves influences by decisions others made.

From this it should be clear that to explain in any exhaustive sense why a particular event took place just the way it did, we would have to know the entire history of the universe. Had any agent, angelic or human, made a different decision, the world would be a different place. But we can never know more than an infinitesimally small fraction of these previous decisions, let alone why these agents chose the way they did.

The question of “Why did this happen to me?” is unanswerable. It’s a mystery. But this mystery is not about God’s will or character (as I argued here); it’s a mystery about the vastness and complexity of creation. Every particular thing we think we understand in creation is engulfed in an infinite sea of mystery we can’t understand. Anything we know about a particular aspect of any particular event that happens the way it does is immersed in endless human decisions, angelic decisions, and various “flaps of butterfly wings” that are too vast and complex to get our minds around.

This is the case not because we are fallen. It’s simply because we are finite. This is why our first and foremost job description involves very little knowing but a great deal of loving. Our limited domain of responsibility is primarily to love God and others as we are filled with God’s love.

—Adapted from Is God to Blame? pages 96-104.  - Greg Boyd

Does God Intervene?

Given the vast influence of angelic and human free will, what influence does God have in determining what comes to pass? While God has an important role to play in anticipating and creatively responding to decisions agents make, is God only a responder? Does he have anything to do with what’s going on in creation?

The question is extremely important because Christianity is founded on the assumption that God can and does unilaterally intervene in the affairs of humans. The biblical portrait of God is one who responds to events. He is a God who at times supernaturally intervenes to alter the course of history and of individual lives.

If we start with Jesus as the revelation of God, we can’t avoid concluding that God intervenes in the world. Indeed Jesus is the supreme instance of God intervening in human affairs. In Christ God became human! If that doesn’t constitute supernatural intervention, nothing does!

Christ’s ministry was centered on demonstrating God’s supernatural power in counteracting the tragic effects of the kingdom of darkness. He announced the kingdom of God was at hand and proved it by supernaturally healing and delivering people from demonic oppression. And he taught us to pray that his Father’s will be done “on earth as it is in heaven.” The rest of the biblical narrative concurs with this perspective, for it is woven around miracles that God performed on behalf of his people, often in response to prayer. From the parting of the Red Sea to the miracles of the early church, the Bible witnesses to a miracle-working God.

From a Christ-centered perspective, God’s ability to break into history is the foundation of our confidence in him. If God can part the Red Sea, become a human being, die on a cross and rise from the dead, then we can trust him to intervene and redeem today’s tragic circumstances. Even more fundamentally, we can trust that he will someday vanquish all his foes once and for all, bring this present age to a close, and set up a kingdom of love that will never end. We are confident that things will not always go on as they are precisely because God is not bound to the natural processes.

—Adapted from Is God to Blame? pages 108-109   - Greg Boyd

When Prayers Go Unanswered

The following excerpt is Greg’s contribution to this book:

_____________________

Two very ill children are prayed for. The first is miraculously healed while the second tragically dies. We understandably want to know why.
Many would claim that this is because God, for some mysterious reason, willed the first to be healed and the second to die. Others would claim that God willed both children to be healed, but the people praying for the second child lacked the faith to receive it. I would contend that both options run into biblical problems, and I know from experience, as do many others, that both sometimes have catastrophic practical consequences.

But are these the only two options?

In Daniel 10, we find God immediately responding to a prayer of Daniel by dispatching an angel to deliver a message. Yet, it took twenty-one days for the message to be delivered (v.13).
Now, suppose we knew nothing more about this episode and asked the question of why it took twenty-one days for God to answer Daniel’s prayer.

Some would answer that God, for some mysterious reason, simply willed His answer to take this long to reach Daniel. Others would answer that Daniel must have lacked sufficient faith to receive the answer until the twenty-first day.

Both would be wrong. The reason for the delay had nothing to do either with God’s will or the
strength of Daniel’s faith. The angel rather, explained to Daniel that a principality and power over Persia resisted him for this period of time, and it wasn’t until Michael the archangel got freed up to help him get God’s message through (v.13).

From this episode (and a host of other Scriptures), I believe we should learn that God’s will and our faith are not the only two variables that affect the outcome of prayer. The world is far more complex than that!

God decided to populate this world with human and angelic free agents, and as the “Prince of Persia” demonstrated in Daniel 10, this gives us a degree of “say so” to affect what comes to pass – even at times, to the point of interfering with God’s will.

In fact, every decision free agents make to some degree affects what comes to pass in the present and future, including sometimes, the “if,” “how” and “when” a prayer gets answered.
So think about this. This means that, to understand why any event unfolded the exact way it did, we would have to know every single human and/or angelic decision ever made that influenced the event unfolding the precise way it did. And this applies as much to the question of why God’s response to our prayer unfolded the way it did as it does to why any other event unfolded the way it did.

Since we obviously can’t begin to know the innumerable past free decisions that lead up to any given present event, we must accept that. Unless God reveals it to us, we simply cannot ever answer the question of why.

Yet, it’s vitally important we realize that the reason the why question is unanswerable is not because God’s will and character are mysterious, for these are clearly revealed in Jesus Christ. Rather, “why” questions are unanswerable because the world is infinitely more complex than our little brains can handle.

When faced with the question of why prayer saved one child but not another, I encourage you to not blame God or the victims by assigning the child’s death either to God’s will or to someone’s lack of faith.

Let’s rather openly acknowledge that we simply do not know. But in acknowledging our ignorance, let’s celebrate the one thing we do know: namely, that God is as good and beautiful as He is revealed to be in Christ.

Fall From Grace

The Origin

Like so many of our English idioms, “fall from grace” originates in the Bible and is a direct quote from the King James Version. In his letter to the Galatian church, the Apostle Paul warns “Christ is become of no effect unto you, whosoever of you are justified by the law; ye are fallen from grace.” Or, in a more modern translation, “You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace.”

Of course that fall is a consequence of the very first fall from grace, the one where Adam and Eve chose to sin against God, plunging themselves and all of humanity into a state of sin, of disorder, of chaos. The whole of the Christian faith is concerned with this fall from grace and how those who have fallen can be restored. Now Paul is warning this church against legalism, against thinking they can be restored to favor with God on the basis of their adherence to the law. He knows better. He knows that the law brings only captivity. “For freedom Christ has set us free;” he says. “stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery” (1). If they reject righteousness by a gift of grace to pursue righteousness by works of the law, they will fall—fall from any hope of experiencing God’s grace.

The Application

Deep within the sinful human heart is the knowledge that we have fallen from grace, and with it the conviction that if the fault is ours, so too is the remedy. We naturally believe we can and must be made right with God by our often efforts. Grace is too good, too foreign, too unbelievable for our minds and hearts to receive. And yet the Christian gospel calls us to abandon our own efforts and instead to embrace the work of Christ. The restoration can’t originate from within so it must originate from without. John Stott explains it well: “You cannot add circumcision [as the ultimate sign of law-keeping] (or anything else, for that matter) to Christ as necessary to salvation, because Christ is sufficient for salvation in Himself. If you add anything to Christ, you lose Christ. Salvation is in Christ alone by grace alone through faith alone.”

We have all fallen from grace. Paul says elsewhere “For the wages of sin is death.” Our fall has taken us from grace to alienation, death to life. Thankfully, wondrously, he goes on: “but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Grace is there for those who will surrender their own efforts at righteousness and instead grab hold of the righteousness of Christ. No wonder, then, that so many Christian songs celebrate the beauty of grace, for grace is all we have.

Concrete For Rebar

I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.–Philippians 4:13

Did you know there is no strength in concrete? The strength is in the steel the concrete encapsulates. A building that is only concrete will quickly crumble, and a building that is only steel will move and bend. The concrete is not the strength but holds the real strength, the steel, in place. The same is true of the body’s skeleton being held in place by the muscles and skin. Likewise, Jesus in me is my steel; His will is the steel and my will is the concrete. When I choose, the concrete is poured and it sets, after which the steel will not move. His love in me is the steel, but I must set it in place by my will. I choose Jesus in the situation. I hear His words and I set the concrete in place by an action of my will. The believer, upon being offended, yielding, and hearing His voice, now sets the whole thing by taking one step forward and hugging the person, saying, “I love you.” It was Jesus in him loving, but the Christian set the whole thing in motion by a choice.Next, the believer feels the concrete set, the strength of the steel is revealed, and the believer actually experiences supernatural love. Wonderful! It does no good to withdraw and wait to get stronger; these are faith decisions resolved in a believer who learns that Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Choice is merely setting the concrete around the steel that is in him.

Does this mean that Jesus needs me? Yes! Many are repulsed by the thought of Jesus in need, but He showed us that He lived His whole life in need.God created the world and gave dominion to man. In so doing He is bound to work through man.Jesus had to become a man; it was the plan from the beginning, the lamb slain from the foundation of the world (Revelation 13:8). He needs those--the concrete--that will choose Him to be expressed through them.

“Jesus in me is my steel.”  This makes perfect sense to a Christian who possesses the Mind of Christ and is operating in His Soul.  And the picture for Life is clear when associated with the concept of “Concrete For Rebar.”  We see with our spiritual eyes what He can and will do for us.

We experience Him when we CHOOSE to.  LIFE for a Christian is an uncomplicated, easily-experienced adventure when choosing Jesus is done.

Here’s a seldom thought-of fact: Christians GET to choose Jesus for His Life each moment, but Unbelievers don’t have that choice (they don’t have Jesus).  Unbelievers can only choose/draw from the Natural Soul (natural mind, natural will, natural emotions) they were physically born with.  Christians get to choose to live from Christ’s Soul.  Well, amen.

False Gods in the Church

 We often think of an idol as a statue, but an idol can be anything we use to meet the needs that only God can meet. In other words, a false god.

There is no end to the false gods we create. In Western cultures we often strive to feel worth and significance by acquiring money, possessions, and power. We bow down to the false gods of materialism and control. Some try to relieve their inner emptiness by trying to get approval for being sexy, talented, or successful. They bow down to a false god of fame. Some feed their hunger for life by convincing themselves they’re special to God because they believe all the right things and engage in all the right behaviors—in contrast to others who believe the wrong things and engage in all the wrong behaviors. These bow before the false god of religion, which is one of the ways that idols end up in the church.

When we chase after false gods, we seldom realize what we’re doing. We don’t think of it as idolatry. In fact, it’s possible to bow to false gods while believing you’re bowing to Jesus Christ. What we believe often has little to do with reality.

In the West, we tend to attach great importance to what we believe. This seems to be especially true of Christians. We treat beliefs as though they have magical power, as though merely believing something makes it so. For instance, many assume that believing Jesus is Lord of their life magically makes him Lord. This is undoubtedly why so many evangelical churches spend an exorbitant amount of energy getting people to make a one-time confession of belief.

The truth is, merely believing Jesus is Lord no more makes him Lord of my life than believing Vladimir Putin is the president of Russia makes me his follower. For Putin to be my leader, I would need to submit my life to him and become a citizen of Russia. Likewise, for Jesus to be my Lord, I need to submit my life to him and become a citizen of his Kingdom.

This does not mean that beliefs are not important. Obviously it’s impossible to surrender to Jesus unless you first believe that he is Lord. Still, the belief is not itself the surrender. Embracing a belief is something you do in your mind. Actually surrendering your life is something you can only do with your will.

The important question, then, is not what you believe. The important question is what you decide to do, moment-by-moment, on the basis of what you believe.

—Adapted from Present Perfect, pages 46-48 - Greg Boyd

Religion that Blinds Us to God

For a variety of reasons, many Jews at the time of Jesus had come to believe that heaven had been closed since the writing of the last book of the Old Testament. God was distant and no longer active among his people. Their religion focused on holding fast to the law God had given in the past and various religious interpretations and traditions that had been developed from that law. While God had originally given the law as a means of fostering a living relationship with him, these people had made the law an end in and of itself. Rather than getting their life and worth from the God who gave the law, they were attempting to get life from the law itself.

In other words, religion had become a substitute for the living God.

This is one of the reasons these Jews couldn’t see that God was present in Jesus Christ. All they could see was a man who didn’t follow the religious rules. For example, Jesus offended them by healing and feeding people on the Sabbath and by hanging out with people with scandalously sinful lifestyles. They couldn’t see the beautiful way this revealed a God who cares more about people than rules. Because they were trying to get life from their religious tradition, they missed the beauty of what God was doing right in front of them.

In an attempt to help these misguided people get freed from their religious blindness, Jesus once responded to their criticism of his healing a man on the Sabbath by saying, “My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I, too, am working” (Jn 5:17). God hadn’t stopped being active, Jesus was saying. He’s always been about his work, and never more so than in the miracle Jesus had just performed.

It wasn’t that God had stopped talking and working. These people had simply stopped listening and looking.

If we are not careful, our own religion can blind us to the ever-present God. Instead of relying on the living God to give us the worth and significance we crave, we can easily start relying on religious traditions, doctrines, and ethical rules in order to get life. We feel like our life is worthwhile and significant because we are right—as opposed to all those who are wrong. The more tightly we cling to our religion, the more our judgments will blind us to the living God who is always active right under our noses.

Instead of rejoicing that God has just healed a man, we might find ourselves offended that one of our religious rules was broken.

Traditions, doctrines, and ethics are important. But they help us participate in the life God has for us only to the extent that they facilitate a loving relationship with God, ourselves, and others.

The Father is always doing his work, which means the time to look for the Father working is now. The place to look for the Father working is here. And the people in whom we must look for the Father to be working are ourselves and whoever we happen to encounter.

—Adapted from Present Perfect, 132-134  - Greg Boyd

Chicks!

All of us love baby chicks!  Barbara and I cannot go to a couple of hardware and country stores in our town at certain times of the year without checking to see if they have any baby chicks in the store.  They are so cute…so tiny…so vulnerable.  The last time we saw some there was one little chick being attacked by others in the container…I looked for a store employee who came and “rescued” the little fellow.  Chicks need nurturing and protection.  Jesus speaks of this in today's text…

Chicks!

O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were unwilling. --Matthew 23:37

An interesting thing about eggs is that not every hatchling is equally successful. One chick will come out first, a second starts out painfully slowly, one can only get his head out, and some never come out. Yet all are given birth by, and loved by, the mother. I have noticed the same thing to be true in Christians. Some come in glory, some struggle, some never come, and some just die. I am saying this only to acknowledge my ignorance; I neither have answers nor believe faith calls for answers. I have engaged in discipleship all these years and have found believers I could place in all of the above categories, for I know there are those who love Jesus and just do not get very far. The legalists would call them lost.Yes, they will straightforwardly call them lost until they find in their own families those who are “lost.” Any who have ever had a suicide or an early death among their loved ones know what I am talking about. I have personally known people who committed suicide. I will not say that most of them were unbelievers. To me, they were believers who just could not get any more than their heads out of the shell; for a variety of reasons they just never could rise above their circumstances, lying emotions, or the voice of the enemy. Yet I believe that I will see them in heaven. Others may have a different opinion. Remember, I am not saying that I understand; I am only making observations. Anyone who has risen above difficult things in his own life should ask why; what was it that enabled him to do so? I do not believe he will rightfully credit anything other than the grace of God. Well, amen. I believe that all the chicks were given birth by and loved by the Father.

In this day’s writing Michael draws our attention to a very interesting scripture.  Its context is Christ talking about “the teachers of the law and the Pharisees” and the seven “woes” to them He mentions just prior to our text verse…for abusing the people.  In all, Jesus speaks of the “loading down” and “wearing down” of the people instead of edifying and being constructive in their teaching and “ministry.”  The end result: people in bondage.  Jesus always wants to come and bring freedom and protection.  Jesus is a 180-degree difference from these teachers and Pharisees.

Notice two crucial items Jesus mentions:

1. the legalists kill and stone THE PROPHETS & THOSE SENT TO THE PEOPLE

2. I wanted to gather your children and YOU WERE UNWILLING

God SENT the prophets and others to teach, guide, and protect.  The legalists hated them, and were UNWILLING to let the people hear them.  No wonder our Lord had such disdain (Webster Dictionary: “a feeling of strong dislike or disapproval of someone or something you think does not deserve respect”) for these religious leaders.

And Michael points out legalists he has known who have called those who commit suicide as “lost/unbelievers.”  I love and appreciate Michael saying “I will not say most of them were unbelievers…they were believers who just could not get any more than their heads out of the shell…”  I know Michael had that perception and understanding because he believed and taught that being a believer/Christian is about the new birth, not anything we do in this life.  Legalists who call someone who has committed suicide an unbeliever raise all sorts of doubts about their ever having been spiritually born again.  All “chicks” who are a Christian have been “given birth by and loved by the Father”!

And Michael points out three aspects of life that can be difficult, if not devastating:

1. circumstances

2. lying emotions

3. the voice of the enemy

These three are why the teaching of Michael Wells IS SO important for the multitudes around the world who have been misled and mistreated.

And Michael gives us the bottom line as to how those who have been fortunate to rise above such difficulties should respond and reply:

         “Anyone who has risen above difficult things in his own life should ask why;

         what was it that enabled him to do so? I do not believe he will rightfully

         credit anything other than the grace of God.”

Oh, how sweet, Amazing Grace.  Unfathomable riches of God.

What is Faith?

Faith is a Person.

Many people see faith as a sort of currency we spend with God to get what we want or need from Him. The more of it you have, the bigger things you can buy. Many have blamed themselves for not having enough faith when things didn’t turn out the way they had prayed and hoped they would. In one church, I was told that the pastor’s wife had recently died because she didn’t have enough faith to be healed. Others blame their lack of faith for unfulfilled desires about finances, relationships, career advances, family struggles, and countless other things.

To these people, faith is something to be spent for gain, and if you don’t have it, you lose.

To take such a viewpoint seriously leads the logical mind to ask, “How, then, am I supposed to have more faith?” To be told “Just have faith” sounds reasonable to the one saying it, but to the person hearing those words, it feels easier said than done. How are we supposed to wholeheartedly believe for something that we simply aren’t sure is going to happen in our lives?

The challenge to have more faith about a specific outcome is often nothing more than a religious promotion for positive thinking.

It becomes a matter of faith in faith. It is a subtle but effective use of misdirection. Nothing is wrong with positive thinking, but don’t mistake it for faith.

People experience authentic faith when their focus is on the Faithful One. Faith is not wishful thinking enhanced by the steroids of positive expectations. Faith is confidence in the One who does all things well. Faith is the plain recognition of the presence of the One who determines and directs every outcome of every situation we will face in life. Faith is certainty based on the Person who is in charge of our circumstances regardless of the predicament we may be facing. In fact, our faith finds its very existence in that Person.

Faith Is a Person

Faith doesn’t originate from us. The question is not whether your belief is big enough or strong enough or pure enough to receive the outcome you want. Faith is about Jesus! He doesn’t hope for a certain outcome. He knows. You’ll be much better off leaning into His faith than trying to crank out your own.

We depend on His faith because only His faith is perfect and never fails.

Our trust is in Him because He is more than sufficient for every need we have and every obstacle we face in life. The faith you have isn’t based on your ability to conjure up enough positive vibes to get the job done. It’s not about us at all. “In Him we live and move and exist,” Luke wrote in Acts 17:28. That environment of perfect faith is a good place to live.

It is the faith of Christ that is ours. It is vicarious faith. He believes on our behalf, so all we need to do is trust Him. We don’t need to pray for faith. In Him we already have it. What we can muster up on our own isn’t enough to move a grain of sand. If you doubt me on that, just try it.

It isn’t your job to manufacture faith.

He (Faith) lives inside you and is more than able to rise to the occasion when faith is required, which is at every moment of life. Just as Jesus is your righteousness, peace, strength, and joy, so is He your faith. The union you share with Him is your only source for faith.

The revelation of this truth will free you from trying to believe in your own strength. It will cause you to know that it isn’t your faith that matters. In fact, there is no such thing as “my faith” because my faith is His faith, and His faith is based on His Father’s faithfulness. The vicarious faith of Jesus Christ is your faith. What a relief!

- Steve McVey

Is Hypergrace Biblical

Hypergrace, according to a mainstream Christian news magazine, is a dangerous and unbiblical teaching. By proclaiming the unconditional love of God and forgiveness for all, hypergrace preachers have taken grace too far. We have made grace unbalanced and radical.

Hypergrace, apparently, is unbiblical. It’s a modern invention based on a few scriptures taken out of context, and it does not reflect the whole counsel of God.

This claim – that hyper or extreme grace is unbiblical – is easy to test. All you need is a Bible.

Six pictures of God’s grace

In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace. (Ephesians 1:7)

God is rich in grace, but how rich is he? The word for riches in this verse (ploutos) is the same word used to describe God’s wisdom and knowledge (Rom 11:33). God is as rich in grace as he is in wisdom. How wise is God? He is exceedingly wise! He is hyper-wise. As for one, so for the other. Limit God’s grace and you limit his wisdom.

And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. (Ephesians 2:6-7)

Other translations refer to the “full wealth,” “extraordinary greatness,” and “immeasurable (limitless) riches” of God’s grace. According to this scripture his grace is surpassing and incomparable meaning “it can’t be compared with anything else” (NIrV). Whew. Calm down, Paul, you’re getting carried away! Your epistle is unbalanced and extreme.

And God is able to make all grace abound to you (2 Corinthians 9:8)

The word abound (perisseuō) means overflowing as in “more than you need.” It’s the same word used to describe the leftovers after Jesus fed the 5000. Excess food reveals excess grace. God gives you grace for your need and then he gives you extra grace that you don’t need until you are overflowing and spilling grace all over the place.

In other words, God is generous to the point of lavish wastefulness.

For if by the transgression of the one, death reigned through the one, much more those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ. (Romans 5:17)

The abundance (perisseia) of grace doesn’t sound that impressive in English but it’s super-impressive in the original language. The word literally means super-abundant. What superman is to man, superabundant is to abundant. Read it literally and Paul is talking about the superabundance of God’s favor, which is an apt description of God’s exceeding, incomparable, and over-the-top grace.

The Law came in so that the transgression would increase; but where sin increased, grace abounded, all the more (Romans 5:20)

Paul uses the same word as before – the one that means super-abundant – and adds the prefix huper or hyper, which means over, above, and beyond (huperperisseuō). So if you think God’s grace is super-abundant to the point of superfluous excess, you are halfway there. And if you think it’s hyper-, you’re getting warmer but you’re still not quite there, for Paul literally preaches a hyper-super-grace!

The grace of our Lord was poured out on me abundantly (1 Timothy 1:14)

Yes, it’s the same old word in English but English is a woefully poor language for describing the extraordinary riches of God’s grace. Here we have another compound word, huper (over, above, and beyond) plus pleonazō, which means to increase or super-abound. As with his letter to the Romans, Paul literally describes God’s grace as hyper-super-abounding.

If we are to agree with the Bible, we should speak about grace the way the Bible does. We should use big, hyperbolic words and flowery phrases like this:

The grace (unmerited favor and blessing) of our Lord [actually] flowed out superabundantly and beyond measure for me… (1 Timothy 1:14, AMP)

Biblical grace is hyper

The apostle of grace demolishes the notion that hypergrace is an unbiblical or modern message, and we’ve only looked at six scriptures.

We have not examined the extreme grace of a God who loved us while we were sinners (Rom 5:8), who took the legal charges against us and nailed them to the cross (Col 2:14).

We have not considered the hypergrace significance of the cross and the empty tomb. On account of grace and at great personal cost, God tore up the books recording our sins (2 Cor 5:19).

Nor have we considered the testimony of a universe that is inexplicably expanding at an ever-increasing rate because it isn’t yet big enough to contain all the good things a hypergrace God has planned for us.

To suggest that God’s grace is less than hyper is unbiblical and blasphemous. It’s like saying God is good but he’s not that good, he’s wise but not that wise. Diminish grace and you diminish God.

Get your understanding of grace from Christian magazines, and you can be forgiven for thinking that hypergrace is bad, modern, and unbiblical. But read the Bible and you will see that hypergrace is a small word for describing an extraordinary reality: The One who sits upon the throne of grace is exceedingly rich in grace and he has poured out his measureless grace upon you!

Hypergrace preachers have not taken grace too far. On the contrary, we have not taken it far enough. We have not begun to scratch the surface of God’s goodness towards us.

Bubbles Eventually Burst

By Anabel Gillham

For we have brought nothing into the world,
so we cannot take anything out of it either.

I Timothy 6:7

There’s nothing quite so helpless as a new born baby. He (she) is totally at the mercy of those who are caring for him. If his caretakers are loving, kind, compassionate, conscientious, tender, and gentle with him, his world turns at an acceptable, smooth, steady pace. Take any of those six things away from that infant, and his world starts rocking–he cries, and tries to get someone to love him, be kind to him, have compassion on him, wait on him patiently, hold him tenderly, and speak to him gently. He has nothing in his hands (which he has not as yet discovered can hold things) and he doesn’t have a single bag of “stuff” that he calls his own.

But wait. There is someone else very much like this new born babe: An old person who depends solely on those around him to care for him. In the same way, he needs a loving, kind, compassionate, industrious, tender, gentle person. And that pretty well sums up his needs. He doesn’t have anything in his hands either–not because he hasn’t discovered those hands, but because he has discovered that he can’t hold anything any longer. He may have two or three bags of “stuff” that he used to cling to tenaciously, but that “bag of stuff” has no meaning to him any longer and he probably can’t even remember what’s in the bag!

We shouldn’t be surprised at this turn of events. Timothy tells us that this is what to expect: We brought nothing into the world, so we cannot take anything out of it either.

There have been cultures that buried a person’s most precious possessions with him, believing that these would bring happiness to that person in the world to which he had moved when he left everything behind.

“Things” make life here on Planet Earth more comfortable, they give us security, they give us an identity, and they enhance life with more “fun.” There’s nothing wrong with that. It is just that I must realize that my “things” bring very temporary comfort, questionable security, a fragile identity, and the character of “fun” changes with every year added to our personal calendar.

I find it difficult at times to accept the truth about Anabel’s life as it is now. There are things I used to have a passion for–boating, skiing, hiking, hitting the ball back and forth at the tennis court (I hesitate to call what I did tennis), biking, outside activities of any kind, working up a good sweat out in the yard, painting all the rooms in the house and probably tackling the house, too! New Year’s Eve meant staying up all night with friends playing silly games and finishing the celebration with bacon and eggs at someone’s house for breakfast! My definition of “fun” at this time in my life is very limited–and don’t make any smart remarks–you’re heading in the same direction! It is New Year’s Eve and we’re usually with the crowd until at least 12:01! Tonight I am very content being here in my warm house, pajamas on, and ready to crawl into bed around ten or eleven and read for just a while. That can’t be! Not me! Anabel? Isn’t that unbelievable?

Oh well, I knew this would happen–Timothy (and hundreds of others in the same boat with me) told me this was inevitable!

But not to get alarmed. I have seen the futility of keeping watch over my bag of stuff; I have Someone taking care of me who is the epitome of kindness, tenderness, gentleness, is aware ofmy every need, and Who loves me dearly. I have an identity that cannot be taken away from me even if I’m in a comatose state in the nursing home, and I am going to be moving one of these days to a place that He has prepared just for me! Do you see why I can say–“Don’t fret! It’s okay! Everything is going to be all right!”

Thanks, Timothy, for the words of wisdom that you penned those years ago. As I live on this Planet Earth with all the other people, I’m finding your words to be totally true! And thank You, Lord, for loving me and taking such good care of me. I anticipate seeing what You have fixed up–just for me!

Christ Died For ALL.

Christ Died For ALL.

What happened at the cross? The obvious thing that most people mention first is that Jesus put away the sins humanity had committed against God. But if that were all Jesus had done, we would still have a big problem. Sins were the symptom of a deeper problem—man’s utter confusion about God’s identity and about his own. That darkened understanding came from Adam. It is a darkened mind, doomed to produce sinful actions. What good would it do to deal with the fruit and leave the root intact? Our minds had to come alive to the truth of what Christ has done and who we are.

So Jesus also had to do a second thing at the cross.

Not only did the sins of Adam’s race need to be put away, but Adam’s race itself had to die. As long as the family of Adam continued to live, nothing else could happen other than sin. Embracing the identity of a sinner can produce nothing but sinful actions. Mankind didn’t simply need to stop sinning. We needed the source of sin to be put to death. Cleaning up a flooded room does no good if you don’t stop the leaking faucet.

So that is exactly what Jesus did. He took on Adamic humanity, drawing it into Himself on the cross so we would die with Him. Jesus wasn’t the only one who died on the cross that day. You died with Him!

The question is, who else was included—only believers, or does this act of Jesus on the cross include everybody?

The Bible answers this clearly. “The love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that one died for all, therefore all died; and He died for all, so that they who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf” (2 Corinthians 5:14-15). For whom did Jesus die? Twice in this text, Paul wrote that He died for all.

Does all really mean everybody?

Some suggest that the word all doesn’t always mean everybody, and they are correct. The Bible sometimes uses the word in a generic sense. For example, the Bible says that all Judea went out to be baptized by John in the Jordan (Mark 1:5). Obviously, not everybody in Judea was baptized. The word there means, “all types of people.” It’s like saying, “Everybody eats at that restaurant.” We don’t literally mean everybody. We’re using the word in a general sense.

On the other hand, the word can also mean each and every person. The question is, did Jesus die for all types of people or for each and every person? I believe the latter to be the case. The Scripture says, “But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honor; that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man” (Hebrews 2:9 KJV). He didn’t just die for all kinds of people.

Jesus tasted death for every person.

Look again at the verse in 2 Corinthians 5. “One died for all.” Who is the One who died for all? That’s Jesus. Who are the all? That’s everybody.

Paul goes on to say, “Therefore all died.” Is it the same all? Of course it is. The verse clearly teaches that the same ones for whom Jesus died are the ones who died with Him. Jesus died for Adam’s race, and that same race (humanity) died with him.

What He accomplished on the cross is real regardless of whether we know it or believe it.

You and your decision didn’t cause your co-crucifixion with Christ. Jesus and His finished work accomplished that. Let’s not say we believe that everything is centered in the cross and then turn around and contend that the cross means nothing until we believe it. Let the credit rest where it belongs—on Jesus.

Does this then mean everybody is a Christian? No, it doesn’t.

A Christian is a believer in Jesus Christ. Rather, it means that the success of the finished work of Jesus Christ on the cross doesn’t depend on human beings casting a vote in His favor. When He cried out, “It is finished,” He meant it. There is nothing we need to do to deal with the problem of sin. Jesus has already done it. All need only to believe it and receive it so that our experience aligns with the eternal reality of His successful work on our behalf.

Our sins and our sinful nature were both crucified with Him that day.

We aren’t included in the crucifixion of Jesus at the moment we believe. “I have been crucified with Christ” regardless of whether I have faith in Him. My belief doesn’t make it real. Humanity’s co-crucifixion with Jesus on the cross is real whether we believe it or not. Watchman Nee wrote, “It is the inclusive death of the Lord which puts me in a position to identify myself, not that I identify myself in order to be included. It is God’s inclusion of me in Christ that matters.” Which, then, is the correct order?

Do we believe and then become included in His death, or we are included and then believe?

Nee rightly answers that we are not included because we believe. We believe because we are included, and that is what matters. Faith doesn’t make it happen. We died with Jesus, and the old Adamic nature was destroyed. It happened! We all died with Him—that’s a historical fact regardless of whether we have faith. Faith doesn’t manufacture anything. It simply sees what already exists and is real whether we see it or not. We all died with Jesus, and that is a fact.

- Steve McVey

Can a Christian Be Demon Possessed? No!

So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. –John 8:36


1.       There is never a hint in Scripture that the solution to a believer's problem is demon  
          possession. The Epistles deal with a variety of practical problems from self-
          righteousness to unrighteousness, and nowhere is the casting out or denouncing
          of demons given as a solution.

2.       For the unbeliever the condition of internal demon possession is dealt with by
          casting out the demon. For the believer, the external works of the enemy  
          (temptation and false doctrine) are to be resisted and stood against.

3.         The Greek word for demonization (daimonizomai) is translated "to be possessed by a demon." In context, it is translated as one who has a demon dwelling in him. The word is only used in the Gospels. Those who believe in the possibility of demon possession of Christians often make the distinction between possession in the spirit of man, possession in the soul (mind, will, emotions), and possession of the body. However, Jesus makes it clear that casting out the demons is analogous to casting out the inhabitants of a house (Matthew 12: 28, 29, 43-45). I Corinthians 6:19 states that the body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, and Paul there speaks of the body, not the soul or spirit, for the body encompasses all. How, then, can it be said that the demon could be in the body of the believer but not in the spirit? The body is the Lord's. John tells us that "greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world" (I John 4:4). A demon cannot enter a believer and take over, for it is God's house the demon would be attempting to enter. Remember when the High Priest went with fear and trembling into the Holy of Holies? Are we to believe a demon can enter the Holy of Holies established in the believer?

4.         There are many passages that declare that Christ's victory over Satan is so complete that Satan cannot come back and take (possess) the believer (John 17:15; I John 5:18; II Thessalonians 3:3).

5.         The concept of worship, by its very nature, involves the giving of attention to the respected being. Many believers devote precious time focusing on the work of Satan, hence, in some type of convoluted manner, worshipping him. So much time is spent binding, rebuking, and casting out demons that could have been spent worshipping Jesus. People that constantly focus (worship) on the demonic have an oppressed look, which they take as a proof of the great battle they are in, though the battle has already been won by the only One worthy of the fight. They have the countenance they have earned from not setting their minds on the things above.

6.         "If only you had seen what I have seen!" This appeal to experience falls flat. Traveling as I do, I have seen things that I would not even pen. Though I saw them, neither Scripture nor the Holy Spirit testify to their likelihood; they merit only the trash bin. It must be recognized that Satan is a liar through and through.

7.         There is the problem of categorizing as demons the deeds of the flesh listed in Galatians 5. The flesh cannot be cast out but only denied by taking up the cross. I asked a question of a pastor who was casting demons out of believers: "You claim to be casting out by name attributes that Scripture identifies as the deeds of the flesh. That cannot be done. In six months what are you going to tell that eighteen-year-old boy when his hormones are surging and he is once again lusting? Will you tell him the demon of lust returned?” His answer surprised me: "No, then we will tell him to abide!" Obviously my next question was: “If abiding works, then why would it not work in the beginning?” If the desire is to confuse and oppress, tell a believer who is struggling in mind, will, or emotions that his problem is a demon.

8.         Finally, I remember when this teaching of demons plaguing the Church was introduced in the early seventies. Where are those same proponents today? If demons were the real problem with defeated Christians, then why are the same men not loudly proclaiming the message throughout the Church today? The world is getting worse. Have those men cast out all of the demons? No, the men are still around but have moved on to "new" spectacular methods, programs, and causes. Yet the old banner continues to be picked up by others.

Given the biblical truths Michael presents, and the practical application he gives, how is it that churches and individual Christians give so much attention to the devil?  I can remember my adult years prior to becoming a Christian, and I do not recall ever giving any reason or excuse for my “sinful” thoughts or actions being the result of an attack from Satan.  Only after being Born Again and being around Christians and in church did I ever begin to hear such talk.  Do what?!?

When are Christians going to focus on who they are in Christ, and who He is in us!!!

And live in the victory over a defeated enemy won by our Savior and Lord Jesus Christ!

How the Cross Erases Your Sin

In Colossians 2:14, we read how God canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness which stood against us and condemned us. That word “canceled,” means to wipe out, to erase, or to abolish. By means of the cross, God wiped out our indebtedness to the law that stood over us that Satan used to condemn us. The passage doesn’t just say that he canceled our sin as though he went through a list one by one, wiping out each sin individually. That alone would be beautiful, but he did more than that. Nor does this passage simply say that he canceled our indebtedness as though he paid off the whole account all at once. What God did was even more beautiful than that.

God went to the root of the problem, and he canceled the charge of our indebtedness. This goes beyond wiping away our individual sins or abolishing the debt itself. He canceled the charge itself, which was the power of this indebtedness to hold us in bondage to Satan. He canceled the claim that the indebtedness has any right or power over us to hold us captive.

Think of it this way: suppose you found yourself in great debt. You’ve spent unwisely and then you lost your job. As a result, the bank will soon foreclose on your house and repossess your car. Now suppose I am a very rich person and I have plans to help you out. I could pay off your bills one by one. This would be like God erasing our sin one by one. Or I could contact all of your creditors and pay all of your debts at once. This would be like God erasing our indebtedness.

However if I stop there, the economy will remain in place and money will still have the same power, which means that you could conceivably fall back into debt again. In addition, you have to deal with the poor credit rating and the bad reputation from your economic failure. What God did was more fundamental than either paying off our sins one by one or erasing the debt. He canceled the charge of our indebtedness itself. God blew up the whole economy. He destroyed the very concept of money. In doing so, he destroyed the very claim that money could own you or that banks could own you. He went to the root of the problem by destroying the very concept of indebtedness.

That’s why the Psalmist says, as far as the east is from the west our transgressions have been cast away from us (Ps 103:12). Like the square root of pi, there is no ultimate east and there is no ultimate west. It is a distance that spans an infinity in any direction. If God takes our transgressions and throws them an infinity to the east and an infinity to the west, they are annihilated, obliterated, erased, and canceled.

Under Satan’s rule, where the law has dominion, indebtedness has meaning. While we were created to live in the land of God’s love, because of our rebellion, we were brought into the land of indebtedness to the law. Into this land, God comes and restores the rule of God’s kingdom, where behavior is not motivated by threats and fear through legal means, but by internal transformation by the Spirit. In this new land, the charge of indebtedness has no meaning. The rules have changed.

We could think of this in terms of our citizenship. If you are a citizen of the United States, the laws of another country, like Mozambique or Zimbabwe for instance, are irrelevant. Those laws don’t apply to you. So also, the law of indebtedness don’t apply to us because we’re not citizens in that kingdom anymore. The rules within that kingdom no longer apply. The charge of indebtedness has been canceled.

This is why Paul says: “Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Rom 8:1). Because Jesus canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness that stood against us, we now live in a new land, the land of life “in” Christ Jesus. There, the law of condemnation no longer applies.

—Adapted from 6/3/12 sermon at Woodland Hills Church entitled “I Owe It All To the Devil“

- Greg Boyd

Pure Love

If I handed you a glass of water and told you it was pure, you would assume nothing else was in the glass but pure water. If the glass contained anything other than water, even in small traces, I wouldn’t be honest calling it pure water.

Is God pure love or not? Of course He is.

If anything that contradicts love were present in Him, we couldn’t truthfully say that He is pure love. We would have to say He is part love and part something else. The very idea is a scary thought.
What if God were part love, but other aspects of His character contrasted with love, as some theological constructs suggest? How would we know that at any given moment, we might see a side to God that we don’t want to see? How could we ever rest in peace about our relationship to Him? How could we be sure that we would be only the objects of His love and not the targets of things that came from a place other than love? Can you imagine a deity dealing out something that didn’t come from love? It’s the kind of thing you might find in horror movies.

My whole life was revolutionized the day I sincerely and irrevocably believed that God is love.

Until then, my confidence in the constant expression of His love could be so easily shaken. My circumstances occasionally made me wonder. Sometimes an Old Testament verse tripped me up and caused me to doubt. At other times I saw things going on in the world around me that I couldn’t reconcile with the existence of a God who really is pure love.
The time came, however, when I put my eyes on Jesus. We have seen that He is the “exact representation of [the Father’s] nature” (Hebrews 1:3). Because that is true, the question is, did Jesus leave out part of who His Father is? If He did, and if His Father has a dark side that Jesus didn’t bother to mention or show us, that was a big omission! Reasonable people could even say it would have been dishonest to leave out such information while telling us, “He who has seen Me has seen the Father” (John 14:9). Jesus didn’t do that. You can count on it.

There is no other side to God that Jesus didn’t reveal.

Don’t let anything other than Jesus Himself be your source for understanding who the Father is. “God, after He spoke long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, in these last days has spoken to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world” (Hebrews 1:1-2). Even insights gained from the Bible are rightly understood only through Jesus. He came to show us the Father, and what He has shown us perfectly and clearly is that our Father is love. That’s it—nothing more, nothing less.
To suggest that focusing exclusively on the love of God as the totality of His being leaves out something is to insult Divine Agape. Love is His fundamental makeup. Everything that can be known of Him must be seen through the lens of agape, or we end up presenting a god with a multiple personality.

Jesus proved that God is pure love by coming into this world.

The day came when “the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us” (John 1:14) to communicate this divine love, which would not be squelched. Rejection didn’t still it. Death didn’t stop it. Even hell couldn’t stall it. The only thing left is for us to receive it—to receive Him.

- Steve McVey

God’s Love and Your Freedom

 The most distinctive aspect of the revelation of God in Christ is Jesus’ demonstration that God relies on love to defeat his enemies and to accomplish his purposes. More than anything else, it was the perfect love of God revealed in the incarnation, ministry, and self-sacrificial death of Jesus that in principle defeated evil and thereby accomplished the will of God.

As he commands us to do, God overcame evil not with violence but by suffering violence on Calvary for the sake of love (1 Peter 2:20-23). This is the very definition of the kind of love that God eternally is, which we have discussed here. And this is the same kind of love that followers of Jesus are commanded to express to all people, including our enemies.

In this light, I believe that plausible models of providence must have at their center a God whose eternal nature is other-oriented, self-sacrificial love, as revealed in Jesus.

Before the creation of the world, God predestined that he would acquire a people—a “bride”—who would receive the Father’s perfect love for the Son and participate in the Son’s perfect love for the Father. However, if love is the goal of creation, then the creation must include free agents. As the early church uniformly understood, for contingent beings such as humans, love (as well as every other moral virtue) must be freely chosen. Had God created us such that we had to love, our love could not be genuine.

To illustrate, suppose a scientist invented a microchip that could control every neuron in a person’s brain and that was so sophisticated it could be implanted without the person knowing it. If this scientist programmed the microchip to do so, she could coerce any person to feel, think, speak, and behave in perfectly loving ways toward her, and her subjects would even believe they were doing this of their own volition.

While they would certainly appear to love this scientist, would we not consider her demented if she mistook the coerced appearance of love to be actual love? In making subjects “choose” to love her, the scientist was actually preventing them from genuinely choosing to love her, for they no longer had the capacity to do this of their own volition. In reality, this demented scientist would just be loving herself through these subjects, as much as if she were manipulating puppets on her hand to mimic loving expressions toward her.

So too, had he wanted to, the all-powerful God certainly could have created a world in which everyone was predestined to feel, think, speak, and behave in perfectly loving ways toward him and each other. But God would know, even if we did not, that we would be mere puppets on his hand. If God instead wants a people who genuinely love him and each other, he must create us with the capacity to choose to love or not. He must give us genuine say-so to affect what comes to pass as we choose to lovingly align our wills with his or not.

Love requires freedom.

- Greg Boyd