Month: July 2020

For all who have sinned without the law will perish without the law, and all who have sinner under the law will be judged by the law.  Romans 2:12

Unbelievers are stuck on issue of whether or not God is fair.  Is He capable of sending someone who has never heard the Gospel to eternal condemnation because they failed to accept Jesus as their Savior? Wrestling with that issue, they are distracted from the reality that they have heard the Gospel and are without excuse.  It’s as if they look for a reason to discredit God so that their own rejection of Him is justified.

Paul gives the answer here to the question of God’s ultimate fairness.  Each man is judged according to the revelation of God he has received.  Those who have lived without knowledge of the law are still without excuse.  Those who have heard the Gospel are also without excuse.  In the previous chapter, he explains.  God has revealed himself in nature and in the moral code of mankind, no matter the culture, to cause man to worship Him and seek His face.

Every person, in every culture, has God’s moral code written on their heart.  They are warmed by love and appalled by hatred.  They embrace honesty and feel violated when lied to.  The punish treachery and applaud fairness.  Even the most hardened atheist will cry out over the injustice of being wronged yet conveniently fail to explore why he has a strong internal opinion at all about the fact a wrong was committed.  By whose standard was the ‘wrong’ considered wrong?  Mankind was made in the image of God and we have enough conviction in us about right and wrong, even with a carnal conscience, to know that God exists.

Why does this issue matter to me today?  God is not easily understood.  He is full of mystery.  Because of that, my faith can be threatened by seeming inconsistencies. I can be tempted to bend toward unbelief.  Instead of looking for loopholes today which, I believe, might absolve me from putting all my trust in Him, I stand on what I do know.  He is just, fair, loving, and longsuffering.  If a particular mystery in scripture appears to put any part of His character in question, I know it is only because I have partial eyesight.

Whatever I don’t understand makes me move closer to You, by faith, instead of farther away.  I guard my faith with a vengeance.  Amen

I am the door.  If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out to find pasture. John 10:9

In the daytime, sheep are put out to pasture.  They graze, nap in the sun, even play.  At nighttime, they go back into the sheepfold to sleep in safety. Day after day, and night after night, their way of life is unchanged.  Their familiar routine offers security, abundance, and relationship.

The boredom which has plagued the American church is waning for a small segment of the church.  While we are seeing the ‘great falling away’ of the masses, there is revival among those who have chosen to walk the narrow way with Jesus.  This next generation burns with a fire that is unprecedented in recent history.  They know what so many of their parents never learned.  Christianity is not about a religion, it’s about a person.  Knowing the Bible, reciting the Apostle’s Creed and The Lord’s Prayer, ‘does not a Christian make!’  Christian education without knowing Jesus will cause Jesus to say one day, “Depart from me.  I never knew you.”

The rhythm of a Christian’s life, the person who knows Jesus, should be one of resting, grazing, and working.

• When threatened by wild animals, I run back to my shepherd, and to the safety of the fold.  My heart may be beating wildly but nothing can hurt me outside of His will if I stick close to Him.  Restorative rest is a promise He gives me.
• When following the Shepherd, I enjoy abundant spiritual food.  The Word of God is a pasture, always green.  It must surely resemble the lush green landscapes of New Zealand, the most beautiful countryside I have ever seen.  Take a back country road and what you see around every turn is another pasture of sheep.  Each view is a postcard.  The food Jesus provides for me, meditatively and instructively, is the likings of the finest pastures.
• When I have eaten sufficiently, work awaits.  The work is not abusive.  It is not laden with high expectations without the foundation of proper nourishment and proper equipping.  The shepherd has given me both.  He has fed me, He has tutored me, and He has trained me.  My work is the culmination of His promise.  “My yoke is easy and my burden is light.”  Work in the context of a relationship is the key to a joyous calling.

Your pastures are so green and satisfying, Jesus.  I have rested, I have eaten, and now I will work.  In Jesus name, Amen

The ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat.   Genesis 8:4

As I sit and listen to the noise of the natural world outside my office windows, I’m aware of all that lives outside in the open air.  Noah and his family witnessed the killing of every living thing outside the ark and were given no instructions from God about what would happen on the other side of the flood.  Their lives were taken up with building the ark and surviving catastrophe.  As the ark came to rest and the floodwaters receded, they had no blueprint.  The rest and the quiet were gracious surprises.

God provides rest and blessing after the storm.  While I am being tossed about, I am so taken with surviving that the thought of rest and reflection on some future day seems out of reach.  I’ve learned that I cannot know what blessing will look like.  God fashions it, that ‘new thing’, and no amount of curiosity will be able to paint a scenario that resembles what God will create.

For the storm, there was warning and detailed instructions for survival.  For the new world, there would be daily grace and spiritual intuition.  Once the mountain peaks were visible, Noah would know to send out a raven, one who could gather food from the carnage that rested on exposed land.  On another day, he would decide to send out a dove, one who would search for new foliage.  None of this was spelled out by God but all of this was put into the heart of Noah because he walked with God.

The nature of a storm is such that it takes all mental and emotional faculties to stay afloat.  There are no resting periods to reflect on the past nor dream about the future.  It’s inconceivable and doubtful that there will be a future.  But God is not bound by time.  While the winds of heaven howl, the certainty of future blessing is as much a reality on God’s timeline.  In the midst of the uncertainty between Egypt and Canaan, God spoke to Moses.  “I will personally go with you, Moses, and I will give you rest.”  Exodus 33:14

Make me a victor in Christ and prepare me for ruling and spiritual rest.  Amen

About three months later Judah was told, “Tamar your daughter-in-law has been immoral. Moreover, she is pregnant by immorality.”

The story of Joseph is one of the predominant stories in Genesis. Abraham’s descendants were saved when Joseph assumed a place of political power in Egypt. If Jacob and his sons had not fled to Egypt in a time of famine, the line of Abraham would have ended.

But the puzzling thing is this ~ Why, in the middle of the story of Joseph, does God bring in the story of Judah and Tamar? Isn’t it out of place? This tiny story is really the stunning focal point of the whole book. Here’s why.

Through Tamar’s offspring would come King David’s ancestral line. Without her pregnancy, Judah’s line would be extinct. In essence, Joseph’s rise to power made a way for Tamar’s child to get to Egypt! Perez, her son, was able to live outside of famine and grow to prosper. Ten generations after him would birth a shepherd boy who would become King.

How well do I handle God’s interruptions? When He leads me on a detour, or so I believe it to be, how willing am I to trust Him? For all I know, the detour provides the next doorway to my future. God hasn’t laid down His sovereign rule over my life; He has exercised it. Just because I can’t see the value of His interruption doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.

Getting older yields many gifts. One of them is the privilege of looking back at a large chunk of my life to see the fingerprints of God. The places of pain that I thought were wasted were really invaluable. Some of the places that God took me (and I mourned all the way there), were places of blessed connections. How well I remember God’s words in Hosea. ‘I’m calling you to the desert to speak tenderly to you there.’ Desert equals disruption if I look at it from my limited viewpoint. But desert really equals a life-defining moment when God is there to speak into my life.

Against what are you straining today? Perhaps your trust in the Shepherd has eroded because of the place he’s taken you. What appears to be a meaningless detour never is when God has you by the hand. Do the very thing I failed to do so many years ago. Embrace the place you are in, by faith, and ask God to give you eyes to see the treasures under the rocks.

You don’t make detours. I’m on Your path and always secure. Amen

And Pharaoh said to his servants, “Can we find a man like this, in whom is the Spirit of God?” Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Since God has shown you all this, there is none so discerning and wise as you are. Genesis 41:38-39

It’s one thing for pagans to ask the question, ‘Can we find a man in whom is the Spirit of God?’ It’s quite another to realize that in the family of God, it can be equally difficult to find someone who is full of the Spirit. If each of us is a container for the Spirit of God to live His life, why is He not more recognizable?

I’m convinced that life is one long series of choices where I choose whether or not to quench the Spirit. He speaks; I turn my ear toward more enticing voices. He suggests; I ignore His suggestion and pick something that promises instant gratification. He begs obedience; I procrastinate and then live in perpetual guilt. He woos me to behold Him in all His glory; I am oblivious by the lights and glitter of Babylon.

The only time I am more than willing to drown out everything that competes with the Spirit is when I suffer. My need of Him is stronger than my need for things that are of little consolation. Stripped of everything that used to matter, Jesus is in full view. His voice is clear and merciful. “I’m here!”  His invitation is gracious though I don’t deserve this prodigal’s homecoming. As I sink into waves of mercy, He proceeds to say what He has said across the ages to repentant sinners. “Go and sin no more.” Of course. How could I think of it after such a lifesaving encounter!

The Spirit of God is prominent in me only when my need of Him has exposed how precious He is. He is on full display when He is my treasure. May others see that I am obsessed and possessed.

Joseph’s betrayal, imprisonment, and isolation proved to be three great friends – for these lifesaving wounds led him to cling to his God. No wonder Pharaoh saw the Spirit in so short an encounter.

Lord, the greatest lesson of my lifetime is to learn to embrace suffering and not fight it. Each trial has led me to You. Amen

But the men [angels] reached out their hands and brought Lot into the house with them and shut the door. And they struck with blindness the men who were at the entrance of the house, both small and great, so that they wore themselves out groping for the door.  Genesis 19:10-11

God is faithful to protect His children.  The men who came to Lot and his family, the ‘angels unaware’, shut the door to the outside gang who had come to do Lot’s visitors harm.  Knowing their numbers and their strength, knowing they could probably still break down the door, the angels struck the members of the gang with blindness.  Even that didn’t stop them.  They were still obsessed with finding the door and breaking in ~ so strong was their obsession with sexual perversion.

What does it take to break under the hand of God?  Personally, it has taken a lot.  My own heart was so darkened that it took a lot of time and pain to bring me to the end of myself.  I wanted what I wanted ~ and I was  obsessed in my own private and stubborn way.  I have since learned that if not taught the sweet fruit of submission when we’re young, the desire for personal autonomy magnifies over time.  So much harder to submit at 45 than at 4 years of age.  That’s why we teach our children to obey the first time.  We’re preparing them to say, “Yes, Lord!” when Jesus calls them.

You may be watching the Lord break the will of a loved one.  You may be shaking your head at how stubborn they are. (And also humbled at the memory of how stubborn you were.)  You wonder how much longer.  Though they have felt the heavy hand of God, they are still groping for the door that leads them to satisfy their cravings for sinful pleasures.

Though it may look hopeless today, it is not.  Not all believe, we know that.  But those who burn the brightest for the kingdom experience a pivotal moment when they surrender in the fire.  As you watch the crushing of that person you love, know that God knows their limits and frame.  You can trust His hand that afflicts – even in your tears for their repentance.

Lord, you hear my cry.  It’s hard to watch someone fight before they bow their knee.  I know Your justice but I am comforted that You are also limitless in mercy.  Amen