The New Tolerance

If you are alive, you’ve noticed. But perhaps this article will give language for it.

We live in a day where there is profound intolerance exercised in the name of tolerance. I call it “the new tolerance.”

It goes something like this.

“If you don’t agree with my beliefs and my value system, then you’re intolerant.”

Which being interpreted means: “In the name of tolerance, I’m intolerant of everyone who doesn’t bow to my values and beliefs.”

Or

“I’m intolerant of everyone except those who agree with me, and in the name of tolerance, I will brand them intolerant.”

What is tolerance?

True tolerance doesn’t force people to adopt a belief system, whatever it may be.

True tolerance can “agree to disagree” and go on with one’s life in peace without ever entering into a social media smackdown over politics, ethics, or theology.

True tolerance values all mortals as made in God’s image, and therefore, regards them worthy of love, while at the same time pointing out areas of disagreement and even condemning beliefs and actions that violate God’s will.

Disagreeing with a person’s habits, values, or ideas isn’t the equivalent of hating, fearing, despising, or wishing them ill.

Loving a person doesn’t mean approving their practices or beliefs.

Love and approval aren’t the same thing.

Even God doesn’t always approve those whom He loves.

Jesus, who is the human face of God, said so much:

“He is kind to the ungrateful and wicked.”

~ Luke 6:35

By contrast, the new tolerance says, “I will tolerate everything except those who disagree with me.”

That, dear friends, is an extremely intolerant tolerance.

Let it not be so among the people of God.

- Frank Viola

Sowing and Reaping

Sow for yourselves righteousness, reap the fruit of unfailing love, and break up your unplowed ground; for it is time to seek the Lord. --Hosea 10:12

Coming from a farming community, I have sat on a tractor more than once and thought how nice it would be if we did not have to do that every year. Every farmer knows the truth that he cannot sow once and then keep reaping for the next seventy years. The effects of sowing and reaping last for one season. Therefore, if we were to apply this principle to consequences, we could readily see that they, too, are for a season. Sow to the flesh and reap to the flesh; sow to the spirit and reap to the spirit. Galatians 6:8, “For the one who sows to his own flesh shall from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit shall from the Spirit reap eternal life.” However, a person cannot sow to the Spirit once and expect to reap the consequences of that act for the rest of his life. The same is true for the flesh. If one sows to the flesh, for that season he will reap flesh. The answer is to start sowing to the Spirit in this season and the next, so in that way each new season will bring something new, beautiful, fresh, and living to reap, rather than by sowing to the flesh and reaping death. 

It makes no sense that a Christian would commit a stupid act of the flesh and God would keep him under bondage, placing him for the rest of his life in a new category entitled “Second-class Believer”!Again, if it were possible to commit one sin that would cause suffering the rest of his life, then it would also be possible to commit one act of righteousness that would carry a person through his whole life. But abiding is for the moment, the season. God is not interested in punishing us for the rest of our lives. Often believers think everything that goes wrong is a consequence of a past mistake, like marrying the “wrong” person, succumbing to temptation and sin, or betraying a loved one. Very likely it is not the past that is causing misery, but today’s walking in the flesh.

OK, how many of us recognized this scenario and quickly admitted a personal experience, or acknowledged someone else’s fling?

Sowing and reaping.  A simple law, correct?  With many optional issues of sowing and many optional issues of reaping, correct?  What is about these familiar words of God that we do not seem to “connect” with?

Each of us has to take Michael’s discipleship to heart, and make some choices about our past, our present, and our future.  Correct sowing on our part yields a spiritual harvest from God.  But we must keep one thing in mind: WE are the ones who do whatever SOWING.  God only enters into the reaping.

- Mike Wells

Ask Of Me

If you remain in me and my words remain in you,
ask whatever you will, and it will be given you.
John 15:7

I have always had trouble with this verse. Here
are some comments that I found helpful.

In creation God acts sovereignly and alone. But in the
unfolding of HIs redemptive purposes, He wills it other-
wise. He chooses to unite with Himself human instru-
ments and share with them the excitement of creativity.
The incarnation is part of the working out of this plan.

In sending His Son to become a man, God revealed in
a new way His purpose to limit Himself to working in
and through a relationship with man. The vital, indis-
pensable part of this working relationship is prayer.
God communicated His will to the Son in the intensive
exercise of prayer that occupied so many of our Lord's
nights in desert places.

This brings us to the basic divine principle in prayer--
that God unites His people with Himself in whatever He
wants to do, first leading them to pray and then giving
the thing for which He burdened them to pray.

The same principle is taught by the Lord Jesus in His
Upper Room discourse under the symbolism of the vine
and the branches. Abiding in Him is the condition He
established for our asking and His acting. What had
been set up.  Arthur Matthews

You see, it all comes back to one word, "abiding."
Jesus says, "without Him, we can do nothing." I wonder
if when we are judged at the Judgement Seat of Christ,
it will be for what Jesus has done through us, His power
not ours?

It is always about Him.

The judgement is not for sins because those have been
paid for.

- Victorious Indwelling

THE REALM OF THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN

             There are many strange ideas around about the difference between the terms “Kingdom of God” and “Kingdom of Heaven”.  Carnal-minded men have long tried to make a distinction between the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of Heaven, as though they were two separate kingdoms.  Our Lord’s instructions upon sending out the twelve were, according to Matthew, “And as ye go, preach, saying, The kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Mat. 10:7).  According to Luke, “He sent them forth to preach the kingdom of God, and to heal the sick” (Lk. 9:2).  Certainly Jesus did not preach two conflicting messages at the same time!  Surely He was not announcing two separate and distinct kingdoms and declaring them both to be at hand!  These, and many other passages, show the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of Heaven are one and the same.  Yet — there is a difference!  For, you see, heaven is a REALM and God is a PERSON.  The Kingdom has its origin in the REALM OF HEAVEN, and in the PERSON OF GOD.  The term “Kingdom of Heaven” denotes from whence (from what place, location, realm or dimension) the Kingdom proceeds, whereas the term “Kingdom of God” reveals from whom (from what person or being) the Kingdom originates.  When we consider these two items, place and person, it immediately follows that as to REALM the Kingdom is out of the heavenlies, but as to PERSON the Kingdom comes from God.  It is called the Kingdom OF God because it is from and by God.  He is the Instigator and Head of the Kingdom.  It is called the Kingdom OF Heaven because it has its inception in heaven — the invisible realm of Spirit.

- Preston Eby

On the Cross ........

"On the Cross Jesus absorbed you into Himself. Colossians 2 says He absorbed the laws and codes that stood opposed to you and He CANCELLED them! He redeemed you and me from the curse of the law so the blessings can come to us freely! Everything about you that could be judged was swallowed up and absorbed into Jesus Christ! Everything you have done past, present and future was totally removed from the memory of God! Jesus who never sinned once was made your sin so that you and I who don't live obediently all the time can be seen as TOTALLY righteous ALL the time in God's eyes!

You died in the body of Jesus! That is what the Bible teaches in Romans 6 and Galatians 2. You were buried with Jesus, united with Him in His resurrection. When He came out the grave so did you. You were co-ascended to the heavenly realms with Jesus and are currently coseated with Jesus in heavenly places! You are not trying to get to heaven - you are in heaven already with Jesus! Romans 5:20 says that where sin increased grace did MUCH MORE abound! What it is saying is that the law of the Old Covenat made people sin more but the grace of the New Covenant empowers us to get strength and mastery over sinning as well!

Romans 6:14 says that sin will not have mastery over you because you are not under law but under grace! When sin increased through the law grace came in abundance to take away the mastery of sin off our lives. When people say that if you take the law off me then nothing is left to restrain me from sinning - people say but if you take the law off me then I can go out and commit adultery! They are giving a revelation of the adultery that is in their hearts. Because the law stirs up sin but grace gives us mastery over sin. Galatians 3:24 says that the law was put in charge to lead the human race to Jesus Christ. The law was to be so severe, perfect, holy, harsh and beyond the standards of man so that we would admit we have absolutely no hope but to depend on Jesus Christ.

The Bible says in Galatians 3 that now we have come to Christ we are no longer prisoners of the law and Romans 7 says we are dead to the law so that we may bear fruit to God. So we must love the law of God for the REASON that God gave the law. If you love the law because you know that the law was meant to lead you to God then you will get closer to God and more humble and more anointed. But if you love the law because you think it makes you more holy and more righteous then you will get further from God and you will get more self-righteous. The law has gone! All I have got is grace and love and mercy and blessing! Not dependant on my performance but on Jesus! What is left?! Permanent joy, happiness, signs and wonders, unity! 100% of your relational problems is based on what I am talking about today. From the Old Covenant to the New God totally changed the way that He relates to you. Under the Old Covenant God only relates to you through the law and never by grace. Under the New Covenant God NEVER relates to you through the law but ONLY through grace!

Hebrews 8:6 says we have a better covenant with better promises and a superior Mediator!

Under the law God demanded of you a perfect righteousness but under grace He provides for you His perfect righteousness." Rob Rufus sermon

"The New Covenant says.......

"The New Covenant says that God accepts you, loves you, favours you, accepts you not because of your performance but because of Jesus obedience and performance on your behalf. That is the New Covenant! Jesus is the superior Mediator! Where the ministry of death and condemnation finishes forever and the ministry of blessing starts forever!

The entire New Covenant can be summed up in this; Jesus is ENOUGH! All Paul's writings to Romans and Galatians can be summed up in this; Jesus plus anything equals NOTHING. Jesus plus nothing equals EVERYTHING!

The church world today is being challenged by the Spirit as to how they will align their relationship to God - a mixture of law and grace which is nothing at all or a pure atmosphere of grace of New Covenant.

I hate sin and I don't encourage sin! I hate it if it come(s) to me! I forgive it in you! As you do to me! I do not encourage sin at all! But the time you are under the most pressure to go back to the law is when you have just done something wrong! You think if I can do enough and pray enough then I may earn my way back to God! You do not earn your way back to God - Jesus already earned your way back to God! You are ALWAYS the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus! If you have just sinned don't go into gloom or condemnation then thank the Father that you are the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus and;

My disobedience does not disqualify Christ's obedience on my behalf!" Rob Rufus sermon excerpt from Aligning Our Allegiances For The Anointing To Flow at Full Volume Preached on Sunday 10th June 2007

Do You Love Me?

Breakfast is over and Peter walks with Jesus by the
sea. They talk. You have read the conversation but
probably you have not understood that the word in
Greek for 'love' is not what we translate as love in
English. Here is what Peter heard.

...Oh Simon Peter, son of Jonas, are you Loving
(Agapeo, pure unselfish love) Me greater than
these? He said to Him emphatically Yes, Lord,
You Know that I affectionately love (phileo, bro-
theraly love) You. He said to Him, You must feed
my lambs.

He said to him, again, the second time. Oh Simon
Jonas, are you Loving (agapeo) Me. He said em-
phatically Yes, Oh Lord, You know that I affection-
lately love (phileo) You. He said to him, You must
shepherd My sheep.

He said to him a third time, Oh Simon Peter, do
you affectionately love (phileo) Me? Peter was
made grieved, because He spoke to him a third
time, are you affectionately loving (phileo) Me?
So then he spoke to Him, Oh Lord, you know all
things. You know that I affectionately love (phileo)
You. Jesus said, Feed My sheep. John 21:15-17
From the Greek translation, The Pure Word.

Only God can love with pure unselfish love.
The pain in Peter for his denial of his Lord was
great and when Jesus asked Him to go for a walk
with Him, his heart sank--at least most of us are in
fear after such failure. Peter was totally incapable
of using the agape word in response to Jesus' ques-
tion. It is interesting to me that Jesus came down to
Peter's level in the third question. Denial is such a
terrible thing, but Agape Love Itself, covers and
blots out that which we cannot move. Peter was
given the opportunity to affirm his love for Jesus
three times which matched the three times that he
denied his Lord.

You, are loved with pure, unselfish love
just as Peter was. It is only His agape Love within
that is able to love, agapeo, others unselfishly.

What to Do If You See God as Violent

God really is as beautiful as he is revealed to be on Calvary. Communicating this is my goal in everything I write—especially Crucifixion of the Warrior God and Cross Vision. But for many, to see him as being that loving, is not easy. We have to make a concerted effort for our brains to adjust to see this revelation of God.

When we are tempted to view God as being violent, I want to suggest four things that can help you make this adjustment.

(1)
 Consider the cross as a looking-glass that enables you to discern what else is going on behind the scenes of any violent depiction of God in the Old Testament. The cross fully reveals what God is like, and if you are having trouble seeing how violent portraits of God in the Old Testament point to the cross, then you are at some level assuming that God might be capable of being as violent as these portraits ascribe to him. This means that you are not yet fully trusting that God is fully revealed on the cross. As I argue, the OT authors merely caught “glimpses of truth,” which means that their vision was mostly cloudy.

(2)
 If you previously believed that God had a “dark side,” sometimes it will feel like the God revealed on Calvary is “too good to be true.” If that happens, let your imagination enter into the good news! However beautiful you envision God, he is infinitely more beautiful than that! If it feels “too good to be true,” this simply indicates that you are at least moving in the right direction. It just feels “too good to be true” because you have been accustomed to imagining God as “good” even though the God you envisioned was partly ugly. If you continue to place your complete trust in the cross, your habitual association of truth with a partly ugly God will gradually fade.

(3)
 When you read about ugly portraits of God in the Bible, remind yourself that this ugliness is a reflection of the ugliness of our sin that Jesus bore on the cross. It is not a direct reflection upon who God is. These ugly pictures are literary testaments to the fact that the heavenly missionary has always been willing to bear the ugly sin of his people and to thereby take on ugly appearances that mirror that sin.

(4)
 Even after you believe that God is altogether beautiful and has no non-Christ-like streak in him, it can continue to feel unreal so long as your mental picture of God’s love is abstract and/or foggy. But in Christ, God has given us a vivid, concrete, “flawless expression” of exactly what he is like. I encourage you to ask the Spirit to help you vividly imagine the beautiful, true God revealed in the Son. Take time to surrender your imagination to the Spirit, asking him to help you see God’s perfect, infinitely intense love for you in the eyes of Jesus. Hear God’s perfect, unwavering love for you in words that Jesus tenderly speaks to you. Sense God’s perfect, unsurpassable love for you in the warm embrace of Jesus. (This process is explained more fully in my book Seeing is Believing.)

It may take time, but if you are persistent, you will eventually discern the love of the crucified God in the OT’s portraits of a warrior deity as naturally as you now discern the sin-bearing God-forsaken, crucified Nazarene to be the supreme revelation of God.

—Adapted from Cross Vision, pages 248-251

- Greg Boyd

Easter Reflection 01

It Was Your Sin that Murdered Christ! 

Sometimes it does us good to consider the sheer sinfulness of our sin. Sometimes it does us good to consider what our sin has cost. Perhaps these words from Isaac Ambrose will challenge you as they did me.

When I but think of those bleeding veins, bruised shoulders, scourged sides, furrowed back, harrowed temples, nailed hands and feet, and then consider that my sins were the cause of all, methinks I should need no more arguments for self-abhorring!

Christians, would not your hearts rise against him that should kill your father, mother, brother, wife, husband,—dearest relations in all the world? Oh, then, how should your hearts and souls rise against sin! Surely your sin it was that murdered Christ, that killed him, who is instead of all relations, who is a thousand, thousand times dearer to you than father, mother, husband, child, or whomsoever. One thought of this should, methinks, be enough to make you say, as Job did, ‘I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes.

Oh, what is that cross on the back of Christ? My sins. Oh, what is that thorny crown on the head of Christ? My sins. Oh, what is the nail in the right hand and that other in the left hand of Christ? My sins. Oh, what is that spear in the side of Christ? My sins. What are those nails and wounds in the feet of Christ? My sins. With a spiritual eye I see no other engine tormenting Christ, no other Pilate, Herod, Annas, Caiaphas, condemning Christ, no other soldiers, officers, Jews or Gentiles doing execution on Christ, but only sin. Oh, my sins, my sins, my sins!”


These words from Joseph Hart seem fitting:


Many woes had Christ endured,
 Many sore temptations met,
 Patient, and to pains inured:
 But the sorest trial yet
 Was to be sustain’d in thee,
 Gloomy, sad Gethsemane !

Came at length the dreadful night:
 Vengeance, with its iron rod,
 Stood, and with collected might
 Bruised the harmless Lamb of God:
 See, my soul, thy Saviour see
 Prostrate in Gethsemane !

There my God bore all my guilt:
 This, through grace, can be believed;
 But the horrors which he felt
 Are too vast to be conceived:
 None can penetrate through thee,
 Doleful, dark Gethsemane !

Sins against a holy God,
 Sins against his righteous laws,
 Sins against his love, his blood,
 Sins against his name and cause,—
Sins immense as is the seal
 Hide me, O Gethsemane !

Here’s my claim, and here alone;
 None a Saviour more can need :
 Deeds of righteousness I’ve none;
 No,-not one good work to plead:
 Not a glimpse of hope for me,
 Only in Gethsemane.

Father, Son and Holy Ghost,
 One almighty God of love,
 Hymn’d by all the heavenly host
 In thy shining courts above,
 We adore thee, gracious Three,—
Bless thee for Gethsemane.

The Living Bible

From the Living Bible Isaiah 53 which was written 700 years before the
birth of Jesus Christ.

...how few believe it!
Who will listen?
To whom will God reveal his saving power?

In God's eyes he was like a tender green shoot, sprout-
ing from a root in dry and sterile ground. but in our
eyes there was no attractiveness at all, nothing to make
us want him. We despised him and rejected him--a man
of sorrows, acquainted with bitterest grief. We turned
our backs on him and looked the other way when he
passed by. He was despised and we didn't care.

Yet it was our grief he bore, our sorrows that weighed
him down. And we thought his troubles were a punish-
meant from God for his own sins!
But he was wounded and bruised for our sins.
He was chastised that we might have peace;
He was lashed--and we were healed!
We are the ones who strayed like sheep!
We, who left God's path to follow our own.
Yet God laid on him the guilt and sins of every one
of us... 

And when he sees all that is accomplished by the an-
guish of his soul, he shall be satisfied; and because of
what he has experienced, my righteous Servant shall
make many to be counted righteous before God, for he
shall bear all their sins. Therefore I will give him the
honors of one who is mighty and great, because he
poured out his soul unto death. He was counted as a
sinner, and he bore the sins of many, and he pled with
God for sinners. Isaiah 53: 1-6; 11,12

We commemorate the crucifixion and resurrection
of our Lord in just two weeks. It is not too soon to ponder
what our precious Savior did for us when He went to the
cross and became sin for us.

The Purpose of the New Covenant

The primary purpose of the new covenant was not for God to come and change our external behaviour. Rather it was God changing the way He relates to us.


Under the Old Covenant, God dealt with the external problem, namely people’s sins. They were punished and cursed when they sinned and broke the laws. But under the New Covenant, God dealt with the internal problem, namely our fallen sinful nature. He changed us from the inside, giving us the very nature of his Son, Jesus Christ, and credited the perfect obedience of Jesus to our account.


Our old sinful nature has been crucified with Christ, and our spirits made 100% righteous:


“For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him”. (2 Cor 5:21, NKJV)


And this is the way He now sees us: blameless and fully righteous in His sight:


21 And you, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled 22 in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight. (Col 1:21-22, NKJV)


6 knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin. 7 For he who has died has been freed from sin. (Rom 6:6-7, NKJV)


Before we came into Christ, we were enemies of God, and we were alienated from Him in 2 ways:


1) We had a sinful nature inside us and we were slaves to this sinful nature, running after every evil thing to gratify the desires of our flesh:


“among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others”. (Eph 2:3, NKJV)


We were alive to sin (because of our sinful nature) and dead towards God.


2) We were also under the law, which utterly condemned us and showed us how sinful we were.


19 Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. 20 Therefore by the deeds of the law no flesh will be justified in His sight, for by the law is the knowledge of sin. (Rom 3:19-20, NKJV)


But Rom 6:6-7 says that we are now dead to sin. We are now friends of God, and we were united with Him in 2 ways:


1) Our sinful nature was crucified with Christ, and our spirits have now been made alive towards God. The perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ has been imputed to us, and all the benefits and blessings of His obedience has now been credited to us because of our faith in Him.


2) The law has been nullified, nailed to the cross with Jesus:


“having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross”. (Col 2:14, NKJV)


God now relates to people again like He did in the days of the Bible before the law was given, not imputing their sins against them, but instead delighting in us with the love and passion of a proud Father. God doesn’t just see us as if we’ve never sinned – He sees us now as if we have perfectly obeyed all the laws our entire life!


4 But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, 5 even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), 6 and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. (Eph 2:4-6, NKJV)

- Johan & Tracy Olehäll

New Covenant

"The New Covenant says that God accepts you, loves you, favours you, accepts you not because of your performance but because of Jesus obedience and performance on your behalf. That is the New Covenant! Jesus is the superior Mediator! Where the ministry of death and condemnation finishes forever and the ministry of blessing starts forever!

The entire New Covenant can be summed up in this; Jesus is ENOUGH! All Paul's writings to Romans and Galatians can be summed up in this; Jesus plus anything equals NOTHING. Jesus plus nothing equals EVERYTHING!

The church world today is being challenged by the Spirit as to how they will align their relationship to God - a mixture of law and grace which is nothing at all or a pure atmosphere of grace of New Covenant.

I hate sin and I don't encourage sin! I hate it if it come(s) to me! I forgive it in you! As you do to me! I do not encourage sin at all! But the time you are under the most pressure to go back to the law is when you have just done something wrong! You think if I can do enough and pray enough then I may earn my way back to God! You do not earn your way back to God - Jesus already earned your way back to God! You are ALWAYS the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus! If you have just sinned don't go into gloom or condemnation then thank the Father that you are the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus and;

My disobedience does not disqualify Christ's obedience on my behalf!" Rob Rufus sermon excerpt from Aligning Our Allegiances For The Anointing To Flow at Full Volume Preached on Sunday 10th June 2007 - the day that two angels arrived at City Church International!

Knowledge

"...by the time Jesus arrived to Israel - grace and the revelation to Abraham was almost completely gone. Abraham brought the key to knowledge - which is the nature of God.

What is the key to knowledge? I believe personally it is the nature of God. When the nature of God is revealed as goodness and grace - that is the key to knowledge!

…..- the revelation of the nature of God. Justification by faith that God is a good God that justifies the wicked and accepts them and loves them. That's where knowledge is! The nature of God and the revelation of God's nature is the key to knowledge. So once justification by faith came, that is when the church came out of the Dark Ages and you can trace from the Reformation advancements in science - because the religious church was wanting to put to death people that advanced in science!”

……2 Corinthians 5:9; "God was in Christ reconciling the WORLD to Himself - NOT counting MEN'S sins against them!". It didn't just say "the church's" sins against them. The world!
So we are involved with more than just sweet little churches that are happy because they are in grace. This is something that changes the globe. It is because of legalism that we have international wars, ethnic violence, religious wars.
Legalism makes people angry, harsh, mean, judgmental, full of selfish ambition, gossip, slander - you cannot trust legalists!” Rob Rufus sermon excerpt from the session "10 Ugly Faces of the Grace Hating Spirit"

- Rob Rufus

Silence in Arguments

And they were saying this, testing Him, in order that they might have grounds for accusing Him. But Jesus stooped down, and with His finger wrote on the ground.--John 8:6

Arguments have their roots in pride and are calculated to prove intellectual superiority, but they lack power. I have personally won arguments against those enslaved to drugs and alcohol, but they went away still slaves. I have won many arguments concerning marriage, but those couples, too, went away to visit the lawyer. I have won countless arguments with philosophers, psychologists, evolutionists, atheists, and cult leaders. They all went away to worship the image they were seeing in the mirror.

Jesus divided His dialogue with men into two categories: argument and ministry. Argument He usually avoided.Some came requesting food or power, not ministry, and from those He withdrew. Some sought to draw Him into a melee, and we find Him quietly drawing in the sand rather than heatedly presenting His point. Why? His response would have only fueled more debate with those who had a vested interest in not moving at all from their position.Jesus came to minister.If by His own Holy Spirit He was made aware that ministry was not possible, Jesus simply withdrew or refused to speak. As an Indian friend says, “The refusals of Jesus define Him!” For we do, in fact, know more about Him from His refusals than from His accomplishments. He refused the best seats, refused to make a loud noise proclaiming Himself, He refused to hurt the one who was hurting, He refused to minister spiritual truth in the power of the flesh, He refused to defend Himself, and He refused to condemn the woman caught in adultery.

Like Jesus, we must have a goal of ministry, not dialogue. When we begin to talk to our child, friend, co-worker, or pastor and realize we are standing there alone, without the power and witness of the Spirit, it is time to be quiet and draw in the dirt. If He is not ministering, then neither should we. Remember, the issue is not who listens to us, but whether we are listening to Him.

Wonder

For God so loved the world, that he gave His only
begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him
should not perish, but have everlasting life. 
John 3:16

Tell me what it means to perish, and enable me to
grasp the thought of a life that is eternal. Measure
for me the abyss of man's wickedness and guilt dur-
ing all the ages of his black and hateful history, that
I may realize in some degree what that world is
which God loved. Then, pausing for a moment in
wonder at the thought that such a world could be
loved at all, hasten on to speak of love that gave the
Son. And when you have enabled me to know this
love which cannot be known, for it passes knowledge,
press on still and tell me of the sacrifice by which it
has measured and proved itself--His Son, His Only-
begotten Son.

And when you have achieved this, I turn again to the
words of Christ, and I read that it was GOD who so
loved the world, and I crave to know Who and What
God is. When I come to know that it was GOD who
loved, that GOD was the giver, and GOD's Son the
gift, I stand as a wondering worshipper in the pre-
sence of the Infinite, and confess that such knowledge
is too high for me.   

- Sir Robert Anderson

Forgetting What is Behind

...One thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and
straining toward what is ahead, I press toward
the goal to win the prize for which God has called
me heavenward in Christ Jesus. Phil 3:13-14

It is never wise to live in the past. There are, indeed,
some uses of our past which are helpful, which bring
blessing. We should remember past mercies, that we
may have confidence in new needs or trials in the
future. We should remember past comforts, that there
may be stars in our sky when night comes again.

But while there are these true uses of memory, we
should guard against living in the past. We should
draw out our life's inspirations not from memory, but
from hope; not from what is gone, but from what is yet
to come. Forgetting the things which are behind, we
should reach forward to those things which are before.

To live in the past is to, perhaps, lose hope for
the future. Jesus said He could "do nothing because of
their unbelief. " It is especially difficult when one faces
loss. We become grounded, turkeys instead of eagles.
Our eyes should be on the goal...to win the prize for
which God has called me heavenward. Paul wrote
these words from prison while facing death.

God's Love

Your Identity in Christ