Did Jesus Believe in Satan

Jesus’ teaching, his exorcisms, his healings and other miracles, as well as his work on the cross, all remain somewhat incoherent and unrelated to one another until we interpret them as acts of war. As in apocalyptic thought of the time of Jesus, the assumption that undergirds Jesus’ entire ministry is that Satan has illegitimately seized the world and thus now exercises a controlling influence over it. Three times the Jesus of John’s Gospel refers to Satan as the “the prince of this world” (John 12:31; 14:30; 16:11). He here uses the word archon, which was customarily used to denote “the highest official in a city or a region in the Greco-Roman world.” Hence Jesus is saying that, concerning ruling powers over the cosmos, this evil ruler is the highest.

Thus when Satan claimed that he could give all the “authority” and “glory” of “all the kingdoms of the world” to whomever he wanted – for they all belonged to him – Jesus did not dispute him (Luke 4:4–6). Jesus assumes that the entire world is “under the power of the evil one””(1 John 5:19) and that Satan is the “the God of this world” (2 Corinthians 4:4) and “the ruler of the power of the air” (Ephesians 2:2).

Jesus sees this evil tyrant as mediating and expanding his authority over the world through multitudes of demons that form a vast army under him. Indeed, Jesus intensifies this conviction somewhat in comparison to common views of the day. When Jesus is accused of casting demons out of people by the power of Beelzebub (another name for Satan), he responds by telling his hostile audience, “if a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand” (Mark 3:24). His response builds upon their shared assumption that the demonic kingdom is unified under one “prince,” who is Satan. His point is that this kingdom of evil, like any kingdom, cannot be working at cross-purposes with itself.

Indeed, Jesus adds that one cannot make significant headway in taking back the “property” of his “kingdom” unless one first “ties up the strong man” who oversees the whole operation (Mark 3:27). This, Luke adds, can only be done when “one stronger then he attacks him and overpowers him” and “takes away his armor in which he trusted” and then “divides his plunder” (Luke 11:22). This is what Jesus came to do. His whole ministry was about overpowering the “fully armed” strong man who guarded “his property,” namely, God’s people and ultimately the entire earth.
Jesus’ success in casting out demons reveals that his whole ministry was about “tying up the strong man.” The whole episode clearly illustrates Jesus’ assumption that Satan and demons form a unified kingdom. They are, a “tight-knit lethal the organization” that has a singular focus under a single general, Satan.

Because of this assumption Jesus can refer to the “devil and his angels,” implying that fallen angels belong to Satan (Matthew 25:41). For the same reason Jesus sees demonic activity as being, by extension, the activity of Satan himself, and he therefore judges that everything done against demons is also done against Satan himself.

For example, when his 70 disciples return to him after a successful ministry of driving out demons, Jesus proclaims that he saw “Satan fall from heaven like a flash of lightning” (Luke 10:17–18). The “strong man” and his household clearly stand or fall together. They together form a single, relatively organized army, unified in its singular purpose of hindering God’s work and bringing evil and misery to his people. The head of this army and thus the ultimate principle of all evil, is Satan.


—Adapted from God at War, pages 180-182  Greg Boyd

Do We Not Have to Choose?

“The good Christian life”…or, simply, “the Christian life”…neither is in the Bible.  And Michael shows us how we eat from the wrong tree so often while trying to live in a way God never speaks of…  This is a great “day’s” writing!

By myself I can do nothing. I judge only as I hear, and my judgment is just, for I seek not to please myself but Him who sent me. --John 5:30

We make the statements, "All Jesus ever did, He never did. The Man who did everything did nothing. We are to let Jesus work through us as God worked through Jesus.” These statements prompt the question, "Do we not have to choose?" So often we hear about choosing correctly, about those Christians who refuse to do so, and about the issues of choosing and free will. However, the point is not choosing but what we choose. Of course we must choose; we choose to get up, go to work, eat, and so on. Again, the issue is what we are choosing. Once we establish the real point, we will come to a "Y" in the road. Go right and we will make the choices God wants us to make. Go left and we will be on the wrong road, where the emphasis is on choosing those things considered to be good: choose to pray, read the Bible, witness, stop the deeds of the flesh, and love an enemy. However, this is not the choice God wants us making. If we think the decision that we need to make is to lay down our sin, we are on the wrong track and can be sidetracked for years. It is easy to spot someone on the wrong road; he will say something like, "I should pray more, give more, do more witnessing, love more, be a better mate." This reveals a person that has made a wrong choice. So what is it God does want us to choose? First, choose to lose our kingdom, our glory, our pride, our righteousness, and our strength. This is the opposite of choosing to do better; it is admitting that we cannot do better. Second, we will be ready to choose to accept His righteousness, kingdom, glory, and strength. The third choice is to allow His life to flow through us, and we will then be living in dependence on the Son as He was with the Father. These three choices will produce and accomplish everything that was desired on the left road, but without the self-effort that leads to self-righteousness and the false sense that we are living “the good Christian life.” 

It cannot be said enough…Life as a Christian is coming to the realization and recognition that “Christ is our life” as a Christian, and all our efforts are not what God wants.  Life as a Christian is when He lives His life through us.  The Christian life (man has determined that…in fact, the two words never appear together in the Bible) is when we are trying to keep a list of doing the “good” and not doing the “bad.”   And we simply have to choose which “life” we will live.

May we find more and more Christians on the road that leads to making the choices God wants us to make.

Michael has given us three very simple choices we must make…how many will make them?

Do Angels and Demons Really Exist?

While the supremacy of God is never qualified in the Bible, this supremacy is not strictly autocratic. Other “gods” or spiritual entities like angels and demons are not mere puppets of the God of the Bible. Rather, they appear to be personal beings who not only take orders but also are invited to give input to their Sovereign (see 1 Kings 22:20; Is 6:8). They collectively constitute a type of “heavenly counsel.” These gods never rival the Creator’s authority. Thus they are never construed as major competing deities.

In sharp contrast to the Augustinian monopolizing view of divine sovereignty, the sovereign One in this concept invites and responds to input from both his divine and human subjects. The supplications and decisions of his creatures genuinely affect him, to the point where he may even altar previous plans in response to his creatures’ requests and behavior.

This notion that there exists a council, or a society, of divine beings between humans and God who, like us, have free wills and can therefore influence the flow of history for better or for worse, is obviously jarring to a number of Western worldview assumptions. Indeed, for many believers it is foreign to their Western Christian assumptions as well. For a variety of reasons, Westerners have trouble taking seriously the “world in between” us and God. Even when Westerners do theoretically acknowledge the existence of “angels,” we tend to view them as mindless, volitionless, wholly innocuous marionettes completely controlled by the will of their Creator.

If we take the biblical teaching on gods seriously, we must confess that our Western assumptions are erroneous. Indeed, the “heavenly” world largely overlaps our “earthly” world and can hardly be said to form two worlds at all. The “world in between” is, from a scriptural perspective, simply part of the cosmos.

This stands in contrast to the Greek metaphysical assumption which has shaped our Western worldview that the “heavenly” is composed of timeless “forms” that lack all contingency, a notion that exercised a profound influence on Christian theology and contributed to the church’s eventual abandonment of a warfare worldview.

In Scripture, as opposed to the dominant Hellenistic philosophical tradition that so influenced Augustine and other theologians of his day, there was nothing “heavenly” about being timeless, immutable, purely actual and devoid of contingency. There was nothing “perfect” about being an “Unmoved Mover” (Aristotle), and no sense could be made of saying that “time is the moving image of eternity” (Plato). Though it forms the cornerstone of the classical tradition of the Western church, no biblical author ever dreamed of such a notion.

The Bible depicts a “heavenly” world that parallels the “earthly” world, one where freedom and contingency in the “earthly” world has its counterparts in the counsel of heaven. The two worlds overlap and influence one another.

Because of our indebtedness to Greek thought through the classical view of God as well as our indebtedness to Enlightenment naturalism, modern Westerners have difficulty affirming the existence of—let alone the significant freedom and power of—this “world in between.” For these reasons many conservative theologians have difficulty positing genuine contingency in God himself.

But this theological tradition, more than anything else, is what creates the problem we have with explaining the nature of evil. In biblical terms, the evil experienced today—whether the beheading of martyrs or earthquakes—might be the result of evil human intentions. Or it might be due to a malicious “prince” over a part of the world, or some other cosmic power. None of these acts of evil could be an ordained feature of a secret blueprint God has for the whole world.

The character of God can remain untarnished in the face of the terrifying dimensions of our experience only to the degree that our view of the free, contingent world in between us and God is robust. Only to the extent that we unambiguously affirm that angels and humans have significant power to thwart God’s will and inflict suffering on others can we unambiguously affirm the goodness of God in the face of the evil being manifest in our world today.


-Adapted from God at War pages 130-141

Fullness of the Father

There is a calling that supersedes all other callings. Paul the apostle called it the high call. For all those who will have ears to hear, listen to the wisdom of the Spirit.

This high call consists of God's people encountering the fullness of the Father, making that goal their number one priority. For many years, the enemy has worked overtime trying to get the focus off of this simplicity and onto people's individual calls, individual dreams, and individual aspirations. There is nothing wrong with these things, but there is a higher call. The Holy Spirit desires to bring every believer to the point where they can say, "I count everything else in my life garbage in the light of knowing Him." This is essential to the outpouring that is coming soon.

The Holy Spirit's desire is that not just a few would have a focus like this, but collectively, the Body would humble itself and set its goals higher on the fullness of the Father. Men's dreams and men's goals for the Lord are not enough to get the job done. There must be a pressing toward the mark of this high call of God in Christ Jesus. This needs to be the mindset of the Body. This high call will never change and needs to be set in stone. Some will say that this is a season of getting to know Him deeper. No, this is the focus and must remain your focus until the end, for there is no greater dream or goal than this one. And when you hold to the Head, which is Christ Jesus, you will receive the full nourishment that is needed to accomplish every task at hand.

Many in this day are saying dream big, but the Spirit is saying it is not big enough. Many have lost the sight of the glory of God or they have never experienced enough of the fullness of God to realize that this is not only available, but this is what fills the temples and brings the teaching of the Gospel into full manifestation. Some want glory for  themselves, and there is no way that these two can live side by side.

So, again, press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus and be found in Him in total. Be consumed; let this fire burn deep. Take your laser focus and put it on knowing Him and spend as much time that is needed in fellowship. Signs and wonders, healings, fresh manna from Heaven, waves of the Spirit, and all types of ministries will flow like water, uninterrupted by man, and the enemy will have to say that this flood is too strong and too severe and he will lose his hold. And as long as you remain with this mindset, the waters will not stop flowing--filled to overflowing. It is one thing to be hungry, but it is another thing to be hungry and to know that you are full and you will remain full.

- Dave Roberson

Be Loved

By Tresca Grannum

One of the deepest longings of mankind is to be loved. We will do almost anything to be loved. Our whole being craves and thirsts for love, and not for any kind of love, but for pure “unconditional” love. Have you ever wondered why this is so? We will fight each other, manipulate each other, control each other and even destroy each other when we do not feel loved. For love, we will try desperately to please each other, sometimes at any cost. We will perform for each other and allow ourselves to be used and humiliated by each other, all for the sake of love—for just one crumb or drop of human love.

Have you experienced a very destructive, unhealthy relationship? Some relationships can wreak havoc on you emotionally and cause confusion, fear, timidity, hostility, or coercion. There are other unhealthy relationships where you feel distant, ignored, unvalued, and unfulfilled but you find yourself adapting to it, feeling it is better than nothing. Why? Because of one crumb of love? I have met many individuals who are battered and abused both emotionally and physically, and they always say to me, “But I love him.” I have talked to teenage girls who intentionally got pregnant. The reason they give: “I wanted someone to love me and need me.”

This is no mystery; we all need and want to be loved. I too have felt that same sense of despair and desperation and would do almost anything to fill my cup of tainted and unsatisfying human love, only to have to scrape the bottom of the barrel over and over again and come up short. How could we be so needy and sometimes stoop so low to be loved? And why do we continue to pursue human love with a vengeance only to find ourselves empty and unfulfilled?

Why, because our Father made us this way. Our Heavenly Father, created us for Himself and to give us as gifts to His Beloved Son. We were never created to live and exist from human love, but only from our Father’s love. We were created to be containers of our Father’s pure, heavenly, untainted, infinite, and unconditional love. We were created to experience a love that transcends us, that overflows from us, a love that consumes us.

And this love is only found in God. He knew that one day we would come to the end of ourselves and long for something different, and thirst for something to satisfy us when we have done and tried everything to appease ourselves. He knew that we would one day go searching and seeking for His love and once we apprehended it we would never leave home again, attempting to be satisfied otherwise.

One of my favorite passages in the Bible is about the woman at the well. It truly depicts the story of every human soul in search of love. We go from thing to thing, person to person and quickly tire throwing each other away when our needs are no longer being met. One day she met Jesus, who told her about a love, that when she drank it, she would never thirst or long for human love the same way again. In Christ, we can drink and be satisfied. In Christ, He fills the longings of our souls. In Christ, we experience a love so rich, so pure, that one drop satisfies us.

If you are hungry, or if you are thirsty for love…come inside where your Beloved resides, sit and drink of His love.

Red-Faced Monkey

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.--Romans 12:2

When it comes to the topic of battling sin, one rule must never be broken,and that is that we are never to battle sin! It is a misplaced focus. No, we are never to fight sin if we desire to overcome it. Let me illustrate. There is a story of a fellow in India who was traveling from village to village selling a magic potion. The man would ask for a clean bucket, into which he would pour clear water and some of the magic potion. As he stirred the mixture, through sleight of hand he would drop in three or four nuggets of gold. When the water was drained off, there was the gold. In one community a moneychanger watching the demonstration asked if he could purchase the formula for 50,000 rupees. The fellow was more than happy to sell, and after receiving the payment, he turned to the moneychanger and said, "There is one thing you must never do while making the gold, or else the potion will not work. While stirring the water and adding the formula, you must never, never think of the red-faced monkey!" As you can well imagine, the moneychanger was never able to make gold! Wherever he went, from the Himalayas to the south of India, no matter how hard he worked to block it, the red-faced monkey would pop into his mind. So it is with sin; as long as it is made the focus, it will never be overcome. I have often commented that God has delivered me from many things, but not once was I freed from anything on which I was centered. 

           

Many have focused on their sin ten, twenty, thirty, and even forty years; their sin has become so much a part of their life that they are not even sure what they would do were they to be miraculously delivered. If 25% of thought life were concentrated on something consuming and immediate deliverance occurred, exactly what would replace that portion of mental energy? What would fill the vacuum? The solution to warring against sin is to set our minds on something other than the sin. This cannot not be done by consciously avoiding the sin, but rather by making the Lord the focus of daily thought life. If our focus is not kept on the things above but is allowed to traffic in the things of the world, we as believers will be led to Christian fatalism, the belief that this life in these bodies will constantly be given over to defeat and misery. Thus we will accept continual suffering as the norm and wait for the day we will be caught up into heaven. The truth is that all suffering has a purpose and, in the end, produces abundant living today.

It didn’t take me long to think of something from my life (albeit it was from way in the past) that applied explicitly to the principal Michael teaches us today…  Years ago I played golf.  IF I stepped up to a tee and there was “out of bounds” to the right, and IF I let that become my “focus”…guess where I hit the ball?  In fact, I used to say that I couldn't figure out why the golf courses that were built with homes snug up against the fairways didn't make it “out of bounds” if someone hit their ball into the backyard of someone’s home…just have them get the ball and place it two club-lengths from the boundary and play on.  IF it wasn't a hazard or penalty for hitting the ball there, a huge percentage of shots that went into those backyards (or, into someone’s windows!) would never happen.  WHY?  Because the golfer wouldn't “focus” on the penalty and the place…they would never enter their mind.  They could focus on hitting the ball down the fairway.

Duh!  Am I going to set my mind (focus) on warring against sin in my life (in hopes of getting rid of it), OR “if ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God.  Set your affections on things above, not on things on the earth.  For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.”  Amen.

Living Sacrifice - What is it?

Romans 12:1-2

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. 2 And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.

The earlier chapters in the book of Romans, up to chapter 11, deal  primarily with what God has done for us (the indicatives) whilst chapters 12-16 deal with people's actions in response to God's (the imperatives). 

Our conduct or what we ought to do must stem from our knowledge of what God has done, otherwise our imperatives are just  pious morality adherence's. It is in this context that we want to understand what living sacrifice means.

As born-again Christians, we are in Christ and Christ is in us (Jn. 6:54-56;.Gal. 2:20). These are our main indicatives. Our response in Christian living is as in Acts 17:28  ‘… for in Him we live, and move, and have our being…’. Christian living is simply living an exchanged life  ‘not I, but Christ liveth in me’ (Gal. 2:20). What it basically means is that all our actions, whether the words we speak, the things we do or our very being, be an expression of the Son of God living through us.Paul aptly described it in this way: ‘For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.’ (Phil. 1:21).

When we are born again, we are dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. (Rom. 6:11).  Hence, our Christian living is  of Him, through Him and to Him. Period.  Our flesh count for nothing.

A living sacrifice is a body that has been sacrificed (dead) but kept alive by the life giving Spirit.  Hence, we present to Him as a living sacrifice by a faith that expresses total dependence on the life giving spirit,and nothing of ourselves (the flesh is dead, sacrificed!).

In summary, Christian living is a living sacrifice, beautifully expressed by Paul in Galatians 2:20:

‘I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.’

A Christian, armed with this understanding, can exude the fragrance of Christ so needed in Christianity today... so that we can bring Christ out to the world and the world can be attracted to the true God living in and through us….it is evangelism at its best.

We are kindly reminded of what Ghandi said :

‘I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.’― Mahatma Gandhi

 Rejoice.

Prayed on 01.07.2012

Let's pray together.  Thank you Father that we can come this morning into your presence, and Father when we think of the weather, how it can be so cold, and windy and snow and frost, and then to come into your house here this morning and to come into your presence where there is warmth and love and comfort, shows us something of what life can be like Lord, it’s not always easy, it’s not always smooth, it’s not always just the way we would want it, and that is because life is dynamic.  And this morning as we come together, we all come from a background this week which might have been really, really busy, might have been some pain and some hurt, some confusion.  On the other hand it might have been great joy and surprise and excitement. There might have been hard work, physical drainage and emotional drainage, or there might have been exhilaration and great enthusiasm and zeal.  All of these things our Father make up the mix of life, and they are life and they are our life, that's what we've had this week.  And as we come here together as family from all of those different backgrounds, and all of the different personalities and gather in your name, and become brothers and sisters together, seeking to put aside a little bit the things that have been difficult and then opening ourselves to you in this moment and saying, “I know you love me. I know you accept me. I know you know that I've messed up. I know you know that I've fallen short, that you, you still love me and care for me and, and you want me to grow and mature and, and be all that you've purposed and planned for me”.  So we thank you this morning Lord, that that's the God that you are, your not sitting there waving your finger saying, “Tut tut”.  Your saying, “Why did you do that, you know that's not good for you, and I can see that your, you didn't want to do that, and that you regret that, let's walk on together and see where we go.”  And so Father I thank you for, for your love for each person here this morning, that you care for them desperately.  As I said to someone last night, “Do know that God really, really love's you.”  And sometimes Father we need to be reminded, remind ourselves that you really, really love us, and want the best for us.  So Lord, thank you so much for your love your care, and your very presence abiding within us in the person of Jesus and power of the Holy Spirit.  We ask these prayers in Jesus name.  Amen.

The God of Judgement

Christ came in the express image of His Father to show us what His Father is like. Why? To correct the wrong perspective that the writers of scripture had of Him of being a revengeful, retributive, killing and hateful God. These were the attributes that the writers of the Old Testament saw Him as...even though Jesus revealed the Father heart of God has loving, kind, forgiving and graceful the concept that the Old Testament writers had of Him was carried over into the Post Cross Era and incorporated into the Gospel and preached as the Gospel when it is NOT.

This revengeful God syndrome of religion is propagated by some Post Cross believers in that God is a punishing people God, who destroys cities, nations and kills people by sending calamities, hurricanes, floods, typhoons, tsunamis, earthquake etc,...because of their sinning. But the worst concept of all is that God will pour out great anger and wrath and horrible tortures and judgments upon humanity as the saints bask in the sunny, peaceful resort of heaven enjoying His blessings. Then they go as far to preach that the vast majority of people God created out of His love for them will suffer torture in a towering inferno of hell fire for eternity .

Now I know that concept, but I can no longer believe it in the light of how Jesus presents His Father. Through Jesus I have seen the depths of the love of God, and I have experienced some of the heights of the love of God, and for the life of me, I cannot find a God who is so angry that He would want to pour out a vengeful wrath upon His people or punish them in the torture chambers of hell for eternity. Jesus Himself tried to destroy that concept of an angry, vengeful God. He said, "It has been written in your very own law . . ." (He did not deny the law of the Old Testament). He said, "It has been written in your very own law, ‘an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ I know what is there BUT, I say to you, love your enemies! Do good to those who despitefully use you! I know what is written in your law. You would like me to take this prostitute and stone her".

Religionists today stone prostitutes and homosexuals with their condemning and despising slurs, and as some have said, referring to the people whom they put into what they call the "Hyper Grace Camp" that "this cancer needs to be removed from the Body of Christ". It seems that some within Christendom would like to get rid of sin in the manner of some of the other religions of the world to the point they would like to see a cleansing take place and get rid of people who don't see things their way. That is not a God concept, yet so much of the religious world has accepted it. But Jesus revealed a different concept to us! "It is written in your very own law...but you had better listen to Me. You know, you run to the Scriptures, because in them you think you have eternal life, but you won’t come to Me, because when you do, I’m going to tell you some things, and I’m going to reveal to you an understanding of God and the Father-heart of God that you’ve never had. And because it doesn’t fit with what you have been taught in the past, because it doesn’t fit with the religious law that you have received, you will reject and not understand the love of God. That is why you cannot have the Logos in itself" (John 5:39-40).

You can take the Bible and justify the most heinous, horrible crimes with it, and people have done so, thinking they have done God a service. But God is in the business of restoring humanity back to Himself. He has no thought of destroying, but of uplifting.

Yes, there is judgment. But it is a righteous judgment that is a refining fire that restores people not torture them for eternity.!

- Glenn Regular

What Happened on the Cross

Since the time of Anselm (11^th century), and especially since the Reformation in the 16^th century, the tendency of the Western church has been to focus almost all of its attention on the anthropological dimension of the atonement, usually to the neglect of the cosmic dimension that is central to the NT. In the standard Protestant view, the chief thing God was accomplishing when he had Jesus die on the cross was satisfying his perfect justice and thereby atoning for our sins. The work of the cross is centered on us.

While I do not minimize this aspect of Christ’s work, I cannot agree that the primary significance of the cross is found here. From the perspective of the NT, the anthropological significance of Christ’s death and resurrection is rooted in something more fundamental and broad that God was aiming at: to defeat once and for all his cosmic archenemy, Satan, along with the other evil powers under his dominion, and thereby to establish Christ as the legitimate ruler of the cosmos, and human beings as his legitimate viceroys upon the earth.

Whereas since Anselm the dominant way of thinking about the atonement focused on what it accomplished for humanity (reconciliation to God), and thus viewed what it accomplished against Satan and evil powers as a byproduct, the view that I espouse is that the NT construes the relation between these two aspects of the cross in the converse order. Christ’s achievement on the cross is first and foremost a cosmic event—it defeats Satan.

Thus as Scripture portrays the matter, the foundational reason Christ appeared was “to destroy the works of the devil” (1 Jn 3:8), to disarm “the rulers and authorities” (Col 2:15), and to “destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil” (Heb 2:14). The consequence of this victory is that he is seated on his rightful throne, the whole cosmos is liberated from a tyrannical and destructive ruler, humanity is delivered “from the power of darkness and transferred … into the kingdom of his beloved Son (Col 1:13), and all who accept it are thereby reinstated to the original position and responsibility of stewards of the creation that God had always intended for us.

While Christ’s substitutionary death for sinful humans is central for understanding what Christ did for us, therefore, this dimension of Christ’s work is possible only because of the broader cosmic victory Christ won on the cross.

Through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, God stripped Satan and all levels of demons of all their power (Col 2:15). Therefore Christ now reigns in the power of God far above all such demonic powers. Expressing the tension of the “already/not yet” that characterizes the entire NT, Paul can say that “all things” are already “under his feet,” (Eph 1:21-22) though the actual manifestation of this truth is yet in the future. But the central point remains: the work of the cross was about dethroning a cruel, illegitimate ruler and reinstating a loving, legitimate one: Jesus Christ. When Jesus Christ is reinstated, all who are aligned with his rule, all who are “in Christ,” all who are his “bride” and part of his “body,” are reinstated to their appropriate position of authority as well. In a word, we are saved because he is victorious.


—Adapted from God at War, pages 240-246  - Greg Boyd

Three Reasons Why You Need to Make that Apology

Frank Viola writes.........

Recently, I was reading a book that contained a story about those who have been diagnosed with terminal cancer.

The story demonstrated that when such people get past the denial phase, they shift their priorities and focus on what really matters most in life.

One of them is relationships.

In 7 Ways to Destroy a Friendship, I talked about the main factors which hinder friendship.

One of the things things which repairs broken relationships is apologies.

I've been a Christian for many years, and I can count on one hand the times when a fellow believer made an apology to me.

Last week, I received a call from a person I who I hadn't heard from in years.
He called to apologize for something he had done to me in the past.

I was monumentally impressed.

My response essentially was that he was forgiven even before he made the call, and I had harbored no ill feelings toward him.

But his apology provided fertile ground to renew our relationship, which had been lost.

Whenever we violate Matthew 7:12 with a respect to a person we know — or even don’t know, saying things about them or to them that we’d never want said about us, the Spirit of God will put His finger on it (if we are sensitive to Him).

And the spiritual instinct to apologize to them them will follow.

Here are 3 reasons why disciples of Jesus should apologize to others whenever we treat them in a way we wouldn't want others to treat us. (There are others, but these three stand out in my mind right now.)

1. It clears your conscience, facilitating further transformation into Christ’s image.

2. It restores (or begins) a relationship with another believer on the right foundation.

3. It embodies and displays the humility of Jesus Christ, thus giving glory to God.

Consider this an encouragement and a reminder to keep short accounts with people.
It’s also a challenge to contemplate the relationships you've had in the past and see what can be done — on your part — to repair them.

All told, apologies demonstrate that someone is truly living by Christ’s life, for it takes uncommon insight for a person to recognize when they've mistreated another human being (which is usually rationalized in their minds) and deep humility to let them know that you’re sorry for what you've done.


As always, this brings us back to Matthew 7:12 – there is no more important word made by Jesus. It’s the very nature of divine life

Adam's Life Cut Off

He cut off Adam’s life as your source at Calvary. Then, when you were re-created in Christ, God gave you a new life—Christ as life.

Eternal life is not a mere extension of your life. Eternal life is Christ Himself (1 John 1:1-2). Adam is no longer your spiritual ancestor—Christ is. You’ve been spiritually reborn from Christ’s spirit “gene pool,” to use a metaphor. You now have not only a new spiritual present and future, but a new spiritual past!

Christ, not Adam, is now and always will be your spiritual Ancestor. Everything that happened to Christ on the cross happened to you because you were in Him. “He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him” (Ephesians 1:4).

- Bill Gillham

The Perfect Peace of God

"I will give you perfect peace as you stay your mind on Me." — Isaiah 26:3 (my paraphrase)

The door had just closed behind Wade ... the last one to leave with his lunch sack under his arm. Bill was gone. Even Esther, our dog, was outside. And I was getting ready for another big round of depression. I had made it through breakfast and fixing lunches, but now that I was alone I was going under ... fast. I had been pacing the house and was walking down the hallway when, in utter frustration, I stopped, made a fist, and shook it in God’s general direction. (I’m confident He was very impressed.)

God! You have promised me peace, and I don’t have it! I am an emotional basket case. My insides are churning. My hands are trembling. My thoughts are so confused that I don’t know whether I’m coming or going. There’s a lump in my throat that just stays there. I am hurting so badly, and I certainly don’t have any semblance of peace! My world is completely haywire! Why, Lord, why? And it was almost like He whispered to me ...

“Anabel, what are you setting your mind on? What are you thinking about?”

How many times have you accused Him of being the reason for your problem, for not coming through on His end of the bargain? No. You must understand that He never promised an unconditional peace. It comes with instructions: I will give you peace if you will stay your mind on Me.

I guess I’m a slow learner, Lord. I still think of peace as freedom from problems. No. That’s not it, is it? Peace is resting in You. Peace is knowing You can face the day through me. Regardless. I remember, Lord, when I used to wake up and say, “My God! Another day! How can I possibly get through it?” It’s different now. Oh, I still wake up and call on You, but I say, “My precious God. Thank You that You are going to meet today for me.” That’s peace. Perfect peace.

I pray that this thought will cause you to rest more completely in His arms today.

Anabel Gillham

Times of Little Feeling

It is of very little importance to consistently feel God in your life. There will be those times when you do feel the Lord and as a result realize He is at work. These periods are very enjoyable and reassuring. However, there will probably be far more times when there is very little feeling, if any, that God is anywhere close, let alone dwelling inside you. The loving Father has structured the Christian walk in this manner in an effort to wean us from walking by feel as opposed to faith, confidence, and dependence on Him. Even if your feelings should react in the opposite direction from the truth of God's Word, it is imperative that you remain focused on what God has said rather than what you may or may not feel. Your emotions are not God's barometer of truth; His Word is.

Bill Gillham
Lifetime Guarantee, Harvest House, 1993

Avoiding Dangerous Attractions

At a company convention, Christine ran into an old college professor. She had admired his teaching skills and loved being his assistant in the undergraduate chemistry course. After a group luncheon, they promised to stay in touch. Initial emails were infrequent and often focused on activities and people they both knew. But it didn't take long before they began to share about their individual lives and families. From there, the conversations turned very personal, but Christine told herself that it was safe because he was old enough to be her dad. Christine knew the exchanges meant too much to her, and she also knew her husband would be hurt if he understood how she really felt.

Christine was definitely engaged in what I call a "close call."

After more than 30 years of counseling husbands and wives who have been hurt by infidelity, I've learned that being aware and being prepared are never more important than they are today. In this culture, there are just too many opportunities for infidelity.

The concept underlying my "close calls" message is that an attraction to another individual will happen. That means it's essential that you be alert to risk factors and be intentional about strengthening your marriage. Let's look at the stories of five couples and the close calls they experienced. Each story illustrates a different risk factor that can lead to trouble:

Unmet needs

Todd and Karen showed up looking like they'd just been on vacation, smiling and holding hands. But as we sat down, appearance gave way to reality.

They were parents of two great teenagers. But about a year previously, Todd had shared about how unhappy he was with their marriage. He felt like everything was focused on the kids, and though he was proud of the children and freely acknowledged what a great mom Karen was, he described how he was feeling neglected. He felt like a lower priority than the children and more like just a paycheck. He wept as he shared this with Karen.

Karen had listened rather stoically when Todd shared his feelings, thinking to herself, It must just be midlife. I can't do any more than I'm doing. I've certainly been a better spouse than my alcoholic mom was. That night, Todd and Karen went to sleep and never again talked about that conversation — until they were in my office trying to recover from his affair. Their close call had been ignored.

This "other woman" was a committed Christian married for almost 20 years who loved her husband and had no plans for divorce. But she, too, was feeling overlooked and disconnected from her spouse. She and Todd were both emotionally vulnerable to someone else's attention and affirmation.

You might appear to have it all together in your marriage. But if you or your spouse has unmet needs and feels lonely; if you're just functioning but life is no longer fun; if you've forgotten how to nurture each other — then your vulnerability to another's attention could sweep you off your feet and carry you away before you even realize what's happening.

Sustained stress

After 10 years of marriage and almost three years of fertility treatments, Sharon was the mother of three healthy children. She felt like life just couldn't get any better — until her husband, Bill, became enamored with the flirtations of a new 20-year-old employee.

At first, Sharon was shocked. But when she found out that the employee had a promiscuous history, it caused her to view Bill as a victim of the young woman's sexually charged emails. So Bill and Sharon decided to keep his inappropriate responses a secret. They didn't talk about it and never sought help, but they were grateful for having made it through a close call. That is, until three years later when Bill started texting a different new employee. Sharon met the recipient of the text messages and realized it was the same problem, just a different woman.

When you're vulnerable to temptation, it's easy to be in denial about how close you are to collapsing — so you choose not to think about the possibilities. But all it takes to trigger inappropriate feelings for another person is the kind of stress that Bill had been going through for years, the kind that left him living overwhelmed and emotionally drained. He needed relief and found that befriending young women lifted his mood above the grind of daily life. Close calls that become first-time adulteries are almost always about the need for comfort and distraction.

Old romances

Trying to catch up on her emails while the kids were napping, Jessica saw a note from Sam, one of her old college boyfriends. Tempted to open it, but knowing she didn't have much time, she saved it and decided to move on through the rest of her inbox. Just as Jessica anticipated, her baby woke up while she was looking at the last of her emails.

Jessica is playing with fire.

Old romances are never forgotten. The infatuation is stored in your brain. The former girlfriend or boyfriend might not look like he or she once did, but when you reconnect with an old flame, you start the process of rekindling those feelings of infatuation.

Initially, you'll talk about current families; but inevitably, you'll recall your younger relationship and shared experiences. Those conversations can confuse each of you about your current marriages. You may quietly begin to entertain the idea that you have married the wrong person. If you continue to stay in touch, within just 60 days you'll be looking for ways to meet face to face.

Social media

Overseeing social media advertising for her small family-owned company, Sharon could easily track down friends from the past. Soon it was not only easy, but frequent and, at times, compulsive. When her husband would question all the time she spent on these endeavors, Sharon would brush off his concerns.

Sharon is likely to cross several predictable thresholds that will create a close call for her.

Once you come across old friends, their ongoing and intensifying connections can become mood-altering experiences that brighten your day. You will start looking forward to those interactions because connecting with them enhances your mood at the same time it lowers your anxiety and depression levels.

Conversations will gradually move from professional to personal in content, from external situations to personal feelings. You may eventually feel more understood by online acquaintances and share less with your spouse. At this point, it's easy to begin starving your marriage at the expense of feeding your friendships.

When you begin to realize the depth of your feelings for these individuals, you will be faced with the choice of stopping it or hiding it. Hiding usually wins, and the addiction moves into high gear.

Shared hobbies and interests

Kevin and Susan, together with their friends Russ and Sheri, were horrified to read in the local paper about the sex-slave trade occurring in their city. The two couples immediately volunteered to help put an end to trafficking, and soon they were making a difference in their community.

Eventually, Kevin's job and work hours changed to the point that he wasn't always available to help. Meanwhile, Sheri became pregnant; morning sickness caused her to cut back her efforts, as well. Russ and Susan continued to be highly involved in this effort, and the passion each had for it remained undiminished. Soon they were spending more time with each other than they were with their spouses.

Passions, interests and hobbies shared with members of the opposite sex, other than your spouse, can lead to risky emotional closeness such as occurred with Russ and Susan.

What do all these stories have in common? In every close call, none of these spouses was looking for someone with whom to commit adultery. Most close calls start innocently enough, but when we fail to recognize the warning signs, innocent encounters can quickly move in dangerous directions. So, what steps do we need to take to protect our own marriages?

I encourage couples to talk. Vulnerability and openness in discussing attractions is your best protection. As you discuss the risk of attractions and the threat of close calls, take time to promise each other:

• I will not hide an attraction from you.

• I will listen to you with respect and without anger if you share an attraction you're feeling.

• I will work with you to adjust our interactions to better protect and enrich our relationship.

• I will never knowingly cultivate the kind of friendship that could threaten our marriage.

• I invite you to tell me when you think I am developing an inappropriate attraction.

Don't wait until these attractions develop — be proactive about guarding your relationship. You will never regret it because close calls that are ignored always end badly.

Dave Carder serves at the First Evangelical Free Church of Fullerton, California. He is the author of several books, including Close Calls.

No Anchors

It is amazing how often a “3-letter word” can make such a huge difference in our life!  While the world continues to keep its focus on the “what” of an action, God wants us to focus on the “why.”  This is a beautiful picture of God’s Way to a full life of freedom and joy.

I will not speak with you much longer, for the prince of this world is coming. He has no hold on me, but the world must learn that I love the Father and that I do exactly what my Father has commanded me. --John 14:30, 31

As a ship will never leave port if the anchor is not hoisted, often our flesh has an anchor somewhere in the world holding our spirits, and we never seem to be able to sail on. As long as we have a fleshly anchor, the enemy will have something in us and we will not be cut free from his oppression. If we shrink back in inferiority when we have to talk to people, why is that? There is a fleshly anchor that is holding us in bondage. Is it pride, so we do not want to make mistakes and appear foolish? Is it unbelief, so that we do not believe our value to God and instead walk in insignificance? See how an anchor keeps us from sailing? When we can be controlled by another's look or negative word, why is that? How can someone calling us rotten names wreck our day? It cannot unless there is an anchor. When outer events, words, and behaviors can shut a believer down, it is because there is something in him to which these events are anchored. We must not be consumed with what we are doing but why, for in the why we will find our freedom. There is something He would show us that must go. When it goes, we will be free, and when the god of this age comes through others' words and behaviors, he will find that there is nothing in us . . . nothing except Christ!

How many of us want a full life of freedom and joy?  Isn’t that really experiencing God…Christ’s Life in abundance (John 10:10)?  Amen!

So, when will we learn to deal with the “why” of our actions, instead of the “what”?  A “why” like unbelief or pride is the real culprit, and Christ is the solution to eradicating both from our life.

Jesus never operated from the “what” to do, but from the “why” to do it…even from His early childhood of 12 years of age (Luke 2:41-49).  And He didn’t ever have a “why” that was contrary to God’s heart.

What is God’s heart in everything for you and I?

This is such a simple lesson to learn, but as long as we let our focus remain as the world focuses on life, we will allow the enemy to maintain that fleshly anchor, and we will see inferiority and another’s control rule our lives.

God, come and show us the “why” that must go!  We want to be free!  We want nothing to be found in us except Christ!  God, come and take away the “why” that is keeping us anchored to the enemy’s oppression.  God, find us faithful to choose Your “why” in every matter where our choice makes the difference.

- Mike Wells

We Need Not Work

The last lie of the enemy that Michael exposes and expounds upon is one that I have witnessed in the past from some who talked a good game, but were as “tinkling brass” in their life as a Christian.  The very life of God that indwells every Believer longs to flow through each one, and it is an absolute denial of His existence in oneself to be one who declares “we need not work” and slinks into passivity.

If we have worked so hard in the past to gain victory, the enemy would now have us doing nothing at all.  The life of faith is a life of activity, although there is an immense difference in work that is an expression of our faith and work that is trying to produce faith.  The life of Christ within us is always active.  “My father is working until now, and I Myself am working.” (John 5:17)  As we allow this life to flow, we will be very active.  Those who live in passivity, never allowing the life of Christ to be expressed through them, are simply not abiding.

…for the abiding Christian…there will be extended periods in which no activity is overtly seen, but in the deepest parts of his being he is being strengthened for the day when life within is made apparent in fruit for those around him.  Let me remind you, too, that God does not intend to resolve every manifestation of the flesh through a quick answer…we will allow the Lord as much time as He sees fit to make us mighty oaks.  However, the passive believer who never shows manifestations of life is not abiding, no matter how spiritual he may sound.  True faith cannot help but produce work; it is inevitable and cannot be blocked, for faith is from God and possesses His power.

Just as a tree, by the power of its life, can break in two a mighty boulder beside which it is planted, so faith is the power within you which will overcome all obstacles.  It is not from you but from Him.  Therefore, if you possess faith, it will be manifested.  We will not allow the enemy to stifle our faith through the deception of inactivity.

One of the worst thoughts I have ever heard expressed is that “those who teach ‘abiding’ are teaching passivity.”  I am not sure whether that comes from one who is misguided about what abiding is, or whether it comes from one who is mad at God about something…perhaps both.  Since abiding in Christ is being so connected to Him that His life can, and will, flow through me…it is inevitable that “my life” will be an active life, but it is not me, but Him.

I summarize the most outstanding points for me as such:

The life of faith is a life of activity.

The life of Christ within us is always active.

As we allow this life to flow, we will be very active.

True faith cannot help but produce work.

Faith is from God and possesses His power.

Faith is the power within you which will overcome all obstacles.

It is not from you but from Him.

If you possess faith, it will be manifested.

And then, as Michael concludes, “We (I) will not allow the enemy to stifle our faith through the deception of inactivity.”  Well, amen!

Good Fruits are Not the Good Works We Perform

In Matthew 7:16, Jesus says that to recognize false prophets, “you will know them by their fruits.” In Matthew 7:20 He says something similar: “By their fruits you will know them.” Many teachers and Bible scholars say that Jesus is referring to a person’s good works as the indication of whether or not they are a  false prophet, or more generically, whether or not they are even a Christian.

Good Fruit Does Not Equal Good Works

Two things can be said against the idea that good fruit refers to good works in Matthew 7:16-20.
First, in the immediately following passage (Matthew 7:21-23), Jesus talks about a group of people who have all the good works, but they do not know Jesus. They are so “good” in the good works department, they prophesy in His name, cast out demons, and perform many miracles.” Surely, if good are “fruit” then these people qualify. But they do not qualify. Jesus says they practice lawlessness.
So what does Jesus mean when He talks about knowing someone by their fruit? A few chapters later He tells us. In Matthew 12, Jesus once again brings up the topic of good fruit from good trees, and this time, He specifically states that the good fruit is the good words that proceeds out of person’s mouth, while bad fruit is the bad words that come out of their mouths. So by Jesus’ own words, the “fruit” He has in mind is not the good works that a person does or doesn’t perform, but rather, the words that come out of their mouths. Jesus emphasizes this again a little white later in Matthew 15:18 when He says that those things which come out of the mouth proceed from the heart (cf. Luke 6:45). This fits right in line with what James, the brother of Jesus, writes in James 3 about the tongue.

Christian “rules” for Proper Speaking

So what does it mean to have good fruit come out of our mouths? Strangely, we Christians have seemed to reduce this teaching of Jesus down to a few guidelines:

• Christians cannot use curse words or vulgar language.
• Christians should try to include verses or references to God and Jesus in their discussions whenever possible.
• Christians should always stick up for the truth, no matter the cost—even if what we say sounds hurtful and hateful. These three rules come from questionable understandings of Ephesians 4:29, Psalm 118, and Ephesians 4:15.

In many Christian circles, as long as we “Stand for truth no matter what!”, season our speech with Bible quotes, and don’t say “the S-word” or worse yet, “the F-word”, we are good to go.
Yet we turn around and gossip at church about the pastor’s wife. We get online and say the meanest things imaginable to people we do not know on Twitter and Facebook. We curse entire groups of people to hell because we don’t like their religion (e.g., Muslims), their lifestyle (e.g., Gays), or their politics (e.g., Liberals). We speak harshly to our wife, rudely to our children, and arrogantly to our “unsaved” neighbor. With our words, we undercut our boss at work, denounce our President as the anti-Christ, and tell police officers that they are racist pigs.
I sometimes think Christianity would be far better off if we just all shut our mouths.

How to truly have “Good Fruit”

In an age when insults are so normal we think “roasts” are cool, and cyber-bullying occurs so often we barely take notice when suicides are the result, followers of Jesus need to be a rock of love in the swiftly-moving current of curses, providing voices of hope, healing, restoration, and acceptance that have almost never been found in the church.
Good fruit proceeds out of a mouth which overflows from a heart filled with love for others.


So the next time you tap out that perfect insult on Twitter, or come up with the witty rebuttal by email, or simply want to lash out in unchecked anger at the false teacher (in your opinion) on Facebook, take a deep breath, move your finger away from the “Send” button, and remember those famous words from Thumper in the movie Bambi: “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say nothin’ at all.”

The "No Trespassing" Sign at the Center

The first thing we need to notice about the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil is that it was located in the middle or center of the garden, along with the Tree of Life (Gen. 2:9; 3:3).¹ At the center of the Paradise God provided for Adam and Eve and all their descendants was a provision and a prohibition. “Upon these two trees,” Bonhoeffer noted, “the destiny of man is to be decided.”² The Tree of Life was God’s provision to meet our needs and share his life endlessly. The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil was God’s prohibition against humans overstepping their proper domain.

            At the center of the glorious life God wants humanity to share in is a “No Trespassing” sign that God graciously gives us to protect us from overstepping our finitude. At the center of the beautiful existence God wills for us is the humble recognition that we are not God and thus must leave to God what God wills to keep for himself, namely, the knowledge of good and evil. Everything else in the garden surrounds this center.

Repenting from Religion Pg 67 - Greg Boyd

The Essence of Sin

My conviction is that we have neglected the biblical teaching that the origin and essence of sin is rooted in the knowledge of good and evil. Consequently, we have tended to define sin as that which is evil, over against that which is good, rather than defining it more profoundly as that which is not in union with Christ, whether “good” or “evil.”

            Consequently, the church has tended to focus on symptoms rather than on the source of the disease. We have tended to define ourselves as the promoters of good against evil and have often seen ourselves as specialists on good and evil. We have consequently become judges of good and evil rather than lovers of people regardless of whether they are good or evil. As harsh as it may sound, we have sometimes promoted the very essence of the fall—the knowledge of good and evil—as though it were salvation!

Repenting from Religion Pg 66  -Greg Boyd

Roger's Quote of the Week

Sin wants to remain unknown. It shuns the light. In the darkness of the unexpressed it poisons the whole being of a person. . . . In confession the light of the Gospel breaks into the darkness and seclusion of the heart. Now the fellowship bears the sin of the brother. He is no longer alone with his evil for he has cast off his sin in confession and handed it over to God. . . . Now he stands in the fellowship of sinners who live by the grace of God in the Cross of Jesus Christ.

            Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Shame..... Shame..... Shame.....

The shame and blame game religion plays with people is the reason our self-righteous self-justification is a desperate attempt to hide from the toxic emotion of shame. Religious shaming says our identity is created by our wrong doings. It tells us there is something generatively wrong with us as humans, believing we are disgusting and unlovable sends us to hide behind self-righteousness to appear justified by religion.  Shame sent Adam and Eve into the bushes to hide from God and religious shaming sends people to cover themselves with the religious fig leaves of the religious do's and dont's by self-righteous self-justification.

The the deeper the shame we are subjected to, the more we will engage in self-righteous self-justification. The more guilt religion subjects us to the more stubbornly self-righteous we become and we set about re-arranging external evidence into a more believable arrangement to protect ourselves and to measure up to the religious standard so religion won't shame us.

Jesus came to remove us from our shame, yet religion keeps playing the shame and blame game. He tells us that He does not condemn us, there is nothing wrong with us for acting as humans. We are lost in a religious wasteland, deceived, distraught and bewildered, Jesus is saying; "I am the way back to who you really are! You were made in the very image of my loving Father, you are not lower than a snake's belly crawling on the ground. You are not wicked and disgusting. Your sins, your self-righteousness may be as filthy rags around you...you need to realize and accept the fact that I have dealt with the sin problem and it is no longer an issue with me or my Father. Just walk in the freedom from sin that I have provided for you, repent (turn from sin) and follow me and I will impute my righteousness to you. You are not unlovable, You are a loved child of our Father God."

As He woos us away from our shame and into communion with Himself, Jesus tells us, “stop trying to justify yourself. You don’t have to prove to me or anyone else that you are justified. Your justification is in me, not in yourself.”

But this impulse to justify ourselves is very deep in us. Instead of resting in the justification Christ has provided us, we continue to compile our evidence to comfort ourselves when things don’t go the way religion wants it to go. We become more religiously disciplined in order to stave off our shame when we are in error. “I’m not perfect, but I’ve been doing what I’m supposed to be doing, I am obeying the Bible to the best of my ability”

Then an accuser from without or within shows up and tells a condemning story of your failures, your guilt, your inadequacies.

The accuser knows that you’re going to fall for the trap. That you will compulsively protest and self-justify your self-righteousness. You’ll counter the accuser’s story with your own. You’ll pull out your self-righteous evidence to refute the evidence against you.

But it’s a trap. It doesn’t even matter whether the accuser’s story is right or wrong, fair or outrageous slander. Even if you can refute him point by point and demolish the accusations against you with evidence of religious obedience, the accuser will not concede his error. He will not give you your due and declare you innocent. So long as he can get you to justify yourself to him, his goals will be accomplished.

Our self-justification exists to keep our shame safely hidden away. The enemy knows that so long as we continue to self-justify, we may hear Jesus’ words, we may mentally assent to them, but they are not intrinsic within us. Shame still remains on its throne, a malevolent, hidden power reigning over our lives.

The thing is we can’t own the truth Jesus speaks to us with shame reigning in our heart. But we can’t get rid of the shame until Jesus’ truth...his justification of us...has taken its place and is intrinsic within us. Which is why we need to rely on our faith and trust in Christ. We need to believe in what we cannot yet see...that we are completely justified in Christ. That he’s vouched for us and is telling the truth when he renders his judgment of us as loved, righteous, cherished and justified.

Whatever your accuser says, don’t bother trying to defend yourself. Just agree with him. Say, ‘yes, you’re probably right.’ You don’t have to go on the defensive and explain yourself or your actions. It could be that they are beyond justification anyways. It doesn’t matter because your justification is in Christ, not in yourself. So go ahead and agree with your accuser because Jesus has already provided all the justification you need.

When we refuse to engage in self-justification, no matter how sorely we want to, but rely on our justification in Christ, it allows that truth to sink a little deeper into our heart. And as the truth of Jesus our justification sinks deeper into our heart, there is less and less room for shame. When shame is dispelled, the Kingdom which Jesus says we carry within us will be revealed and ruled over by the truth...you are justified and righteous. You have nothing to be ashamed of anymore.

Only God has the right to define who you are. And he has already declared you innocent, lovable, righteous and fully justified.  And remember the accuser’s words do NOT carry more weight than God’s?

- Glenn Regular

Is Jesus Really God?

While it is true that Jesus Himself never comes out and explicitly says He is God in the Gospels, He is everywhere portrayed in terms that lead us to conclude to the same thing. He says things like “If you see Me, you see the Father,” “Honor Me even as you honor the Father,” and “I and the Father are one.” A good rabbi (who was only a good human rabbi) in the first century would never have spoken like this.

Moreover, Jesus makes Himself the object of faith, consistently saying such things such as “believe in me.” He everywhere equates believing in Him with believing in God, rejecting Him with rejecting God. “He who believes in Me believes in the Father who sent Me.” Even in His great “Sermon on the Mount” where some claim that we find the “great human teacher,” we find Jesus saying things like “Blessed are you when you are persecuted for My sake.” Who does He think He is? A rabbi is supposed to say, “Blessed are you when you are persecuted for God’s sake.

On top of this, we find the disciples calling Jesus “Lord” (Kurios), which is the Greek equivalent to Yahweh, the name of God in the Old Testament. When doubting Thomas cries out, “My Lord and my God”—Jesus doesn’t correct him. And we find the disciples and others worshipping Jesus in the Gospels, something Jews would never do to anyone other than God! The Gospels present a “fully divine” Jesus.

In the Epistles of the New Testament, 15 years after Jesus lived we find Paul incidentally characterizing all Christians as those who worship Christ (1 Cor. 1:2). He quotes a hymn that had already been established in the church tradition which says that Jesus was equal with God (Phil. 2). And at a number of points he calls Jesus “Lord” (Yahweh) and “God” (e.g., Rom. 9; Titus 2).”

All of this raises a perplexing historical question: Whatever could have convinced these Jews that Jesus was in fact God incarnate? What on earth could have led these Jews to do what their entire culture prohibited them from doing—worshipping a man? What must Jesus have been like, what character must He have had, what claims must He have made, and what incredible deeds must He have done, to convince these orthodox Jews that He was everything their faith said a man could never be?

According to the Gospels, it wasn’t the “resuscitation” of a corpse which convinced them that Jesus was God incarnate; it was the resurrection of a man who had already embodied the kingdom of God—its love, teachings, and power—during His life. It was the resurrection of a man who had already made astounding claims for Himself. And it was the resurrection of a man who never did henceforth die. If Jesus had later died, the whole thing would have fallen to pieces. But He didn’t. He ascended to heaven. (If this isn’t true, one must answer the questions of where Jesus was “hiding” during the entire period of the early church; why and how the disciples would lie, and then die for their fabrication; and why this lie was never exposed or even suspected by anyone.)

My point is that the resurrection and deity of Christ are two sides of the same coin. It is as impossible to explain why the disciples believed one as it is to explain why they believed the other—unless we accept the Gospel accounts on face value. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that even if we didn’t have the Gospels to inform us, we’d have to speculate that Jesus must have made the sort of claims and done the sort of deeds which the Gospels attribute to Him just to explain how the early Christians came to be convinced that He was everything we find Him being in the Epistles!


—Adapted from Letters from a Skeptic, pages 136-140

- Greg Boyd

It Doesn't Work

Often we believe that abiding and walking by faith will bring harmony in every area of our lives.  It will, in fact, bring great peace within; however, be assured that the flesh opposes the Spirit.  Having this battle resolved within through applying the moment-by-moment cross does not assure that the battle is resolved without.  For if we decide to walk after the Spirit, and those with whom we have the most dealings (mates, partners, children, coworkers in the church, and those in our places of employment) are walking after the flesh, there will still be clashes.  (I have often observed that marriage partners get along better when both are walking after the flesh than when one decides to walk after the Spirit.)  The enemy will use this situation to beat the spiritual believer down and bring him to the place where he feels that it is no longer worth the effort to walk in the Spirit.  With this experience comes the thought that it doesn't work.  However, the proof that it does work is the fact that there is a battle between the flesh and the Spirit.  Conflict is being created through contrast.

By walking in the Spirit, you are exercising pressure on those around you, like salt that burns in an open wound.  Don’t give in to the enemy; the Lord is using you in a mighty way.  Allow your life to continue to be leaven to those around you, for what you have has proven itself throughout the centuries to be contagious!

We must also be on guard against judging those who we now can easily see are living a life after the flesh.  It is always easy to forget from where we have come and how miserable an existence we were leading.  The enemy does not want us to stick it out with others, giving to them what the Lord has given to us.  We will, however, by His grace, resist all temptations to turn away from any believer, not being satisfied until we see them raised to victory in Christ.  “…Freely you received, freely give” (Matthew 10:8).

IT never works…HE always does.  Well, amen. 

Whenever there is a battle between the “flesh” and the “Spirit” there is a battle between “it” and “Him.”  What a contrast!!!  If we read what Paul wrote in Galatians ch.5, we get a vivid picture of that contrast.

No matter how much the enemy tries to beat us down and bring us to the place where we could feel we can no longer acknowledge the worth of the effort to walk in the Spirit, we must resist and remember: “There is nothing the nearness of Christ cannot overcome.”  AMEN!  Come, Lord Jesus, and be my “all” in resisting the enemy’s efforts to take me out of walking in the Spirit.

And Michael draws us to another perspective: “judging those who we now can easily see are living a life after the flesh.”  Oh, Lord Jesus, please help me to remember “from where I have come and how miserable an existence I was leading.”  And to always be alert to the fact that I couldn't see anything about living life in the flesh or Spirit UNTIL Christ became my life at salvation!  I should never be judging others who are not seeing this.

Thank you, Lord, that You always make the “Spirit walk” WORK!

- Mike Wells

The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil

            Now the serpent was more crafty than any other wild animal that the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God say, ‘You shall not eat from any tree in the garden’?” The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden; but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the garden, nor shall you touch it, or you shall die.’ ” But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not die; for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

            Genesis 3:1–5

            Man took to himself a secret of God which proved his undoing. The Bible describes this event with the eating of the forbidden fruit. Man now knows good and evil.

            Dietrich Bonhoeffer

            The middle has been entered, the limit has been transgressed. Now man stands in the middle, . . . now he lives out of his own resources and no longer from the middle. . . . Now he lives out of himself, now he creates his own life, he is his own creator.

            Dietrich Bonhoeffer

            We have seen that we were created for unbroken, loving fellowship with God. God’s goal for creation is to have his perfect, triune love displayed to us, in us, and through us. God seeks to be glorified—his triune love expanded and displayed—by how God relates to us, how we relate to God, how we relate to ourselves, and how we relate to others. As we abide in God and God abides in us, we are to participate in the unsurpassable, loving nature of the triune God and love ourselves and our neighbors in the process of loving God, just as God loves us and our neighbors in the process of loving himself. The goal is for humanity to dance with and in the triune God.

            Sin ruptured this fellowship and sidetracked the plan. It was restored in Christ, however, and the purpose of the church now is to reexpress the original goal of creation by living it before the world. As the church replicates God’s unsurpassable and unconditional triune love within itself and to all others, the world comes to believe that Jesus has been sent by the Father. They come to know that the fellowship has been restored because they see it! God is glorified.

            Yet, as we also noted in the last two chapters, the church as a whole has repeatedly failed to fulfill this mandate. In part 2 we explore the question, Why is this so? My conviction is that we have neglected the biblical teaching that the origin and essence of sin is rooted in the knowledge of good and evil. Consequently, we have tended to define sin as that which is evil, over against that which is good, rather than defining it more profoundly as that which is not in union with Christ, whether “good” or “evil.”

- Greg Boyd

Are You Fully Alive - Here's the Key

The cross reveals the full truth about us. This truth reconnects us with our true source of life, which in turn heals our idol addictions. This dimension of the cross is frankly so breathtakingly beautiful that, so far as I can tell, very few followers of Jesus have ever really grasped it. And it contains the secret to living a fully alive life.

You know what something is worth to someone by what they are willing to pay for it. Consider, then, what God was willing to pay to redeem us and make us his bride. Out of his love for us, the all-holy God was willing to do nothing less than to go to the extremity of becoming our sin (2 Cor 5:21) and becoming our God-forsaken curse (Gal 3:13). Which means that God’s love for us led him to the extreme of somehow becoming his own antithesis. It means, in other words, that God gave us the perfect revelation of his true loving nature as well as the perfect revelation of his love for us by somehow becoming anti-God!

God could not have gone further than he in fact did to free us from our bondage and make us his bride. If the worth of something or someone to another is determined by what they are willing to pay to acquire it, then the fact that God was willing to pay the greatest price that could possible be paid can only mean that we have the greatest possible worth to God. The unsurpassable price God paid for us, in other words, means that we have unsurpassable worth to God.
Which means God could not possibly love us more than he actually does, and we could not matter more to God than we actually do.

Another way of saying this is to say that God loves us with the very same love that God eternally is. Calvary is what the love of the Trinity looks like when it encompasses us. Jesus reflects this truth when he prays that we would know that the Father loves us with the very same love he has for his own eternal Son (Jn 17:26).

We are not going too far if we conclude that God loves us with the same love he has for himself as Father, Son and Spirit. The God whose love led him to go to the infinite extreme of offering up his Son to become our sin and our God-forsakenness also gives us, as a result of this unsurpassable sacrifice, “all things”—including, full participation in the loving community that God eternally is (Rom 8:32).

The most remarkable aspect of God’s promise to always ascribe unlimited worth to us is that God promises this “while we were still sinners” and were positioning ourselves as his enemy (Rom 5:8, 10)! In fact, God made this promise precisely by becoming our sin and by standing in our place as a God-forsaken enemy! This clearly demonstrates that the unsurpassable worth God ascribes to us isn’t based on anything positive he finds in us, and it can’t be lessened by anything negative he finds in us.

The cross rather demonstrates that God’s love for us, and our priceless worth to him, are completely based on God’s character, not ours. Even when we are in bondage to sin and are thinking, feeling, and/or acting like God’s enemies, we can trust that it remains as true as ever that we could not be loved more than we actually are, and could not matter more to God than we actually do.
There is nothing that fills my heart with a greater sense of joy, peace, and confidence than the realization that God’s perfect, unsurpassable, unwavering love for me is also unconditional. The person who has allowed this unconditional love to form the core of their self-identity is a person who will remain unshakable in their sense of being fully alive, regardless of what life may throw their way.


—Adapted from Benefit of the Doubt, pages 240-242.  Greg Boyd

For the People of the Kingdom - Love

Roger's Reading Quote .....

For people of the kingdom, participants in the triune fellowship, love and love alone is the bottom line. This is the only thing that gives value to anything we believe, say, or do. This is the reason the world exists, and this is the reason the church exists. Whatever music we play, sermons we preach, churches we build, people we impress, powers we display, stances we take, doctrines we teach, things we achieve—if believers are not growing in their motivation and ability to ascribe unsurpassable worth to people who have no apparent worth, we are just wasting time. We are not making true disciples.

            Indeed, we may actually be doing worse than this. For by engaging in all these wonderful activities without love—by making all this “religious noise”—we are actually providing a distracting counterfeit to the one thing that is needful. How easy it is to not notice that we are unloving when our religious activities are going so well! Our religious noise drowns out the cry of God’s heart.

            This was the chief error of the Pharisees. As we shall see in chapter 11, the Pharisees of Jesus’ day had a lot of religion but no genuine love. They carried out the law to a fault, but their obedience was not motivated by love, and it did not result in love. Jesus assessed that the “love of God” was not in them (John 5:42). They would “tithe mint and rue and herbs of all kinds” while “neglect[ing] justice and the love of God” (Luke 11:42). They did not ascribe unsurpassable worth to God as Creator nor to those to whom God ascribes unsurpassable worth. To no one did Jesus speak harsher words than to these loveless religious professionals.  

- 'Repenting of Religion' - Greg Boyd