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In Whose Image?

4/20/2018

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“Magic mirror on the wall–who is the fairest one of all?” Those of us who grew up with Disney movies as our mainstay recognize these words to be those of the Evil Queen in Snow White, who expects the mirror to answer that she (the queen) is the fairest of them all.

When she does not get her expected answer, the Evil Queen becomes even more evil!


When we think about God and the characteristics of God (sometimes called the attributes of God in theological studies), it is tempting to expect God to look like what we see in the mirror.

Even if we are able to recognize the differences between God’s ways and our own, there are myriads of contenders lined up to influence our image of God. Our nation, our culture, our favorite political party, and even important relationships in our lives can cloud our vision regarding God’s character and attributes. We look into the mirror or into the faces of other people or entities that garner our loyalty, and we attempt to shape God into those images. It has been said that, ever since God created us in His own image (Gen. 1:26-27), we have been seeking to transform Him into ours!

Although we all wrestle with this to some degree, there are ways to refocus our attention on the Living God and allow God to transform us more and more into His own image (see I Cor. 3:18).

The first step is to recognize the voices that are competing for God’s rightful place in our lives. The writer of Hebrews reminds us to “throw off everything that hinders us and the sin that so easily entangles” (Heb. 12:1). In other words, we can refuse to let competing voices move us away from seeking God through reading Scripture and through His work in the Church. Also, we can stay focused on the ways of Jesus, who is “the image of the invisible God” (Col. 1:15). By elevating the ways of Jesus over the ways of our culture or of our favorite political affiliations, we can boldly embrace the true God and become more effective in reaching others for His kingdom.

May we be intentional about ridding ourselves of any idols that we have elevated to “godlike” status, and may we turn again to the faithful and loving ways of Jesus so that we may truly know the Father and be transformed by His grace.


Prayer:

Lord, keep me from worshipping the many good gifts You have given me instead of thanking and worshiping You for them. Keep me from the smallest hint of idolatry, and remind me during temptation that to choose an idol is to reject grace and grieve Your Spirit. Remind me that the worship of money, sex, power, family, possessions, or work is both worthless and tragically foolish, like trying to quench my thirst with a gallon of saltwater. Discipline me in Your grace when I stray and convict me by Your Spirit. In the mighty name of Jesus, Amen. (Adapted from a prayer by Kevin Halloran)


This post was written by Charles W Christian of Holiness Today.  You can find his original post here:  holinesstoday.org/in-whose-image


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Work Out Your Salvation

4/19/2018

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Therefore, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed me, not only in my presence, but much more now in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.  Philippians 2:12-13




​Observation:


As the beautiful early church hymn comes to a close the people of God are invited into the conversation. The beloved are those who have come to follow Jesus Christ. Paul encourages those who have followed him, to continue to work out their salvation “with fear and trembling.” All of this is in light of the beautiful kenosis hymn which has just been quoted. The humility of the Almighty God has resulted in the uniting of humanity with the Divine and participation in the Triune God. For those who have already come to the Lord, there is the charge to continue to work out their salvation, which is an encouragement to continue in the spiritual journey. Each and every single person is to remain connected and “in” Christ, daily engaged in the spiritual journey. 

With fear and trembling God’s children are to reverently and humbly engage in the spiritual walk. Paul would say that this includes the practice of virtues. In other words, Christ’s followers are to intentionally imitate him in their behaviors. This is studying and practicing to become more like Christ. 

This activity is synergistic. As we put forth the effort to imitate Christ, God empowers us, “enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” In other words, when we work at becoming more like Christ, God empowers us to make it possible. This is what happens when God and Man are partnered together in the mission. This is not a works theology for we know that it is not by works that we are saved. However, this is the life of the sanctified. This is the one who has already been saved but must now remain on a journey of transformation into the very image and likeness of Christ. To do so, we practice being like Christ, but God empowers us, so eventually the world wonders whether they are seeing us imitating Christ, or Christ in us. It all becomes seamless, and this is what he means by working our your salvation.

Application

I don’t recall being raised in an environment where we were encouraged to practice the virtues. That language wasn’t used, but I believe the principles were a part of the culture in which I was discipled. To follow Christ meant putting aside the things of the world and wholeheartedly seeking to know Christ. Some of us even wore bracelets embossed with WWJD (What Would Jesus Do). This was a great reminder that we were to have the mind of Christ and follow him in all things. We were to stop in different situations and consider what Christ would do. 

We have stepped away from talking about particular behaviors because there was a period of time in which the church was quite legalistic. At the same time we must realize that to be imitators of Christ, to practice the virtues, to work out our salvation does include the embrace of particular practices. Let’s just think about a few of them:


  1. Our eating habits. We don’t know for sure, but I don’t think that Jesus overate. I’m guessing he ate what was necessary for his life and ministry. We know that there were those who traveled with him and cooked for his entire ministry team. Martha loved putting on a good meal. I’m sure that Jesus enjoyed eating a good meal with those around him, but he didn’t let food define who he was. Walking everywhere that he went, he would have gotten more than 10,000 steps in daily. 
  2. Forgiving those who hurt us. Jesus refused to allow the attitudes of others to define who he was. He graciously forgave those around him, and even went out of his way to provide a pathway for their salvation.
  3. Ministering to the margins. Jesus hung out with people that others would have claimed were “unclean.” He intentionally went to those who were living at the margins and provided a pathway for transformation. 
  4. Living a life of sexual purity. Yes, Jesus is an example for us, and Paul is continually speaking to God’s people that they are not to be engaged in the sexual practices of the day. The first century Roman Empire was a society in which all kinds of sexual acts were approved by the different religions. The Emperor was known to have married a young boy. The temple prostitutes were sanctioned to “help” people to worship. In the city of Corinth it’s known that the city was rampant with sexually transmitted diseases. Married men had relations with their wives so that they would bear children, but in the meantime found other male and female partners to satisfy their “passions.” To be a follower of Christ was to embrace a completely different lifestyle, one which would seem entirely at odds with the prevailing attitudes of the surrounding world. 
  5. Honesty and Transparency become defining factors. Truth has, at times, taken a hit and probably needs to be practiced on a regular basis. It’s far too easy to speak into the grey areas, and yet, truth should be boldly pronounced and lived out in the life of the believer. Transparency should be a virtue, for Christ-followers ought to be those who have nothing to hide. This includes faithful financial stewardship and care of God’s resources. 
  6. Prayer. Spending time in prayer becomes transformational and life sustaining for the Christ-follower. This is the place in which we are brought into intimate fellowship with the Triune God. Time must be set-aside for prayer. This isn’t just a five minute a day relationship with God, but a genuine intimate two-sided conversation in which we become vulnerable enough to have God tell us where we need to grow and mature. 
  7. Scripture. Studying and reading the scriptures helps them to become a part of the fiber of our very being. Just recently I stopped to reflect on the years in which I’ve been spending this time in the word and journaling (blogging). It started out slow and methodical, and yet, I kept learning more and more. Now, I struggle to get through a chapter! (As you’ve probably already learned) Something else has happened and it’s been reflected in my preaching. I may prepare a sermon but in the moment God seems to draw something out of me, and I’m surprised. What I’ve discovered recently is that this slow plodding, spending time in the word for years is suddenly bubbling out of me in unexpected ways. The well of knowledge of the word and God is continually taking me deeper and filling my life, and God is using that to speak to others. 


We could all go on and on, making our lists of things that may be the virtues that we are to pursue. The reality is that in everything we do, we are to practice Christ with excellence, and in that moment God’s power will enable us to do more than we could ask or imagine. Then, as we work out our salvation, the world will wonder whether they are watching us imitate Christ, or Christ in us. 

Prayer:

Lord, I pray for your strength and guidance to be all I can for you. Amen. 

This post was written by Rev Carla Sunburg.  You can find her original post here:  reflectingtheimage.blogspot.com/2018/03/work-out-your-salvation.html

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Were Adam and Eve Real?

4/18/2018

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John Walton’s book, The Lost World of Adam and Eve, is the most recent contribution to a topic that is attracting an incredible amount of attention within the evangelical world: did Adam and Eve exist, and what implications does their existence (or lack thereof) have on the way we read Scripture, biblical authority, and the relationship between science and Christian faith? Walton, who is most known for his book, The Lost World of Genesis One (as well as The Lost World of Scripture), continues the legacy he built there in challenging stereotypical interpretations of the Bible with an informed mind and an elegant pen. The book will serve as a significant contribution in the ongoing conversation.

Walton’s short answer to the question of Adam and Eve’s existence is “yes, they existed.” This will, no doubt, satisfy a great number of evangelical Christians who have seen in recent years more vocal denials of the infamous couple’s historicity.  But Walton’s statement, as previous readers of his work expect, demands qualification. As Walton sees it, while they existed in history we cannot imagine them existing in the way that traditional conservative evangelicalism has always supposed, nor can we suggest that their meaning must be connected with a certain notion of their historicity. Adam and Eve existed historically, but in the Genesis text they serve as archetypal figures for the human race. That is, the biblical text is not so much concerned with Adam and Eve themselves as much as it is concerned with utilizing Adam and Eve to say something about the humanity in general.

Walton defends his thesis well in his classic Waltonian style: proposition by proposition, totaling 21. It would be impossible to articulate Walton’s points thoroughly in a brief review, but a few points demand some attention.

First, Walton realizes the need to deconstruct popular modern interpretations and frameworks prior to building his own case. His book could be separated into two interlaced attempts: Establish what Genesis 1-3 is not about and then establish what Genesis 1-3 is about. It’s simple biblical exegesis.

Second, as a well read scholar of Ancient Near Eastern writings, Walton argues for this point in connection with other comparative literature of the time and geography. This emphasis—of placing Genesis alongside the other stories of the ancient world—is a point missing in most treatments affirming the historicity of Adam and Eve and, more specifically, arguments which attempt to treat Genesis as an account of material origins. Coming from Walton’s analysis, we find that Adam and Eve are assigned priestly roles with the Garden of Eden being the center of the cosmic temple. We find that the trees and the serpent are symbols which find strong parallels in other ancient accounts, and we discover that language of “dust” and “rib” and even “forming” are words that do not carry scientific and anatomical significance but, instead, represent ancient ways of speaking about mortality, purpose, and vocation! To speak of the “forming” of humanity in the ancient world was to speak of establishing a vocation.

Third, Walton recognizes the theological implications of denying a “first couple” (materialistically speaking). If we open ourselves up to contemporary views of origins, we are obviously presented with the dilemma of a long chain of pain and suffering within the world. Creation de novo has long been linked with the Augustinian notion of Original Sin which presumes a perfect, sinless, and painless world prior to the Fall and this, of course, needs to have a pivot point: namely, a literal historic fall from perfection. Walton, thus, goes into territory which few evangelical scholars want to go and even where few scholars who attempt to deny the historicity of Adam and Eve wish to go: he calls for a rethinking of Original Sin. There isn’t time or space here to get into the detailed argument which Walton presents, but it is one of the strong points of the book theologically speaking and, frankly, the most necessary if one wants to consistently affirm scientific continuity and Scripture.

Some evangelicals, no doubt, will accuse Walton of going too far in his call to allow contemporary science and Scripture to exist alongside one another.  The suggestion that Adam and Eve could have existed as two advanced hominids in a long evolutionary chain will seem compromising to some. Others, however, will certainly accuse Walton of not going far enough! As they see it, scientific theory does rule out any real historical Adam and Eve and that suggesting there was a couple is tantamount to having one’s cake and eating it too! But, for the vast majority of Christians who think the whole science-religion war is an unnecessary war with far too many casualties, Walton presents a middle way forward. His book, no doubt because of both his scholarly credentials and his obvious evangelical conviction, will be well received amongst the majority of those who want a thoughtful and, yet, traditional approach towards science and the Bible.

This post was written by Randy Hardman of Seedbed.  For the original post, go to:  www.seedbed.com/did-adam-and-eve-exist/



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The Problem of Evil Solved

4/17/2018

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(Based on a non-canonical hypothetical conversation between Jesus and Thomas.)

For forty days after his resurrection, Jesus met often with his apostles, speaking about the kingdom of God (Acts 1:3). The apostles asked many questions about times and seasons, and about God’s plan.

One day Thomas said to Jesus, “You rose from the dead and defeated Satan! But there is still so much violence and evil in the world. Why?”

Jesus replied, “As I have often told you, there are many things you do not understand now, but you will know later.”

Thomas said, “But can you give us some help now? We are troubled and puzzled that we still see so much suffering and evil all around us!”

Jesus said, “This is a very big question. And there will be a very big answer.”

Thomas said, “Surely there must finally be a truly satisfying answer to evil! Especially the problem of so much terrible and seemingly meaningless, innocent suffering in this present world.”

Jesus said, “In the Age to Come, the Father will fully compensate for all this evil and suffering. He will make up for it fully.”

Thomas replied, “Well, yes. God’s purposes are always good and perfect. And your people in the past have always said that. The Psalms often say the same thing, one way or another. Among us Jews, it’s the traditional answer. But it doesn’t give much help to people who are suffering right now!”

Jesus said, “Yes, I know. But there is a great truth here. In the Age to Come, the Father will fully, genuinely compensate for all the suffering in the present world. He will give the victims of suffering a rich, fulfilling life that far outweighs the suffering. Even if the people who suffer now do not know me now in the midst of their suffering, they will know me then.”

Thomas was quiet, pondering these words.

Jesus continued: “Actually the life to come will be richer, fuller, deeper, more joyous and satisfying than if the person had never experienced the suffering at all. Tears of suffering will become streams of joy.”

Thomas said, “What?! How can that be?”

Jesus said, “In that day you will see that the painful, often overwhelming experience of suffering will have been redeemed. In fact, the heavy agony of suffering will make the New Creation richer and brighter than if it had never happened!”

Thomas said, “I can’t comprehend that.”

Jesus said, “No, not yet. But search the Scriptures. Many places the Law and the Prophets point this direction. Some of my chosen instruments in coming days will teach and write things that point this way. This will give comfort to those who mourn or suffer or must endure torture, tragedy, exploitation, and abuse.”

Jesus added, “I am not saying everyone will be saved, or that suffering buys salvation. No. But I have paid the ransom. I have opened the door. I have conquered death, suffering, the grave, the Evil One.”

Thomas and the other apostles fell silent, thinking about these words.

After a few minutes Jesus added, “This is for you to believe. You must trust me and the Father. You must let my Spirit lead you. And you will be my comforting arms and hands and feet now, to the world’s poor and oppressed, the world’s suffering ones, here and to the ends of the earth.”

Jesus concluded, “So this is for you to believe. It is faith and trust. It is hope, not as the world gives, but as promised by the Father in the Scriptures, and as you have seen in me and in all that I have taught you. This is not meaningless. It is not empty words. It will not satisfy the wisdom of the world. But it is the truth.”

Thomas said, “Lord, I believe.”

Jesus said finally, “I am the Lion and the Lamb. Right now, people see me mostly as the Lamb that was slain, who died but rose again to bring salvation. But I am also the Lion of the Tribe of Judah. The day is coming when I will roar, evil will be judged, and the earth will be filled with the glory of God as the waters cover the sea.”

This post was written by Dr Howard Snyder.  You can find his original post here:  www.seedbed.com/problem-evil-solved/

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What is God like?

4/16/2018

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Question: What is God Like?

Answer: God is perfect in power, knowledge, and in His holy love.

Great is our Lord and mighty in power; his understanding has no limit. (Psalm 147:5)
God is three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Three persons in one God. They are distinct in their personhood but united in their nature. Nature is maybe a bit of a hard word, so let me explain. Nature here means the “kind of thing” something is.
  • Ice cream’s nature is to be a frozen milk product.
  • A giraffe’s nature is to be a long-necked, even-toed ungulate mammal.
  • A triangle’s nature is to be a closed figure with three sides and three angles.
So what’s God’s nature? What kind of thing is God?

The best way to speak about God’s nature is to say that God is, in every way, a perfect kind of thing. God’s nature is whatever is best.

Saint Anselm, a medieval monk, described God as “supremely great.” God is so great, for Anselm, that He’s the greatest being we can imagine. It’s impossible to even think of a being greater than God. If we could think of something truly better than our definition of God, then we should change our definition so that God would be understood as that better thing.

This is what we mean when we say that God is “a perfect being.” We can’t think of anything better.

The idea of perfection is important because we are called not only to love God, but also to worship Him. Worship means to offer total devotion. And only a perfect being is truly worthy of worship. Though the Bible teaches that angels surpass us in power, we do not worship them.
Worshiping anything less than a perfect being is sinful. The Bible has a word for worshiping less-than-perfect things. It’s called idolatry. This is why the psalmist said, “For all the gods of the nations are idols, but the LORD made the heavens” (Psalm 96:5).

The true God can’t be a lesser deity with some powers. Zeus, for instance, from Greek mythology, had a lot of power. He could throw lightning bolts. But he didn’t create lightning. Zeus wasn’t even eternal. According to the mythological stories, Zeus had a father and came into being at a particular point in time.

The only God worthy of worship is perfectly powerful, wise, good, eternal, and is the Creator of anything that exists.

One of the ways that we know from Scripture that Jesus is the true God is that He is worshiped. After His resurrection, when Jesus met the women at the tomb, the Bible says that the women “came to him, clasped his feet and worshiped him” (Matthew 28:9). Jesus is worthy of worship because He is the true God—the second person of the Trinity. And God is perfect.

Now, in order to understand perfection, we have a little bit of a problem. True perfection is hard to describe, because we’re not perfect. Imperfect people have a hard time knowing exactly what a perfect being would be like. It’s like trying to imagine how a person smarter than you would think.

So immediately we’re in trouble.

It’s a little bit like this. We can think of the idea of a perfect circle but when we try to draw one it’s very hard. We mess up. Likewise, we can imagine the idea of a perfect God even if we can’t actually describe all the things this perfect God would be like.

Fortunately the Bible helps us out by telling us some things about God’s perfection. Scripture tells us, among other things, that God’s perfection means that God is perfectly powerful (Luke 1:37), perfectly knowing (Matthew 6:8), and perfectly good (Matthew 5:48).

This means:
  • God can do anything
  • God knows everything
  • God will always do what is right
For us, this is really good news, because this means that we can fully trust God. He knows us completely and loves us perfectly. Nothing (except for us) can stop God from achieving the good plans He has for us.

If God wasn’t perfect in this way, we might not be able to fully trust Him.

If God had all the power, but wasn’t perfectly wise, He could be kind of destructive.

If God was perfectly smart, but wasn’t perfectly good, He might be kind of a villain.

If God was perfectly good, but didn’t know us or have the power to save us, He would be kind of useless.

Take this example. Imagine you have three superheroes:
  • Power Person
  • Genius Guy
  • Moral Man
Power Person can do anything, but he’s not very smart. So whenever he tries to help, he often does the wrong thing.

Genius Guy knows everything, but he isn’t fully good. So sometimes he helps, but sometimes he uses his brilliance for his own selfish ends.

Moral Man knows exactly what the right thing is to do, and he desires to do it, but he isn’t all-powerful or all-knowing. So even though he wants to help everybody, he can’t. He’s just a guy.

If you got in trouble, which of these three would you call?

It’s hard to say. None of them might be any help.

The good news is that God is Power Person, Genius Guy, and Moral Man all rolled into one. He has all the power, all the knowledge, and is perfectly good.

So we can always trust Him.

This post is taken from the Illustrated Catechism, The Absolute Basics fo the Christian Faith by Phil Tallon.  

You can find the book here:  store.seedbed.com/products/the-absolute-basics-of-the-christian-faith  

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Uncle Buddy: It Happened to Old Bud

4/15/2018

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My beautiful old mother was a Presbyterian by faith and was very strict. If we boys had met a lady and had not pulled off our caps, the blackjack brush would have been flying. The American flag would have been in view, for while Mother put the stripes on us, we saw stars. Then the red, white and blue would immediately appear on the surface of our legs.

Some time ago I was crossing a large city, and, behold, I met a young woman with a pair of boots and a man’s hat on. Her hair was gone and her mouth was painted red. She was leading a large bulldog and he had pulled her from one side of the walk to the other until her hands were blistered. In front of a large department store the young woman lost her temper and she gave that bulldog the most outlandish cussing that I ever heard a poor dog get. I gave the sidewalk to the woman and the dog, and I kept my hat on.

When I got to my room, I said, “Now, Lord, my precious old mother taught me to take my hat off when I met a lady.” And the Lord seemed to say, “Yes, you must still do that when you meet a lady. Women and bulldogs are another proposition.”

Robinson, Reuben A. (Bud). The Collected Works of 'Uncle Bud' Robinson (Kindle Locations 4360-4368). Jawbone Digital. Kindle Edition. 

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Full Confidence

4/14/2018

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​​A young man, distressed about his soul, had confided his difficulties to a friend, who discerned that he was striving to obtain everlasting life by great efforts.  He spoke of "sincere prayers' and "heart-felt desires" after salvation, but continually lamented that he did not "feel any different in spite of it all."

His friend did not answer him at first but presently interrupted him with the inquiry,

" William, did you ever learn to float?"  

"Yes, I did," was the surprised reply.  

"And did you find it easy to learn?"

"Not at first," he answered.  

"What was the difficulty?" his friend pursued.  

"Well, the fact was, I could not lie still; I could not believe or realize that the water would hold me up without any effort of my own, so I always began to struggle, and, of course, down I went at once."  

"And then?"  

"Then I found out that I must give up all the struggle, and just rest on the strength of the water to bear me up.  It was easy enough after that; I was able to lie back in the fullest confidence that I should never sink."  

"And isn't God's Word more worthy of your trust than the changeable sea?  He does not bid you wait for feelings.  He command you to just rest in Him, to believe His Word, and accept His gift.  His message of life reaches down to you in your place of ruin and death, and work to you now is:  'Believe ye that I am able to do this?'  He is able to save to the uttermost."  

S.S. Lesson Illustrator, pages 20-21 in ​​One Thousand Evangelistic Illustrations, edited by Webb, A. (1924).  New York: Harper & Brothers Publishers

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Peace Be With You

4/13/2018

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In a world of fear, we can rise above the confusion and reflect Christ’s peace as we live in His peace.

Friends talk about our ever-changing world and our roles as Christians in it: They call attention to daily news headlines reminding us that winds of change blow continually across the globe. They speak of the developing picture of national leaders and shifts in governments around the world. They remind me of the advancements in science and technology that bring innovation at break-neck speed.

Then they ask, “What does it mean to be the church in this new world?”

My answer to that question looks across 1,000 years to the days of the Holy Roman Empire in the west, then 2,000 years to the New Testament era, then 3,000 years to the reign of King David, and then 4,000 years to the adventures of Abraham. Each generation of human history has experienced its own array of opportunities and challenges. When we plant our feet in the soil of each time span, we see that people lived in seasons of change and sensed an air of uncertainty about the future.

However, the basic needs of human beings have changed very little across the years of human existence. People always need clean air to breathe, safe food to eat, pure water to drink, and a dwelling place to protect them from nature’s elements. The basic needs of human hearts have changed very little across the years as well.

So, living and ministering as disciples of Jesus Christ in our new world have common characteristics to the ways disciples have lived and ministered throughout church history. Jesus demonstrated a worthy model when He encountered the woman at the Samaritan well (John 4:4-24).

  • He entered into conversation with this woman who happened to be a social outcast due to her lifestyle choices.
  • He put her need to hear the good news ahead of the social etiquette of His day, which restricted conversation between Jews and Samaritans.
  • He quickly made the connection between well water, which met a basic physical need, and spiritual water, which spoke to the need of the woman’s heart.

​His actions remind us that our physical world is filled with signposts that point us to life’s spiritual realities and ultimately to God and to the peace only He can supply.


As the conversation progressed, Jesus refused to allow the woman to shift topics to pointless religious chatter. He kept the conversation focused on the Father and her need for a relationship with Him. Jesus then promised, “I will give you living water” (John 4:10). Of course, Jesus was using living water as an analogy of the Holy Spirit who flows through our lives. This living water of the Spirit keeps our spiritual lives fresh every day. It makes us fruitful like a river flowing through an arid desert. The Spirit’s living water quenches our spiritual thirst for God and at the same time makes us thirsty for more of His presence and peace in our lives.
The Samaritan woman became so thirsty for this living water that she accepted Jesus’ offer and felt her deepest need met. The overflowing fullness of her heart compelled her to tell everyone she knew about her newfound relationship with God. She was forever changed because Jesus encountered her.

That’s what it means to be the church in today’s world. We are the hands and feet of Jesus for our generation. Of course we’re living in ever-changing, uncertain days. No news flash there; life on earth experiences constant change. But, people still thirst for water, and they still thirst for a relationship with God. We have an opportunity to minister to friends, family, and even strangers just as Jesus did. The peace Christ offered then is still available today.
We can share the Father’s living water that will satisfy their deepest thirst even as they live in our ever-changing world. In our service to Christ, let us offer peace in the midst of the world’s fear and confusion. We can offer hope where hopelessness prevails. Let’s be the hands and feet of Jesus to those who need Him today.

Peace be with you.

This post was written by Frank M. Moore of Holiness Today.  You can find his original post here:  holinesstoday.org/peace


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Humility and Exaltation

4/12/2018

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Therefore God also highly exalted him
and gave him the name
that is above every name,
so that at the name of Jesus
every knee should bend,
in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue should confess
that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.

Phil. 2:9 -11   



Observation:

Something amazing happens in this hymn. First there is the focus on the humility of Christ and the beauty of his incarnation. Then comes the connecting word “therefore” that leads us to new heights in understanding the love of God. This is the exaltation of humanity because Christ's humility was the assumption of human flesh. It was not Jesus that needed the exaltation — it was us! 

By assuming human flesh, Jesus was able to exalt humanity, saving us from death. When Jesus was lifted up by the Father, so were we. Jesus creates a human bridge between created and Creator that allows us to become partakers of the Divine nature; we can now fellowship with the Triune God. 

We are the ones who were in desperate need of this work of God. We all die in Christ, but are then exalted and raised up with him. The result is a Christian life which is empowered by the resurrection. Paul’s purpose in reminding the church of this hymn is unity. Jesus’ followers journey with him in humility to the cross, and are exalted with him into a holy life. In this scenario there is no room for fighting, or personal ambition, only a church community that is focused on Christ.  

Application:

The beauty of Christ’s humility and exaltation is that it has a profound effect on our lives. It is in walking the pathway of humility that we are able to experience the exaltation. This is a message of hope and transformation for the here and now. We don’t have to wait until death to experience the exaltation, but it’s God’s desire for us to participate in Christ today. 

Many people in all of Christendom were baptized on Easter. This has been a part of Christian tradition for nearly 2000 years. It makes sense when we see baptism as dying out to our former selves and raising up out of the water, united with Christ in new life. Baptism itself is humility and exaltation. 

Far too many of us get lost in humility, and often a false humility at that. A bruised self-image is not humility. Allowing our emotions to be beaten up by others and destroying any healthy sense of self is not what this passage is about. It is about the sacrifice of personal ambition, for the sake of Christ. It is about laying down ourselves, our self-interest, our desire to be “right,” so that we may know Christ. 

The beauty of being united with Christ is that we may participate in a transformed community. This isn’t easy because our own thoughts, ideas, opinions and egos can easily get in the way. But that’s why following Jesus is different. If we truly unite with him in humility, we experience the exaltation or participation with him. This is where the renewing of our minds takes place, and no longer do we need to prove that we are right, or that our way is the best way. Instead, there is a genuine desire to know Christ, and this radically transforms our thinking. 

Exaltation is our sanctification as we are united with our holy God. The awesomeness of this encounter can only lead us to praise and adoration, where we confess that Jesus is Lord! The significance of this phrase would not have been lost on those first-century believers. Only Caesar was called Lord, because the people believed in the deification of the Emperor. This was the deification of Christ, who created a pathway for humanity to be united with the Divine. “Jesus is Lord” was a declaration that the humility and exaltation had accomplished much more than any earthly ruler could even imagine. 

Prayer:

Lord, may I follow you in humility, and live in the power of resurrection. Amen.


This post was written by Rev Carla Sunburg.  You can find her original post here:  reflectingtheimage.blogspot.com/2018/03/humility-and-exaltation.html

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10 Common Arguments by Atheists (part two)

4/11/2018

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6. Christian’s only believe in Christianity because they were born in a Christian culture. If they’d been born in India they would have been Hindu instead.

This argument is appealing because it pretends to wholly dismiss people’s reasoning capabilities based on their environmental influences in childhood. The idea is that people in general are so intellectually near-sighted that they can’t see past their own upbringing, which, it would follow, would be an equally condemning commentary on atheism (if one was consistent with the charge), but the idea is fairly easy to counter.

Take the history of the Jewish people for example. Let us say that to ‘be’ Jewish, in the religious sense, is much more than a matter of cultural adherence. To be a Jewish believer is to have Judaism permeate one’s thinking and believing and interaction with the world. But is this the state of affairs with the majority of the Jewish people, whether in America, Europe, Israel, or wherever? One would have to be seriously out of touch to believe so. The same phenomenon is found within so-called Christian communities, that is: many sport a Christian title, but are wholly derelict in personal faith. “Believing” in Christianity is a far more serious endeavor then merely wearing a church name tag. Indeed, being born in a Jewish or Christian centric home today is more often a precursor that the child will grow up to abandon the faith of his or her family, or at least be associated with the faith by affiliation only.

7. The gospel doesn’t make sense: God was mad at mankind because of sin so he decided to torture and kill his own Son so that he could appease his own pathological anger. God is the weirdo, not me.

This is actually a really good argument against certain Protestant sects (I’ve used it myself on numerous occasions), but it has no traction with the Orthodox Christian faith. The Orthodox have no concept of a God who needed appeasement in order to love His creation. The Father sacrificed His own Son in order to destroy death with His life; not to assuage His wrath, but to heal; not to protect mankind from His fury, but to unite mankind to His love. If the reader is interested to hear more on this topic follow thislink for a fuller discussion.

8. History is full of mother-child messiah cults, trinity godheads, and the like. Thus the Christian story is a myth like the rest.

This argument seems insurmountable on the surface, but is really a slow-pitch across the plate. There is no arguing the fact that history is full of similar stories found in the Bible, and I won’t take the time to recount them here. But this fact should not be surprising in the least, indeed if history had no similar stories it would be reason for concern. Anything beautiful always has replicas. A counterfeit coin does not prove the non-existence of the authentic coin, it proves the exact opposite. A thousand U2 cover bands is not evidence that U2 is a myth.
Ah, but that doesn’t address the fact that some of these stories were told before the Biblical accounts. True. But imagine if the only story of a messianic virgin birth, death, and resurrection were contained in the New Testament. That, to me, would be odd. It would be odd because if all people everywhere had God as their Creator, yet the central event of human history—the game changing event of all the ages—the incarnation, death, and resurrection of Christ had never occurred to them, in at least some hazy form, they would have been completely cut off from the prime mysteries of human existence. It seems only natural that if the advent of Christ was real it would permeate through the consciousness (or, if you prefer, ‘unconsciousness’) of mankind on some level regardless of their place in history. One should expect to find mankind replicating these stories, found in their own visions and dreams, again and again throughout history. And indeed, that is what we find.

9. The God of the Bible is evil. A God who allows so much suffering and death can be nothing but evil.

This criticism is voice in many different ways. For me, this is one of the most legitimate arguments against the existence of a good God. The fact that there is suffering and death is the strongest argument against the belief in an all-powerful, all-knowing, all-loving God. If suffering and death exist it seems to suggest one of two things: (1) either God is love, but He is not all-powerful and cannot stop suffering and death, or (2) God is all-powerful, but He does not care for us.

I devoted a separate article addressing this problem, but let me deal here with the problem inherent in the criticism itself. The argument takes as its presupposition that good and evil are real; that there is an ultimate standard of good and evil that supersedes mere fanciful ‘ideas’ about what is good and evil at a given time in our ethical evolution, as it were. If there is not a real existence—an ontological reality—of good and evil, then the charge that God is evil because of this or that is really to say nothing more than, “I personally don’t like what I see in the world and therefore a good God cannot exist.” I like what C.S. Lewis said on a similar matter: “There is no sense in talking of ‘becoming better’ if better means simply ‘what we are becoming’—it is like congratulating yourself on reaching your destination and defining destination as ‘the place you have reached.’”

What is tricky for the atheist in these sorts of debates is to steer clear of words loaded with religious overtones. It’s weird for someone who does not believe in ultimate good and evil to condemn God as evil because He did not achieve their personal vision of good. So, the initial criticism is sound, but it is subversive to the atheist’s staging ground. If one is going to accept good and evil as realities, he is not in a position to fully reject God. Instead, he is more in a position to wrestle with the idea that God is good. This struggle is applauded in the Orthodox Church. After all, the very word God used for his people in the Old Testament—“Israel”—means to struggle with God.

10. Evolution has answered the question of where we came from. There is no need for ignorant ancient myths anymore.

This might be the most popular attempted smack-downs of religion in general today. It is found in many variations but the concept is fairly consistent and goes something like this: Science has brought us to a point where we no longer need mythology to understand the world, and any questions which remain will eventually be answered through future scientific breakthroughs. The main battle-ground where this criticism is seen today is in evolution vs. creationism debates.

Let me say upfront that there is perhaps no other subject that bores me more than evolution vs. creationism debates. I would rather watch paint dry. And when I’m not falling asleep through such debates I’m frustrated because usually both sides of the debate use large amounts of dishonesty in order to gain points rather than to gain the truth. The evolutionist has no commentary whatsoever on the existence of God, and the creationist usually suffers from profound confusion in their understanding of the first few chapters of Genesis.

So, without entering into the most pathetic debate of the ages, bereft of all intellectual profundity, I’ll only comment on the underlining idea that science has put Christianity out of the answer business. Science is fantastic if you want to know what gauge wire is compatible with a 20 amp electric charge, how agriculture works, what causes disease and how to cure it, and a million other things. But where the physical sciences are completely lacking is in those issues most important to human beings—the truly existential issues: what does it mean to be human, why are we here, what is valuable, what does it mean to love, to hate, what am I to do with guilt, grief, sorrow, what does it mean to succeed, is there any meaning and what does ‘meaning’ mean, and, of course, is there a God? etc, ad infinitum.

As far as where we come from, evolution has barely scratched the purely scientific surface of the matter. Even if the whole project of evolution as an account of our history was without serious objection, it would still not answer the problem of the origin of life, since the option of natural selection as an explanation is not available when considering how dead or inorganic matter becomes organic. Even more complicated is the matter of where matter came from. The ‘Big Bang’ is not an answer to origins but rather a description of the event by which everything came into being; i.e., it’s the description of a smoking gun, not the shooter.

For arguments1-5, check yesterday's post:  www.ironstrikes.com/blog/10-common-arguments-by-atheists-part-one

This post was written by Eric Hyde.  You can find his original post here:  ehyde.wordpress.com/2014/03/21/top-10-most-common-atheist-arguments-and-why-they-fail/

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