Author: Albert

Devotionals, January Third Week

January 15th, 2021

You crown the year with your bounty; your wagon tracks overflow with abundance. Psalms 65:11

Today, we will start the third week of January with a theme for a new devotional that we are going to call “Redeeming The Time.”

We have only spent 2 weeks into 2021 and in the remaining 350 days we are always going to need a little wisdom in how we spend our time—what we ask for in prayer, how we exercise our faith, where our energies are focused, the plans we need to see executed, the distractions we should avoid, and how we can reach a God-ordained success for this year.

In Psalms 65:11, we see David talking about how God crowns the year with His bounty and His wagon tracks overflow with abundance. So, rather than start this meditation by thinking of all we can achieve in our intelligence, strategies, and strength—it is a great idea to seek what the Almighty God can do for us this year. This shouldn’t be difficult even for many who see little involvement of God in our day to day lives, considering that many who had planned certain things in 2020 did not see them come to pass, because it was the year of COVID 19, when the whole world was brought to a standstill.

The whole Psalms 65 is amazing.

We see David talking of praises awaiting God in Zion (verse 1). That sounds like a good way to start the year. We should learn to praise God more joyfully.  He also talks about fulfilling the vows. This reminds us of being faithful in all our commitments to God and people. In verse 2, he reminds us that God answers prayers and all people in the world look to Him. In verse 3, he reminds us of God’s forgiveness.  Verse 4 is thrilling: blessed are those who come near to God, they are blessed with the fatness or goodness or festivities of God’s house. So being in God’s presence this year sounds like a sure way to be blessed. A definite path to see reasons to celebrate God’s goodness. Verse 5 is even more comforting: “By terrible things in righteousness wilt thou answer us” in KJV, which is translated as “You answer us with awesome and righteous deeds” in NIV. So we can expect the two-fold miracles of God this year: miracles of mercies to bless His people and miracles of judgments for those who have chosen to live in fearful expectation of His wrath that will consume God’s enemies. I am sure we will see tons of miracles this year.

Verse 6 reminds of us His power in creation. Verse 7, how He quiets the roaring seas—whether literal seas like those we see in hurricanes or metaphorical ones like the tumults we see in riots—“turmoil of nations.” In verse 8, we see that in all of these wonders, the earth stands in awe. God is always going to have something more to amaze the whole world. And yet, in all of these things, He calls us to shout for joy. Verse 9 reminds us rains that water farms come from God. In the 21st century when provisions may not necessarily come from farming, we can still trust that Christ is the rock that gives us water to drink in the wilderness. That rock is everywhere. Agriculture, education, technology, healthcare, retail, natural resources, and many other ways that God provides for people’s financial needs these days. The rock that provides for us is still Christ.  Verse 10 reminds us that in all of those things the harvest is ordained by God. A hardened ground would not allow vegetation to germinate and that could lead to famine. A sick body would not go to work and that would lead to poverty, where paid medical leave does not exist. Productivity, fertility, and favorable results are all from God. It is after verse 10 that we see verse 11 we have for our meditation today to start this new theme.

“You crown” is “atar” in Hebrew. It means lay a wreath, surround, crown-bestower. He is the Alpha and the Omega of the year. Its beginning and its ending. For God, a year is not just a passage of time. It is crowned like a king would be crowned. The jubilation of the new year with firecrackers may be the closest to the Independence Day celebration and inauguration of a new head of government we see. Even without knowing what they are doing, people crown the year on January 1st, something that God has already done. But the year is not a king and it is not a god. The Hebrew word for it here is “Shanah” and it is simply a revolution of time, a period of the age. We see this word used in Amos 2:10 where God reminds Israel that He brought them from Egypt and led them in the wilderness for 40 years. So, a new year does not have an inherent virtue. It can be a year of wandering in the wilderness. In Genesis 41:50, we see the word used in the time before the years of famine came, the time Joseph had 2 sons.  Again, we see that a year can be one of calamity and famine.  If we consider the years that Israel wandered in the wilderness, we can see that was not God’s perfect will for Israel, it was a result of their rebellion. If there’s something we should hope for this year—we hope this is not the year we wander in the wilderness, simply because we refused to hear the voice of God. A year cannot be good simply because we wish it to be. We have to pray earnestly to the Lord who crowns it so that it can be a year of eternal achievements for His glory. 

“Bounty” in Hebrew is tob and it means goodness, pleasantness, prosperity. So, if we want the year to be of prosperity—not one where government borrows trillions of dollars in debt to hand over a few hundreds dollars to people for survival, we have to look to the Lord who ends COVID 19, gives wisdom for the protection of people’s health, and returns all of us to normal living, and see prosperity flowing this year. We can be the land that flows with milk and honey like God had promised Israel to inherit because the Lord crowns the year to be so.

“Your wagon tracks with abundance.”- There’s a such thing as the God-train. What is it bringing to your house this year ? The Hebrew word is magalah and it means path, entrenchment, track. God’s paths are designed to lead to pleasantness and abundance. I know all the theology of Job—that Satan was jealous of Job because the Lord had blessed him with abundance—and the devil accused him before God—and God allowed suffering to come to Job. But James also reminds us that with patience, Job held firm to his God, and God gave him double for his trouble. So if you have been a Job-suffering type, James is challenging you that you believe God—for $1 million you lost, expect to get $2 million. If Job is our example in suffering, let him also be our example for restoration. James does not focus on the pain, rather on the double blessings Job received after a period of time. “As you know, we count as blessed those who have persevered. You have heard of Job’s perseverance and have seen what the Lord finally brought about. The Lord is full of compassion and mercy.”—James 5:11. So, either way, God has ordained abundance.

Let us be be full of faith so that just like Job saw a divine turn around of everything that was unfortunate, we will see God’s favor and we will experience more blessedness, happiness, and prosperity flowing in our lives this year. We know that discipline is ordained for all legitimate children of God (Hebrews 12:6) and everyone who wants to lead a godly life is going to be persecuted (2 Timothy 3:12)—that’s simply the nature of the fallen world we live in—but God’s grace overrides all of that in the end. He crowns the year to be prosperous and His wagon track brings us His abundance. As we put our faith in Him and persevere in patience, we will see His glorious works. “That you do not become sluggish, but imitate those who through faith and patience inherit the promises.”—Hebrews 6:12. We cannot see that by being sluggish or lazy. God only responds to faith. Sometimes we may need the patience like that of Job, but faith has to be there and faith without works is dead. Spiritually and practically, we have to work hard.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you for giving us this new year of 2021 that you have already crowned with goodness. Lord, we pray that you give us the strength and health to be able to do our work this year. We pray that you give us the wisdom to be able to plan how we spend our time in the ways that will bring productivity for us and glory to your name. We pray that you will cause favor in unexpected ways to bring prosperity. We pray that you will end COVID and its accompanying losses. We pray in the compassionate name of Jesus. Amen!

January 16th, 2021

Redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Ephesians 5:16

We continue the devotional “Redeeming The Time,” for the third week of January.  It was fitting to start with Psalms 65:11, where we read that God crowns the year with bounty and his wagon track brings abundance. If we are going to meditate on how we can spend this year for God’s glory and see God-ordained success, it is important to look to Him as we do that.

Psalms 65 does not seem to have an annotation of when this might have happened in the book of Samuel, but it reminded me of the time David tried to bring the Ark of the covenant from Baale of Judah where it had been left by the Philistines. This was the Ark of the chabod—God’s glory. It was the Ark of His presence. The reason I thought of this story in 2 Samuel 6 is because it is where we see the Ark being carried on a cart or wagon pulled by oxen. We read that after Uzzah died because of his irreverence, the Ark was left at Obed-Edom’s house and his house was so wildly blessed that the prosperity of his house could only be attributed to the presence of the Ark (2 Samuel 6:12). It just did not look the same like before.  The cart of the Ark of God’s presence had brought abundance to Obed-Edom’s house quite literary. It is at that time, David hears the news and decides to bring it to Jerusalem—Zion—where he had recently established as the capital of his reign. We should not underestimate God’s presence and glory if we are going to plan our activities for this year successfully.

Seeking God this year is very important, but we also have to keep in mind that we are co-laborers. We know He is going to bless us, at the same time we should be working hard this year. Therefore, we should have a solid plan of how we are going to go from point A to point B, and work towards that.  In Ephesians 5:16, Paul tells us about redeeming the time. The Greek word used for “redeeming” is “exagorazomenoi” and it is also used in Galatians 4:5, which we read during the Christmas season devotional—that Christ was born to redeem those under the law. It means to buy up at a marketplace and take out the merchandise. Christ’s blood purchased formerly enslaved people and brought them out of the slave market into liberty. That freedom cannot be cancelled. We are already out of the market.  This word can also mean to take full advantage, seize an opportunity, and like the NIV translates it, make the most of every opportunity. The Word used for “opportunity” is kairon and it can also mean an appointed time, a fitting season. So, God wants us to take full advantage of opportunities He brings up—the seasons that are fitting for whatever assignment He has given us.

I can think of a number of opportunities in the past that I have taken full advantage of and saw great blessing. I can also think of a number of other opportunities that I did not seize appropriately, at least in my mind, it seems that I could have done much better. I have heard a number of Christians saying that they would not want to work in the government for various reasons, at certain periods or during certain administrations. Such a stance seems unwise when you look at the what the Bible teaches. For example, in the book of Daniel, we see 4 Jewish young men working for Nebuchadnezzar in Babylon. It might not have been as ideal as working for Solomon—but that was not the season—and we all can agree that they made the most of that opportunity. Even though they were tested in different ways, they determined to obey the Law of Moses and kept their integrity. The trials were nothing compared to their faith. They were willing to risk rejection, harassment, and torture, so that they can testify that Jehovah alone is God. Even a burning furnace of over 1000 degrees Celsius did not intimidate them. In the end, they triumphed. So, believers can make the most of every opportunity under any and every administration, employment, company, business, ministry, school, examinations, relationships, economic boom, economic recession, pandemic, etc . They have to be ready for anything that can advance God’s work in season and out of season. Yes, there are special occasions when they can have a higher yield and greater fruit— but they have to be aware that opportunity may present in surprising ways.

Kairos moments sometimes can be once in a generation or once in a lifetime or once in a decade. It’s quite amazing how many people will blow up those Kairos moments by not recognizing what God is doing and seizing the opportunity to make the most of it—only to lose all they have labored to attain at a great cost and end up in troublesome situations that border on going back to square one.  This is probably why the verse that precedes Ephesians 5:16 is as important: “Be very careful, then, how you live—not  as unwise but as wise.” –Ephesians 5:15. There are Christians that have a mindset of “whatever happens-happens” or “anything goes,” so when they experience tragedy or loss , they will think that God wanted it to be that way—even if it is a consequence of their foolishness. Paul instructs us that this is not the case. Opportunities cannot be seized by fools. King Solomon wrote an entire book regarding this—it is called the book of Proverbs. The word translated as wise in Ephesians 5:15 is Sophos related to Sophia for wisdom. God is sovereign but He tells us to be careful, pay attention, work hard, not be sluggish, be wise, use our best judgment, take opportunities—all because He works through those means as well.  

To be wise also means we will need to be  “akribos” –careful. This would mean we would want to categorize people into fools and wise people—for our own protection just so we can avoid being contaminated by fools (2 Timothy 2:23).

I have seen a preacher in Oregon who likes to say that when Jesus comes the second time, he will not come as a judge to punish the wicked—even though there are a dozen Scriptures that say quite the opposite (Revelation 19:11; Isaiah 11:4; 2 Thessalonians 2:8; 1 Thessalonians 1:10; Luke 19:27, just to name a few). Imagine people he is going to ruin with that nonsense. If you were to engage in a debate with such a person on another doctrine such as grace or finances, you may not realize how his eschatology influences his teachings on grace or money—and you could end up in ruins. All you need to understand the folly of that kind of “Gospel” and evangelism is to open the actual Gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John and see how Jesus warns again and again about the wrath to come and need to make repentance a priority.

There is a certain folly that is trendy, though, and it is often not easy to shake off: the love of money. Solomon said that “money is the answer to everything”—Ecclesiastes 10:9, and this is true in the world and how it operates. You can buy houses, cars, food, clothes, go on vacations, do Christian conferences, crusades, donate to political campaigns, build schools, pay tuition, give gifts to friends and family, go to a dentist and pay hefty bill, and do many good things with it. But it is also foolish to be possessed by money. There are just people whose identity seems to be attached to money. Think of some rap or pop music, for example, where a display of riches is boasted rather than seen for the vanity it is. That should never impress us no matter how powerful and exciting it appears. Several times, Scriptures warn us how that kind of warped identity can be dangerous. Greed—is a beloved sin of many people that ends up corrupting their identity. Sin and the identity of sinners are always intertwined just like righteousness and the identity of the saints are joined. We should learn to work hard and prosper financially and at the same time be content, discerning how destructive an identity centered on money and riches can be. (Proverbs 11:28; Luke 12:13-21; Matthew 6:19-20; 1 Timothy 6:3-17; James 5:1-3; Colossians 3:5; Hebrews 13:5; Proverbs 3:5-6;  Psalms 52:7; Proverbs 16:32;  Proverbs 22:1; 2 Chronicles 26:16; 2 Maccabee 9:8;  Acts 12:23; 1 Timothy 2:9; Luke 16:19-31; James 4:13-16; Luke 16:14-15;  1 Peter 3:3; Proverbs 16:18;  Psalms 73:12; Ezekiel 28:5;  Psalms 62:10; Proverbs 28:26; Psalms 49:5-6; Proverbs 13:11; Proverbs 6:6-11; Proverbs 10:4; Proverbs 12:24; Proverbs 22:29; Habakkuk 3:17-18; Jeremiah 48:7; 1 John 2:15-17). 

In our modern age, being “Akribos” also means we should scrutinize our use of social media. Apostle Paul and Apostle Peter had no Facebook, no Twitter, no YouTube channel, and no website—and we all can agree that they brought to us the Gospel,  and 2000 years later, it is still spreading. Now, people who have all of these tools of technology can barely hold up their faith in the midst of little inconvenience. They are not even sure they can transmit their faith to their own children. So, by that, they acknowledge they don’t possess the same faith Paul and Peter had. It is true that social media can be beneficial —but in the grand scheme of things it has never been the primary vehicle of the Gospel—it is not how the Gospel reached to us 2000 years later in the first place.

Paul also uses “blepete” in Ephesians 5:15 for using discernment. There’s a time for everything and we should be perceptive of what is appropriate and when that is appropriate. There are usually trade-offs of what we have to do—we lose some to gain some—and as Christians, we should rely on Scripture. Is what we are gaining worth it? Is it godly? Is it pure? Is it praiseworthy?  Is it beautiful, precious, and pleasing in God’s eyes ? Does it make us more sanctified, confident, courageous, and effective for advancing the kingdom of God ? Do we sense the increase and taste more of the fruit of the Holy Spirit, namely, love, peace, joy, faithfulness, gentleness, kindness, patience, and self-control ? Then that trade-off is worth it. I don’t think that by being careful he was encouraging Christians not to lose their lives—because that would have been antithetical to the Gospel (Matthew 19:25; Luke 9:24; Mark 8:34-38; Matthew 10:27-28). At the same time, it is possible to lose one’s life for foolish reasons. There are just Christians who seem to be in search for trouble rather than seek to advance the kingdom and trust God for protection when trouble seeks them.

Finally, Paul says we should make the most of every opportunity because the days are evil. Yesterday, we saw that there was no inherent virtue in a new year.  Despite the jubilation many people have to celebrate the new year, it could turn out to be a year of famine or wandering. But that word “Shanah” we saw yesterday was also used for the year of jubilee.  The year when slaves were freed and debts were cancelled. So, it can be a year of redemption. It all depends on what the Lord does in that year. Interestingly, the year of Jubilee was an appointed time—it came every 7 x 7 years (Leviticus 25:8-55; Deuteronomy 15:1; Deuteronomy 31:10; Nehemiah 10:31).  You couldn’t decide if it was going to be Jubilee or not. God had already decided that. Because Paul says the days are evil, we cannot afford to let good opportunities slip. We have to be careful and pay attention how we deport ourselves, how we walk around, the way we carry out our conversation in the world. Another verse where Paul uses similar language to this Ephesians 5:15-16 is the Colossians 4:5: “Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity.”—in this Paul was more mission-conscious as we see in the verse that follows. Ephesians 5:15-16 can be applied to any opportunities we get whether secular employment or ministry but Colossians 4:5-6 is clearly focused on how Christianity is perceived in the eyes of the world. How would actions taken by Christians advance the Gospel and bring people to salvation? At the end of the day, this is how our lives will be measured in the opportunities we were given.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that you have put some Kairos moments into 2021. Opportunities will come to us that are once in a lifetime or once in a decade. Lord, we are inadequate to seize seasons of that magnitude, and we pray, Lord, give us the wisdom that we need to be able to succeed in taking full advantage of those opportunities so that your name will be glorified in our lives and the world. In the name of the Lord Jesus, who sees all of our situations, we pray. Amen!

January 18th, 2021

Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might, for in the realm of the dead, where you are going, there is neither working nor planning nor knowledge nor wisdom. Ecclesiastes 9:10

We continue the devotional “Redeeming The Time,” for the third week of January. Today, we will be looking at this Scripture in Ecclesiastes.

Ecclesiastes is one of the books of wisdom of king Solomon—the one that is most popular is the book of Proverbs. These books have many wisdom nuggets—that tell us God’s mind about practical living. For some, Ecclesiastes is similar to Job—a mixture of godly and ungodly thoughts—in which a certain level of spiritual maturity is required to be able to discern what is the voice of God and what is the voice of sinful man. For example, Ecclesiastes 2 tells us more about Solomon’s own conclusions after experimenting with many foolish things—so that we do not have to experiment. It is not an idea of saying—go and try it for yourself and find out. He tried pleasure, it did not satisfy (Ecclesiastes 2:1). He tried alcohol, it turned out to be meaningless (Ecclesiastes 2:3).  He tried building large houses with beautiful gardens (Ecclesiastes 2:4-5), acquired slaves to serve him (Ecclesiastes 2:7), and then increased his wealth with silver and gold (Ecclesiastes 2:8), he even surpassed his own father David in fame and glory (Ecclesiastes 2:9), and yet after all of these things, he concluded it was equivalent to chasing the wind (Ecclesiastes 2:11). So, we need this perspective not just for planning the year 2021 but also for life in general.

God put man in the garden of Eden to work the land (Genesis 2:15). Before the fall, this work was enjoyable and productive. But after the fall, God cursed the ground that man was supposed to work. He said: “Because you listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat from it,’ “Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat food from it all the days of your life.”—Genesis 3:17. The Hebrew word used for painful toil is “Itsabon” and it can also mean sorrow as we see in KJV. It can also be translated as worrisome. All creation has been under this bondage, which it won’t be free from until the new earth is created by God (Romans 8:21; 2 Peter 3:13). The decay of this earth and universe—such as what some call climate change—or other things that are not the way they were in their initial state—are all consequences of the fall of man. People of the world fear rising sea levels, storms, hurricanes, and other elementary forces that could destroy life on earth. They are worried about that. You wouldn’t be able to promise someone to live 500 years, though you may work hard to save as many lives as possible, simply because the fall has limited the days man can live on earth. 

Toil in work has been the story of man on earth since the fall, though perhaps some jobs may be more difficult than other jobs. People may be in different fields or sectors of the economy and earn differing incomes but, truly, when it comes to toil, we are all in this together. Even Jesus, when he was born as a man, he did not go directly into preaching and healing ministry—he first worked as a carpenter. So, He experienced the same challenges of labor and toil that man faces upon the earth. There’s no doubt that we should all call upon the Lord who invites us to come to Him and ease our burdens in such labors (Matthew 11:28; Psalms 68:19).  This is not an invitation that is good only on Sunday when we rest—but an invitation we can take Him up on every day. When we do that, we will find His strength (Philippians 4:13; 1 Timothy 1:12; Judges 16:3;Psalms 18:29; Colossians 1:11; 29), as well as rest for our souls.

The world thinks of strength only from a physical point of view, which is really a temporary energy. So, Paul had to remind Timothy that the Gymnasium work out was of limited value (1 Timothy 4:7-8). Paul instead prayed for the saints to be strengthened “in the inner man”—Ephesians 3:16. When I was a young born again believer, we had intense intercessory prayers with groups of people before church services, Bible studies, and conferences, and in good humor, we called them “exercising prayer muscles.” They were serious, the old-fashioned Pentecostal fire meetings, with shouts, noise, and groanings. I do believe certain spiritual things can be birthed through groaning prayers but we also need quiet prayers of contemplation as we often hear God’s voice in those moments of silence (Psalms 100:1; Psalms 66:1; Psalms 98:4; Psalms 47:1;  Romans 8:26; Galatians 4:19; Isaiah 66:8; John 16:21-24; Hebrews 5:7; Ecclesiastes 5:2; Matthew 6:7; 2 Corinthians 6:2; Psalms 69:13; Isaiah 65:24; Psalms 46:10; Psalms 131:2;  Psalms 62:1; Psalms 4:4; Habakkuk 2:20; 1 Kings 19:12; Jeremiah 12:5; 2 Corinthians 12:9). When they pray with vigorous energy, the saints are birthing people. It is true that in the natural the weights that the young Schwarzenegger could lift with his ripped biceps, rectus abdominis, and transversus abdominis cannot be lifted by people who do not exercise. It is also true that what Elijah, Paul, and Jesus could do in the spiritual realm are unattainable for many Christians who have not learned the prayers of the righteous that avail much. Every morning we should wake up with one desire: to bring our emptying heart-tanks, frail determination, and dispirited will to the divine power station, also known as the “throne of grace” so that we can get filled up again, receiving fresh fire and be endued with power from on high (Psalms 73:25; Psalms 27:4; Psalms 5:3;  Hebrews 4:16; Hebrews 10:22-23; Isaiah 32:15; Luke 24:49; Ephesians 5:18; Jude 1:20; Jeremiah 29:13; Colossians 1:7 &  4:2; James 5:15-18;  Isaiah 60:22; Zechariah 12:8).

While strength in the inner-spirit is our most prized strength, God is not against physical vigor. He is the one who promised “as thy days, so shall thy strength be.”— Deuteronomy 33:25. So, God wants us to eat healthy and have healthy habits of sleep and rest as well as exercise to make sure we maintain the health and strength our bodies need to work hard. Samson may have had a special calling that required physical strength and we may never reach his supernatural ability to use our bodies to do astonishing things, but that testimony alone shows us what the Holy Spirit can do goes beyond the human spirit alone, even the bodies can be taken over by the Spirit of God and strengthened. In the New Testament, supernatural abilities of body strength or teleportation have been given to missionaries, evangelists, and revered saints in church history, on some occasions, to accomplish God’s intended plan to save souls, provide supernatural revelation, or rescue those in danger; however, such supernatural abilities will only be permanent after the resurrection ( Luke 24:31; Acts 1:9; Acts 8:39; 2 Corinthians 12:2; Revelation 11:9-12; 1 Thessalonians 4:17; 1 Thessalonians 15:48-53; Philippians 3:20-21; 1 Kings 18:12). While we may not need that power to do our work now, at least we understand that God has the ability to give us physical strength we need to carry out our duties as well. 

Solomon encourages us “whatever your hands find to do, do it with all your might.” There’s something God has for everyone at a particular point in time. Assignments may change with seasons of life but there’s always going to be something the Lord has for us. Even people who consider themselves unemployed may have certain skills that they can use for something beneficial. The jobs that we have are usually not as random as we may think they are—they have been given to us by God. In the “New Journey Begins” devotional for January 7th, we mentioned that many things related to our biography have been planned by God (Acts 17:26-27). The same is true with our jobs. With this understanding, we should throw our whole hearts, minds, and strengths into such work. Working with all our might does not mean overworking or not taking rest—because that’s just unhealthy and not practical over long term. But I find that I can wake up at 6 am-8 am and go to bed at 10 pm- 11 pm during the week and still rest well. That can give me 14-17 hours of work—though I usually take lunch breaks and I have times I read news to keep myself informed. On weekends, I can be more relaxed.  With the convenience of smartphones these days, we can even read news articles while at the airport waiting for a flight. Doing something like that doesn’t have to be scheduled.

When Paul talks about work, he says “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters.”—Colossians 3:23. Some people have called that the Protestant work ethic—but I certainly hope all people who are Christians, whether they consider themselves Protestants or not, they should find this teaching valuable. Even when I was still a Catholic I used to do the same thing. Not only has God given us the jobs that we have, but we also work for Him—as our boss. If this is the case, then murmuring or grumbling with such work would be equivalent to the behavior of Israel in the wilderness—a rejection of God’s lordship and provisions.

Solomon tells us one thing to keep in mind: for in the realm of the dead, where you are going, there is neither working nor planning nor knowledge nor wisdom. Many of us are going to die—except, of course, Christians who will still be alive the day Jesus comes to take the church for rapture (1 Corinthians 15:51)—but generally we all die— and after that we face God for judgment (Hebrews 9:27). That would involve accounting for our time on earth in everything. There’s a tendency for Christians, once they are born again and they are heavenly minded, to compartmentalize what they consider to be secular work and not have the consciousness of working unto the Lord as mechanics, teachers, chefs, drivers, nurses, politicians, engineers, doctors, construction workers, or bankers. This could make the day of accounting after dying very challenging. Work is often not even about us but can also bless our families and other people—and considering that we have limited time on earth—what are we going to leave behind that will be of value for those who will still be alive ?

Every second, every minute, every hour—will be accounted for before our Lord, the Judge, after we die—and considering that many are not in pastoral or evangelistic ministry—this could, mistakenly, seem to have less weight in terms of eternal accountability-which is why we need to keep in mind Paul’s encouragement. It matters even more so because we can support God’s work such as missions from what we earn in our work.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that you have blessed each of us with a calling and within that you have also charted trajectories for us in which we find our jobs and businesses. We pray, Lord, that you will help us carry the burdens that may be involved in such jobs, so that we can be at rest as we do our best to be productive. We pray that you keep in our minds that in all things we are working for you—so that we can sanctify all our labors and see them bring you glory—not just in the fruits they yield but also the attitude with which we approach them. In the name of our yoke-bearer, Jesus, we pray. Amen!

January 19th, 2021

And that ye study to be quiet, and to do your own business, and to work with your own hands, as we commanded you. 1 Thessalonians 4:11

We continue the devotional “Redeeming The Time,” for the third week of January. Today, we will be looking at this Scripture of 1 Thessalonians 4.

 There are many references about temporal work in the 2 epistles of Thessalonians. For example in 2 Thessalonians 3:10 we read: “For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: “The one who is unwilling to work shall not eat.” There are divine commands for helping those in need as we shall see in our devotional tomorrow, but such assistance is usually limited to special circumstances for verifiable reasons. It is not meant to be for anyone who just so desires to get help. Food assistance or cash-for-food simply wasn’t Paul’s idea of what Christianity should be about. Even widows, who we may think are supposed to be in that category for special assistance, weren’t guaranteed to be on the list of those supported by the church. Paul told Timothy to focus on older widows instead because he preferred those who had vowed to remain widows to be on such lists and it was more difficult to get that kind of commitment for younger women. “But refuse younger widows; for when they might grow wanton against Christ, they desire to marry.”—1 Timothy 5:11. Since they were widows, it was their right to marry, but it was not their right to stay on the church’s financial assistance lists after being married—especially if their new husbands were men of economic means. Paul reasoned that since they were likely to remarry after their husbands died, their husbands should take the financial charge and they should not be considered for financial assistance by church elders.

The rule that those who do not want to work should not eat seems to be an echo of the creation’s mandate for man to have dominion on earth and work the land as well as the rule—we will use that term rather than the term “curse”—of the fall—that we alluded to in a previous devotional (Genesis 3:17-19). Work was instituted before the fall of man. Sweating for bread was a rule decreed after the fall. No man, president, king, political party, or economic system can escape the reality of this rule. While there have been suggestions of “Universal Basic Income” by some sociologists and politicians as the solution for the coming artificial intelligence revolution that could result in high unemployment, the UBI is unlikely to provide sufficient finances for most people to pay housing, education, healthcare, food, and transportation. If such “free money” was significant, it would be unsustainable. If it is small, it will not replace the necessity of work. If the technological revolution threatens some sectors of the economy, people have to adapt fast to find other means of income generation before their jobs are taken over by robots.

In the first phrase of the Scripture we read today “that ye study to be quiet,” the word that Paul uses for “study” is “Philo-timeomai”- with ”philo” being friend or lover and the Greek “time” being acknowledged honor. So, it can be translated as showing affection for what one acknowledges as valuable. Having aspiration for what is honorable. 

The first thought I have is that this is literary contrary to what many Christians in certain denominations think or are taught they are supposed to think. It seems like there are always 2 camps about any doctrine or teaching in Christianity—be that as it may—having this ambition for what is honorable or acknowledged to be valuable is the Bible’s teaching. There is no shortage of arguments and strife over topics like these, but at the end of the day, all Christians agree that Scriptures are authoritative. Even when the Bible strongly teaches to help the poor, those who beg for bread or survival are seen as miserable both in society and in Scripture. It is not honorable to beg for bread. One has to toil for it. It is ingrained in human nature to despise financial dependence and the glory of God that God placed upon man when He created him in His image should stir him to work hard and be economically productive. Even for people who earn a living by their sweat, who can afford their basic necessities without begging , and yet are in the lower class with little means or are paid minimum wage,  are as outcast as the beggars. (Psalms 37:25; Psalms 109:10; Proverbs 6: 6-11; Proverbs 14:20; Proverbs 19:4). There are many opportunities for upward mobility and social connections that are simply out of reach below certain income thresholds. We know how a university education is important these days, yet we also know that it may be unaffordable for many, even the brightest students. Some students may be forced to choose between excellent academic achievements and working to earn a living for their basic necessities. Short-term pragmatism affects many people’s long-term prospects for this reason.

Despite the contempt the rich show the poor, God does not approve those who demean them (Proverbs 17:5; Proverbs 21:13; Proverbs 28:9; Proverbs 14:31; Obadiah 1:12; Proverbs 11:21; 1 John 3:17; Proverbs 11:24; Leviticus 25:35-37; Deuteronomy 15:7-8; Proverbs 22:22-23; Isaiah 11:3-4; Job 29:12; Jeremiah 22:15-16; Psalms 113:7-8; Psalms 72:12; Psalms 82). In June 2019, photos circulated in the media that Oscar Alberto Martínez Ramírez and his nearly 2-year-old daughter, Valeria from Salvador had drowned while trying to cross into the United States. Some people politicized that tragedy. It is possible to argue that countries should have reasonable immigration laws that are obeyed without cruel comments about these poor people who unsuccessfully tried to immigrate to the United States. Many poor people break their necks while trying to pull themselves by their bootstraps and the last thing they need is the mocking of foolish souls because of their unfortunate demise. Losing one’s soul is not just about the dangers of eternal torments of souls in hell, it is also about losing the compassion, decency, purity, justice, holiness, truth and benevolence that God created the soul to express (Mark 8:36; Matthew 16:26; Revelation 2:4-5; James 2:14-26).So, advocating for reasonable laws and principles in society should not be confused with such wickedness. It is possible to encourage responsibility without partnering with demonic activity. 

Since Paul wanted people to be financially self-sufficient and earn their own bread, they had to value that lifestyle. You can’t value it by creating a mindset of long-term dependence. You do not value it by spending time in things that are less rewarding financially or decrease economic productivity. You do not value it by procrastinating important work projects or giving priority to things that do not produce. Also, the more knowledgeable one becomes about wealth creation, the clearer it becomes that working hard is simply one item in the equation. It is possible to create wealth by working smarter rather than working harder. It is true that there are certain activities that may be necessary that are not always going to be scored financially into bank deposits—as we shall see Paul had determined to preach the Gospel for free (1 Corinthians 9:1-18; Acts 20:32-35)— but we also see here that Paul is saying that we should study to be quiet and study how we can maximize our productivity for the sake of God’s kingdom and His testimonies in the world. God takes pleasure in the prosperity of His servants ( Deuteronomy 8:18; Psalms 35:27; Proverbs 10:22). If financial assistance is given to some, there has to be a detailed plan and audits of periodic goals so that even for those, it will be temporary— this could work by understanding the challenges involved and offering sustainable solutions that will have long term benefits. At a certain time people who are assisted should be able to graduate to finance their own expenditures. It is possible that length of time will vary depending on circumstances. The Bible offers objectives but specifics should be decided based on what God is revealing for a particular situation. 

The word that Paul uses for “quiet” is” Hesuchazo.” It means to be at peace or rest. To be still, refraining from speech, and not being meddlesome. We see it used in Luke 14:4 after Jesus asked the Pharisees whether it was lawful to heal leprosy on the Sabbath or not. They kept silent. They had no answer. They probably did not want him to heal on the Sabbath but they also knew that it was right to do good on the Sabbath.

Studying how to lead a quiet life takes time but it is worth studying. There are alternatives. I have heard someone say that there are people who are just “party-iers.”  That’s their life. They are in the bar almost every other day and some other public entertainment and party locations every week-end. I have many cousins and I am amazed at how their lives have progressed differently. One older cousin loved to party—when I finished high school he asked me to tutor him Calculus so that he could study electronics—somehow he never made it. Another younger, I tutored him and he studied engineering and he was kind of a focused guy—no partying—and he is a quite rich guy now. In just one large family with close cousins—you can see how being focused on a certain goal produces differing results over time. Unfortunately, neither is born again—though they are both religious, but hopefully, eventually they will be. We can always improve on how more focused and quieter we are.

Partying is not the only distraction. The stressful events of the last days as we see in Luke 21; 2 Timothy 3:1-2; 1 John 2:18 can create a certain level of worry or anxiety that could cause many to spend quite a significant amount of time focused on those things. If someone is a TV anchorman and makes a living out of scaring people, that’s probably good for business. But for many people, that kind of anxiety can have a destabilizing effect, especially when presidential elections are coming up. It’s a kind of situation that is hard to ignore because results of elections can affect everything you are working towards or you are trying to avoid. Since not everyone will make a career in politics or news coverage, it’s important to strike a helpful balance of how much time one deems useful in watching world events unfold and what they intend to do with that kind of information. It might be helpful for research purposes. God’s people should be aware of how to navigate the world around them.

The word used for “business” is “Prasso.” It can also mean to practice, perform repeatedly, accomplish. Isn’t it awesome that God actually instructs His children to run their law practices, restaurants, retail stores, manufacturing companies, medical practices, education centers, security firms, technology companies, etc ?  I find that amazing. God considers it honorable to be successful in these things. I often hear Christians talk about how they could be locked out of social media platforms. How did that happen? Definitely, not because they have been obedient to 1 Thessalonians 4:11 for the last 100 years. If they did, many major banks CEOs would be Christians. World-reknown technology leaders or those who are “acknowledged as honorable” in Silicon Valley would be Christians. They would have practiced their coding skills and become fluent in different coding languages and discovered all the social media platforms that we see and perhaps even more. These things are not results of luck. Christians are not excluded from them. They have a divine commandment to do them. So what went wrong? Christians believe in divine sovereignty but they do not believe in fatalism. If belief in divine sovereignty means that Christians should not go to university, be successful students, and get good jobs after graduation—then that’s a misunderstanding of Scripture. Andrew Wommack teaches how a false belief in divine sovereignty prevents some people from experiencing divine healing but this is pretty much true for every redemptive benefit we have in Christ. Nearly everything that God gives to us by His grace or blessing is conditioned onto certain principles of faith and work. If you believe that God wants you to be sick, it is almost certain that you will never be healed. Yet, many Christians believe this despite Scriptural evidence to the contrary (Psalms 103:3; Exodus 15:26; Matthew 8:17; Isaiah 53:3-5; Matthew 4:23; Matthew 9:35; Matthew 12:15; Acts 5:16; Acts 19: 11-12; Hebrews 13:8). The same is true with our attitudes towards economic activity with financial rewards. God commands work, He also blesses such endeavor to be profitable and bring abundance ( Proverbs 3: 13-16; Colossians 2:3; Proverbs 14:23-24; Proverbs 15:6; Proverbs 21:20;Deuteronomy 11:11-15;  Deuteronomy 28:12; Deuteronomy 29:9; Deuteronomy 30:9; 1 Kings 2:3; 1 Chronicles 22:13; 1 Chronicles 29:11-12; Psalms 75:6-7; Ecclesiastes 5:19; 1 Kings 10:23;  Leviticus 26:3-5; Acts 14:17;  Proverbs 3:10; Malachi 3:10; 2 Chronicles 25:9;  Matthew 6:32-33; Ezra 6:8; Matthew 10:10; 1 Timothy 5:8; Romans 4:4;  Luke 19:13; Psalms 36:8; Psalms 1:3; Galatians 6:9; Isaiah 48:17; Psalms 128:2; Psalms 90:17; Proverbs 16:3;  Genesis 30:43; 1 Chronicles 4:10; Genesis 22:17; Genesis 13:2; Galatians 3:29; 2 Corinthians 8:9).

The word used for “ergazomai” is work and can be engaging in any task. Not all Christians are going to be business leaders whether small or large enterprises. Some are going to be teachers, work at McDonalds, in farming, as sales agents, as drivers, as retail stores clerks, as park attendants, and as construction workers. They are all earning their own bread—perhaps in differing roles with those in managing and leadership roles—but the bottom line is that they are earning their own bread. The whole point of all of these instructions and commandments is to “lack nothing.”—1 Thessalonians 4:12. This is a divine command, a charge, the Bible’s message. The initial command that God gave to man in the garden of Eden remains in force today—and Christians are definitely expected to be good examples in doing everything they can to be excellent at their jobs—working as unto the Lord—and not for pleasing human masters. A much higher standard of service is expected of all of us saints who are in Christ.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that you have helped the world move along through the industrial revolution and now we are in the information age—with a multitude of sectors in which your people can work and earn their livelihood. Lord, we pray, that you help all Christians around the world to be attentive to these instructions so that they will be able to work and succeed in their labors and will not lack anything. We pray that you will raise many godly servants of God in technology, banking, government, education, healthcare, legal field, and media—so that your name will be magnified through them as they do their best to serve others and also lift up their own families. In the name of Jesus, we pray. Amen!

January 20th, 2021

You yourselves know that these hands of mine have supplied my own needs and the needs of my companions. In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’ ” –Acts 20:34-35

We continue the devotional “Redeeming The Time,” for the third week of January. Today, we will be looking at these words of apostle Paul in Acts 20.

Paul is one of the most inspirational figures in the New Testament and the whole Bible. There are many examples we can learn from in the New Testament, but considering Paul’s extensive ministry, he is probably one of the top 5 New Testament figures besides Jesus, Peter, John, and John the Baptist. I love apostle Paul. He is both deeply spiritual and seriously pragmatic. He understands what it means to be heavenly minded and how to have feet planted on the earth and to live among men. He lived in a different time and period of history that is different from ours, so there are examples that we will have to adapt to our own 21st century, but overall, many of his teachings and comments are derived from Old Testament Scripture, so they have universal application.

Though Paul was entitled to have the support of the churches that he was shepherding (1 Corinthians 9:14), He did not rely on the financial support of churches all the time. Sometimes he did accept offerings (Philippians 4:16). Other times he decided to forego them because he had his own business. Apostle Paul was a tentmaker by profession (Acts 18:3). The Greek word used in Acts 18:3 is “skenopoioi, ”  which is a combination of “skene” that means tabernacle or dwelling and poieo, which means manufacture, make, construct. Man is always in need of housing and habitation, so real estate is a sector of high demand. The materials used to build, design, technicalities, and standards may have changed over the last 2000 years, but demand remains high. These were technically mobile homes. It is cool that apostle Paul worked in the manufacturing and real estate industry of his generation. A person who is in real estate industry today would never find his career to be an excuse for not serving God and obeying the call. Jesus taught that for every excuse people make for not obeying their call, there will be someone to judge them on judgment day who has been able to overcome in that area. The queen of Sheba will arise and condemn the Israel of the days of Jesus because she came from Ethiopia to listen to the wisdom of Solomon and yet Israel refused to listen to the One who created Solomon, a greater than Solomon who was in their midst. Those who make certain jobs their excuse not to obey God’s call will find this quite terrible on judgment day (Luke 11:31; Luke 14:18; Luke 13:29-30; Deuteronomy 28:47; 2 Samuel 11:11; 2 Samuel 24:24; 2 Corinthians 8:1-9; Matthew 22:37; 1 Corinthians 7:20, 30; Proverbs 3:9; Exodus 22:29; Revelation 2:4-5; Revelation 3:14-21). If Paul could do all of this, what excuse do we have not to do the same ?

I will suppose that Paul was not a manufacturer on a large scale as to employ 1,000 people in that kind of business. But he made quite enough money to cover his ministry and personal expenditures as well as the needs of his ministry associates.

He calls them to witness that they were aware of His commitment to pay for his own expenses and those of his associates.  While it remains true that “ a worker is worth his wages.”—Luke 10:7, as Jesus expected that those who preach the Gospel should also live by the Gospel, Paul had not been asking payments for his epistles or producing Bible studies that would be distributed with payment of a fee, or any other appropriate charge of costs for spiritual courses. He had determined to preach the Gospel for free (1 Corinthians 9:18), while making sure he did not stay behind financially by working with his own hands. This was not a requirement; it was a personal choice. A Faith Communities Today survey conducted in the United States in 2015 found that 62.2% of pastors in US churches worked fulltime in the religious field and 37.8% of pastors were bivocational—that is they were both pastors and had another job in the secular world. So, “tentmaking” is a practice that seems to have endured for 2000 years since the days of Paul.

Paul not only covered his own expenses, he also covered the expenses of his associates—and just like his own needs that could have been met by the support of churches—this also wasn’t a requirement. Why did he do that, then? Didn’t he want to save money for retirement? Didn’t he want to save money to buy houses in different cities he would be travelling to? Didn’t he want to take vacations ? There are always a lot of things you can do with money. He is not saying that they were assisting him in tentmaking—I will assume they might have helped—in that case it could have been a collaborative venture. He only says he supported them. So he was earning above his own personal and ministry needs. This is a good example that those 37.8% pastors who are bivocational can learn from. He says “by this kind of hard work,” he was setting 2 examples. The first is that it proved that it was possible to do. No one can say that Paul compromised on ministry effectiveness by doing this. None of us will ever attain the power and reach of his ministry. The effects of his ministry are still felt 2,000 years later. Just look at the Romans, Corinthians, Ephesians, and Timothy epistles. You can learn far more divine revelation and wisdom in those than in all modern Christian books combined. The second example was to help the weak. The Greek word used is “asthenounton.” This means to be sick or feeble or languish or be without strength. Paul wasn’t one who would have thought that those who are weak are burdensome. He worked hard for them. The Greek word used is “kopiontas” and it means to labor diligently, to feel fatigue, to strain oneself.

As we see in this Acts 20 passage, Paul lived the example that he wrote in the epistle to the Thessalonians “And we urge you, brothers and sisters, warn those who are idle and disruptive, encourage the disheartened, help the weak, be patient with everyone.”—1 Thessalonians 5:14.

He did not want people to be idle. He wanted people to be busy working. He did not want people who were disruptive or insubordinate, people who refuse to perform the duty required of them.  Those had to be admonished. Not rejected or hated, but warned in hope they would repent and purpose to do what is right. He also asked the church to encourage the disheartened. Sin is not the only thing that causes people to be left behind in the church. Some could be disheartened and give up. The Greek word used is “Oligopsychous,” which means to lose heart, be faint-hearted, or have small courage. I am sure this covers those who are depressed. Life is harsh, full of losses, demonic attacks, financial hardships, persecutions, relational challenges, diseases, pandemics, and people’s own spiritual struggles. Not all Christians deal with these things in the same way. Paul knew that discouragement of some Christians, regardless of the cause, could ruin them spiritually (2 Corinthians 2:7-11). So, he asked the Thessalonians to be near them. Being near here doesn’t mean to live in the same house, but visit, write, invite, spend time, break bread with. He also asked them to help the weak. So, not only he was doing it himself as we read in Acts 20:34-35, he is writing another church to do the same. It was a pattern to be emulated by all New Testament churches.

I thank God that, in my life, though I have had challenges like many other people do, I seem to carry a huge dose of confidence and courage, springing from within. Knowing Scriptures thoroughly has certainly helped and without them it is impossible to build secure faith that is always a constant no matter what. I have discovered that this gives me joy and encouragement, helps me to stand strong at all times. I believe it is a Christian identity everyone needs to have. God wants no depressed children. I hope to do my part to be an encouragement for those who may need that. I think there are Christians who have some kind of wrong belief systems that, unless people are sad or in some kind of misery, then they are not godly. I do not think that’s Biblical faith. Christ is our rock and He wants us to be rock solid.

Finally, he asked them to be patient with everyone. There are just some people that may need more than one encouragement, more than one request, more than one message, more than one visit, more than prayer once. Since the church is the body of Christ and that means the members have to work together for the body to function, patience is an important fruit of the Spirit that we all need to grow into, to be able to bear with those who may not meet the standards we expect them to meet immediately—standards we hope they would all eventually attain. There are people we may have to work with that are not necessarily easy to work with. It requires discernment, encouragement, helping, and patience.

As I was thinking of how to end this devotional today—I remembered the words of Jesus: “As long as it is day, we must do the works of him who sent me. Night is coming, when no one can work.”—John 9:4. It would not help us to learn all these things without practicing them and there’s an appointed time to finish them. Naturally, we all die—so we won’t be here forever. We will all stand before the judgment seat of Christ to give an account of these things. Moreover, when the great tribulation sets in, when the Antichrist comes, Christians will hardly be able to do anything—so whatever energy they may have been saving—they might as well use it now—because at one point, darkness will cover the whole earth—deep darkness and a great tribulation—and Christians won’t be able to do God’s work. (Matthew 24:21; Revelation 13:17; Daniel 7:21). I believe the church will be raptured before that tribulation—but that’s a topic for another day. In the meantime, we have to redeem every hour and every second, working hard, because there’s an appointed time when all Gospel work will be over, a time when no one will be able to work. 

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that you have given each of us certain talents, skills, gifts, abilities, education, knowledge that we can use to be able to support ourselves financially and also be able to support those who are weak in the church, our families, and friendships. We pray, Lord, that you enable us to have both the wisdom and capacity to be more efficient to follow this example of apostle Paul—so that your name will be glorified in our lives and the world. In the name of Jesus, we pray. Amen!

January 21st, 2021

Unless the LORD builds the house, they labor in vain who build it; Unless the LORD guards the city, The watchman stays awake in vain.  It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: for so he giveth his beloved sleep. Psalms 127:1-2.

Today, we will try to finish the devotional “Redeeming The Time,” for the third week of January. We will take a look at these verses in Psalms 127.

We started this theme with Psalms 65:11, where we saw that God crowns the year with His bounty. We saw that His wagon track brings abundance. We mentioned how that happened, quite literally, when the Ark of God’s glory was brought to Obed-Edom’s house in 2 Samuel 6:12. We concluded that if 2021 is going to be a great year for us, God’s presence will be paramount. There’s abundance that flows from the glory where the Lord rests between the Cherubim upon the Ark of the Covenant. We should approach that throne with boldness to receive His favor and grace. Then, we looked into practical aspects of abundance, success, and being good stewards of the days that the Lord has given us on His earth, right here. We talked about redeeming the time because the days are evil. We must seize those unprecedented opportunities that God brings our way. We also learned that, even in secular jobs, we actually work for Jesus, not human masters, therefore, we should do it with all our might as we will give account for that work after we die. Sanctified work is not just for pastors and evangelists. We talked about the value of being focused and staying quiet to do our businesses. We also saw Paul’s example as a bivocational minister—who not only paid for his own personal and ministry expenses—but also financed his ministry associates—while also helping those who were weak in the churches he was involved with. We must know, understand, and practice these things as the night is coming when no Christian can work ( Revelation 13:17; Daniel 7:21; 1 John 2:18; Matthew 24:21). Many Christians who have ignored these truths have seen Satan and the antichrists beat them in many states, cities, and countries. We cannot defeat the Devil without understanding, practicing, and preaching these truths. 

Today, we will come back full circle and will again try to see the Lord’s help we need in our labors, rather than just the hard work we should be doing. I have read a famous quote that goes like this: Pray hard as if it all depends on God, work hard as if it all depends on you. Most of us have heard this quote so many times. Some say that this was spoken by Saint Augustine and others say that it was spoken by Saint Ignatius. I will admit that there’s a certain truth to this—and if it helps some Christians to summarize what they need to do to be effective—so be it. Personally, I like to challenge accepted aphorisms like these and modify them based on what I find is taught in Scripture. I am not one to just accept quotes 100% simply because they were spoken by a well-known Saint or Christian figure. I want to apply them to the 21st century in general and what I have observed by experience in particular. As far as I am concerned, every quote has to be scrutinized through Scriptures—just like the Bereans did for Paul’s teachings (Acts 17:11). So what do I find wrong with the above quote? It’s the work hard part. I would rather modify this to say: “Pray as though everything depended on God and work as though God would be the one evaluating the diligence of your labor and its success depended upon His approval of your life.” In the first aphorism, you could pray hard and then become independent from God to go work hard on your own; in the modified quote, both the success of prayer and work depend on God’s approval, regardless of how hard working you are. God should not be left in the prayer room while we go out to sweat and toil in the field (Genesis 39:4; Genesis 41:8-41; Proverbs 16:3; Proverbs 19:21; Exodus 33:15; 1 Thessalonians 5:17 Psalms 75:6-7). 

Psalms 127:1-2 is where we see these 2 assumptions of prayer vs hard work face each other and we see how God’s sovereignty outweighs everything man does on earth—no matter how hardworking people are. Hopefully, this could stir us into greater intimacy with Jesus and rather than our motto of “praying hard” being a simple 10 minutes of brushing off our responsibility to seek God—and then running fast into our daily businesses—we can actually start to see prayer itself as the hard work it is—and schedule blocked times to focus on this throughout the day—moments  when we consciously ignore everything else and focus on fellowship with God and falling in love with Jesus. Only prayer should be our priority in those time blocks.

The Psalm starts by saying that “unless the Lord builds a house, they labor in vain those who build it.” How much they work hard is irrelevant. Their skills are irrelevant. The numbers of those who build are irrelevant. Unless God Himself builds it, they shall be working in vain. People who are in areas prone to earthquakes, tsunamis, and hurricanes would probably understand this more easily, but it should be a concept we all understand, regardless of the frequency of natural disasters wherever we are. The same is true with building a family. This Scripture is one that motivates many Christian homes to have Bible reading and fellowship time to seek God as the one builds the home. It can also be used for church—as the house of God—that no matter how well articulated the sermons are, how solid is the doctrine, how pure are the ministers, how enthusiastic are the church volunteers—unless the Lord builds His church—His house (1 Timothy 3:15; Matthew 16:18)—then that church will not see revival or an awakening or the miracles we see in the New Testament that exploded in Jerusalem, Samaria, Antioch, Damascus, and beyond. It can also be applied to anything else men will try to build—whether it is the tower of Babel—a political empire of dominance—defending the nation against terrorism or foreign threats—building a profitable company—or a non-profit organization (Genesis 11:4-8; Psalms 9:17;1 Kings 22:48; Isaiah 31:1; Revelation 3:17). Unless the Lord builds that, it’s all in vain.

We see this principle at work in the life of Simon Peter. He was a fisherman before He was called to become a disciple of Jesus Christ. One day, Jesus approached him by the sea of Gallilee and told him to cast his net in order to catch fish. “And Simon answering said unto him, Master, we have toiled all the night, and have taken nothing: nevertheless at thy word I will let down the net.”—Luke 5:5. Peter had not been able to catch any fish despite toiling all night. What was the point of losing sleep over such fruitless hard work? Anyone could have been as discouraged as Peter had become.  Was it because other fishermen had taken all the fish? Was it because it was bad time? Was it because he had no good skills to catch them? Any of these 3 can be blamed when people do not succeed in their labors. Fierce and rapacious competition in the fishing waters or in the labor market can leave many frustrated (Jeremiah 12:5). Wrong seasons of hunting game can leave hunters frustrated just as they can leave fishermen discouraged (Psalms 34:10). Poor skills can also be problematic in fishing or any other job (Luke 16:2; Proverbs 26:15; Proverbs 22:29). Yet, Jesus blames none of these things. He could have said “maybe you can try again tomorrow.” He could have said “who taught you how to fish?” He did not. He just spoke the Word. The Greek word used is “rhemati”—for “say so.” Peter obeyed because the Lord said so. We are seeing that it is not just hard work we need, we need the rhema of God—we need the Word of God spoken to us.

As Peter followed Christ and became more and more a witness of His majesty and the power of His words, he was attached and joined to Him for good. One day, several disciples deserted Jesus because He had said that they would have to eat His flesh and drink His blood to have life in them (John 6:53-55). Though it is unlikely this meant the doctrine of transubstantiation that the Catholic church believes, clearly regeneration, sanctification, and communion with Christ are life-giving. There’s abundant Zoe in Christ. Some of the disciples, however, understood this quite literally and they decided He was out of His mind and they could no longer entertain His doctrine (John 6:59-66). Jesus started to wonder whether the 12 disciples were about to abandon Him as well.  Peter who had become acquainted with Christ in a more intimate way at this point said ” Where shall we go ? you have the words of eternal life“— John 6:68. This reminds us of how Jesus defeated Satan in the wilderness, that man shall not live by bread alone but by every Word that proceeds from the mouth of God (Matthew 4:4). In both instances, it is “rhemata” and “rhema” we see.

The Rhema is the Zoe-giving Word of God. If the Holy Spirit quickens Hebrews 7:16 in my spirit, it will be more fruitful to meditate on that and receiving a power-impartation of that Scripture than spending hours explaining the mysteries of election in Romans 9-11 to a class of Bible students. Make no mistake, we must know the Logos. I love Bible studies. I read Scriptures intensely. We should never underestimate what a strong Bible knowledge can do for us (Acts 20:32; John 17:17). All Scripture is God-breathed and cannot be broken. We cannot just pay attention to the living and piercing Word of the moment (John 10:35; Ephesians 6:17). Our Rhema Word of the moment must fit into the whole counsel of God of the Logos. A preacher cannot make up a doctrine by saying “I really feel the breath of God on this particular verse” if the conveyed message is being used to contradict and break a dozen other Scriptures in the revealed Logos. With that being said, we must acknowledge the difference between learning the Word and eating His words (Job 23:12; Jeremiah 15:16; Psalms 119:103; Ezekiel 2:8; Revelation 10:9). There’s a difference between searching the Scriptures for “gnosis” (2 Peter 1:5) and hearing His words spoken into our spirits for “epignosis” (Ephesians 1:17; Romans 8:26-27; Romans 10:17; Hebrews 11:3; Matthew 11:27).

There’s a difference between being a seminary graduate and enrolling in the school of Christ’s inheritance at His feet (Luke 10:38-42). Diligent study and communion produce different results. One gives us knowledge, the other imparts to us faith. One is a result of years of rigorous research (2 Timothy 3:15-16; John 5:39), the other is the quickening life-giving insights by the Spirit of God. One fills our heads with truth, the other enlarges our hearts with love, faith, and hope. One makes us informed teachers, the other does supernatural works. Interestingly, though Peter had seen the Rhema do miracles, “at Christ’s word,” here, he is willing to stay with Him because the Rhema eventually leads to eternal life. If we continue following Christ, if we continue hearing His words, If we continue receiving faith impartation, and do not give up, and do not slow down, and do not stray from that path, it shall continue to shine brighter and brighter, until it reaches its zenith, the brightness of noonday (Proverbs 4:18; 2 Peter 1:19).

Receiving rhema requires ongoing communion. The manna of yesterday stinks (Exodus 16:18-20; Hebrews 10:38; Acts 2:42; Deuteronomy 8:3; Matthew 6: 32-34; John 6:27; Proverbs 8:17;  Colossians 2:6; 1 John 1:5-7; 1  John 4:17; Hosea 6:3; 2 Corinthians 13:14; Ephesians 4:30;  Mark 3:17; Isaiah 40:31; 1 Chronicles 16:11; Song of Solomon 2:5; Matthew 5:6; Psalms 81:10; Hebrews 5:14). Smith Wigglesworth used to say that if we live in the glory of yesterday, we are backsliders. Receiving Rhema daily will transform us from glory to glory (2 Corinthians 3: 17-18; Romans 12:2; 2 Peter 1:3-4). So, we need the rhema for supernatural provisions and miracles of God, we also need the rhema simply because we cannot live eternally without those words. We do not have to be smart or special for this, we just need to have our ears open. His words are all the revelation, wisdom, and understanding we need to operate in faith every day (1 Samuel 3:10; 1 Kings 3:7; Jeremiah 1:6-7; Deuteronomy 3:24; John 6:63; Exodus 15:26; Deuteronomy 28:1-8; Proverbs 4:20-22; Proverbs 3:2; Proverbs 9:11, 1 Corinthians 1:30; Colossians 2:3; Psalms 40:6; Isaiah 50:5; Hebrews 3:15; Psalms 107:20; Psalms 147:15).

The Psalmist concluded that it was vain to rise early and go to bed late,  to eat the bread of sorrow because the Lord gives that to His beloved when they sleep. So, being God’s beloved is more valuable than toiling for bread. “For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them.”—Matthew 6:32. You could say—wait a minute—Amazon, Facebook, and Microsoft are all run by people who are not Christians and are worth over 100 billion dollars. So, they didn’t need God to do that, right? It is true that many people can succeed to create wealth without relying on Jesus. Secular people run after those things. But at the end of the day—God is the one who gave that to them—even if they may not acknowledge Him. This is the doctrine of common grace (Isaiah 45:5 or Isaiah 45:1-5; Matthew 5:45; John 3:27; Proverbs 23:5; Psalms 73:12-19)—but ultimately, God doesn’t deprive anything good from His children (Psalms 84:11; Psalms 23:1; Romans 8:32)—and since He knows that we need all of these things to advance His kingdom and live lives worthy of our calling—He wants to bless us.

Just because God is sovereignly merciful to sinners who don’t know Him, does not mean that His promises and the conditions attending them for being blessed can be ignored by those who already know Him. We depend upon the Lord entirely.  “The race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong, nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned.” —Ecclesiastes 9:11. So, Jesus offered us a different model. Since the Father knows we need these things, He will give them to us, we just have to make sure we “Seek first the kingdom of God.”—Matthew 6:33. That’s how we become His beloved. That’s how we can rest and sleep and still receive His abundance. That’s how we can cast our nets in the waters where people toil and catch nothing—and find plenty of fish. That’s how we will hear His voice—the rhema of God. When Christ’s word becomes our daily bread, that word that is so powerful in doing wonders, we will witness glorious testimonies of the goodness of the Lord.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that you have given us your presence and glory for now and for eternity. We want to know you, seek you, learn from you, hear your voice, and see you work wonders, like John and Peter saw you do at the sea of Galilee. We want to work hard as though all our jobs were a sweet aroma offered to your altar, but we accept your wisdom of seeking you first and giving you our all—knowing that you are the one who will add to us the blessings that the pagans run after, as they toil day and night. In the majestic name of Jesus, we pray. Amen!

Devotionals, January Second Week

January 8th, 2021

For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. John 1:17

After our “New Journey Begins” themed devotional for the first week of the New Year, I feel impressed to start a new theme for the second week. We are going to call this “The Grace of Jesus Christ.”

As exciting as the thrill from slavery in Egypt to entering the promised land in Canaan is, it cannot compare to what Jesus Christ has come to give us in the New Testament. Even more so, when considering that the foundations of the entire Old Testament is based on the law of Moses, while the foundation of the New Testament is based on the grace and Good News of Jesus Christ. In this new theme, we will try to explore this grace of Jesus Christ and how we can receive it and walk into it this year, as we seek to co-labor with God in all things we do. We can never overemphasize how much grace we need in order to inherit the promises of God for us this year.

In the verse preceding the one we have in our title today, John writes “For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.”—John 1:16. Grace is a cornerstone doctrine of the New Testament and yet is as often misunderstood as all other doctrines. After all, if grace was appropriately understood, we would already be in a great awakening. The first great awakening of the 1740s with George Whitefield and John Wesley was the time the reformation caught fire and became a revival—going from theologians, commentators, and puritan scholars to the masses as they understood and received the grace of God. It is the doctrine that fired up early churches in the 1st century. I don’t think that if we are to see a similar blessing in our generation it will happen any other way—it will be because of the grace of Jesus Christ.

The grace of Jesus Christ takes a sinner from “the miry clay”—Psalms 40:2, soiled, dirty, and ugly, like Mr Christian in the book Pilgrims Progress after he fell in the “Slough of Despond,” when he is still a sinner (Romans 5:8), and brings him into rejoicing “ in hope of the glory of God.”—Romans 5:2. It always starts that way:                               

Just as I am without one plea, But that thy blood was shed for me, And that thou biddest me come to thee,  O Lamb of God I come, I come                                                                                                                                                      

Then, it transforms sinners with grace upon grace and takes them “from glory to glory.”—2 Corinthians 3:18 as it energizes them “from strength to strength.”—Psalms 84:7, working “from faith to faith”—Romans 1:17, until it brings them to perfect holiness, “Without which none shall see the Lord.”—Hebrews 12:14. So grace is not a stagnant thing. People do not start as sinners and continue to be sinners. Christ does not come to indwell sinners and make them continue to be the way He found them.

The righteousness of God we receive in Christ is not just an extrinsic imputation—outside of our own works and performance—it also initiates an intrinsic transformation through the presence of the Holy Spirit inside of us. Anyone who is in Christ is a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17). Virtually all Christians underestimate the realities, righteousness, and power of this new creation. Even the most faith-filled Christian doesn’t go far enough in understanding and living out new creation righteousness given to us in the last Adam (Mark 9:23; Ephesians 4:24; Romans 5:17). In the first Adam, we are born sinners; in the last Adam, we are created anew righteous. This understanding of the twin of imputation and new creation is foundational to the sanctification that follows after that. If you have been imputed an extrinsic righteousness but do not possess an intrinsic righteousness from the new creation—or you do possess that intrinsic righteousness but you are not aware of it and you do not believe in the power of the new creation—your reality becomes one of cycles of sinning and forgiveness, being justified and yet living as an unjust sinful person—finding every excuse why you can’t live holy. The moment you realize your new nature was created righteous (Ephesians 4:24), things begin to change. A Christian could exclaim—can really understanding of new creation realities change a person’s life ? Isn’t just “being saved” enough ? Well, Jesus warned the disciples that they were at risk of being like the Pharisees because of lack of understanding (Mark 8:15, 21). Understanding is also what separates those whom Satan steals the message they hear and those who produce fruit (Matthew 13:19). That tells me the role understanding plays in transformation. Yes, understanding is the difference between light and darkness, salvation and damnation, impotence and might, maturity and immaturity (Luke 10:22; Ephesians 1:18; John 12:40). If you have been re-created righteous, why would you sin ? (1 John 3:9; 1 John 5:18). Sin is inconsistent with your new righteous nature. 

This grace of Jesus Christ is handed to us—because salvation is “not of ourselves”—Ephesians 2:8, it comes as a gift of God. What is a gift? The Greek word used in Ephesians 2:8 is “doron,” and based on other uses in the New Testament, it can mean “a present, an offering, sacrifice, devotion. ” So salvation is a present that God gives to us. It is not earned. It is not worked for.

Paul labors to teach us what grace is by giving an analogy of employment. In Romans 4:4 we read “Now to the one who works, wages are not credited as a gift but as an obligation.” The picture of wages vs a gift is beautiful because it clearly shows us that salvation is not something that God owes us—paid to us at the end of hard labor at work—He has no such obligation. “All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags”—Isaiah 64:6. It is not just that the good works of sinners are imperfect, their motivations, their intentions, their goals, and everything else about them is corrupt. “Their whole head is sick.”—Isaiah 1:5, they are totally depraved (Romans 5:6), and nothing good dwells in them (Romans 7:18). How can sinners in a such desperate state, who cannot even pray in an acceptable way ever be saved? (Isaiah 58:3). Only by the grace of Jesus Christ.

Paul wrote in 1 Timothy 1:15, “Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners–of whom I am the worst.” Despite man’s bottomless pit, Christ came to save sinners, and even the worst of them can receive God’s unmerited gift and be transformed from being children of wrath into children of God (Ephesians 2:3). Until then, the wrath of God abides on the lost, no matter how much the world and false preachers may convince them otherwise (John 3:36; Romans 1:18). We can’t preach repentance as an irresistible commandment until we grasp this (Acts 17:30). Christ died to save sinners and as His ambassadors we implore them to be reconciled (2 Corinthians 5:20), but repentance remains a message of conviction and warning because of impending disaster (2 Corinthians 5:11). 

The law came with Moses and Jesus Christ said that He had not come to abolish that law (Matthew 5:17). Grace is not about lowering the standards of divine requirements to bring them down within man’s reach, it is about lifting up  the soul of man in order to attain divine standards without his own labor. Jesus said that on judgment day, our greatness will be measured by obeying the sermon on the mount—a much higher standard than the law of Moses—and teaching others to do the same (Matthew 5:19).I don’t know about you, but I want to be eternally great, not temporarily successful and forever ignominious. According to Jesus, murder was forbidden in the law of Moses, but now His gospel of grace and the “law of Christ”— Galatians 6:2, 1 Corinthians 9:21; Romans 8:2—says that angrily calling a brother rubbish carries the same sentence of eternal punishment in hell’s torments (Matthew 5:22).

I have heard people who interpret Matthew 5:17 to say that Christ came to fulfill the law by obeying on our behalf so this means that imputed righteousness is enough for our salvation and we are not to worry about obedience. But Galatians 6:2 literally teaches the opposite. It says through obedience we fulfill the law of Christ. So, now we understand that the truth that Jesus Christ has come to clarify—that the heart is the source of all the wicked things that the law of Moses forbade (Matthew 15:11-20)—and God is as wrathful against rebellious thoughts of men entertained in their minds and words—even if not carried out in action— as He is against sinful acts of men committed physically (Matthew 5:17-48; Romans 8:6-7). That makes even our need of Jesus Christ all the greater—because if Israel could not survive in the wilderness when travelling with Moses—how can we ever match up with a such higher standard ? To be all God calls us to be, we absolutely need the grace of Jesus Christ. If we live to please God, not for the eyes of men, then we must receive all that the grace of Jesus can do in transforming our lives for His glory. The born again believer’s goal is not just staying out of jail because of crimes committed physically. The saint aims higher, to please God in all things, and attain perfection in Christ. We must pursue holiness at all cost. We will see how this is accomplished in this devotional later on (Romans 8:4). This is the greatest happiness a human being can ever achieve on earth. 

Though grace is so foundational to Christianity, throughout the church age there have been difficulty to convey this message accurately. During the holiness movement that came out of the Methodist revival in the 1750s-1850s, the emphasis on holiness could have left the impression man could be saved by the blood, and then, work his way into being holy. Christ indwelling believers to work that transformation was not necessarily a clearly taught path to attain holiness. While there seems to have been an emphasis of justification by faith from the 1950s up to now, the collapse of society and decadent morality we see today would have been unheard of at the end of the 19th century, which is a testament to how grace understood simply as Christ’s obedience for us to give us imputed righteousness,  without actually transforming us to be conformed to His image in our walk is a horrible modern tragedy. Many preachers simply have too much blood on their hand (Acts 20:26).Telling people they are justified without empowering them to pursue holiness is strangling them alive. 

Today’s message of grace is this: Jesus came and obeyed and died for you, you have God’s grace and don’t need to worry about obedience anymore. The New Testament message of grace is: Jesus came and obeyed and died for you, you have God’s grace to save you without your own works and empower you to obey, walking in the light as Jesus is in the light. Those two are not the same message. We need the grace of Jesus Christ in its fullness. We need grace upon grace. The grace that justifies us by faith without works and the grace that restores us into the image of God to perfect holiness in us.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that your grace comes to find us just the way we are—in our confusion, our sins, our ignorance, our selfishness, our pride, our total depravity, and credits to us your own righteousness as a gift we have not earned—but of which we become perpetual debtors. Let your goodness, like a fetter, continue to bind our hearts to yours, so that we can soar with you into this heavenly calling you have called us, and attain the holiness you have prepared for us. In the merciful name of Jesus, we pray. Amen!

January 9th, 2021

When they heard this, they had no further objections and praised God, saying, “So then, even to Gentiles God has granted repentance that leads to life.” Acts 11: 18

 Considering the immense subject of “The Grace of Jesus Christ” that we have started in the second week of January devotional, we will try to do our meditations by starting from the very beginning so that we can finish the week with a much better understanding of what this grace is about, how it works, what it achieves, and why it should be shared with everyone under heaven.

The grace of Jesus Christ starts with repentance of sins. When John the Baptist, the forerunner of the Messiah, started preaching, he said: “Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”—Matthew 3:1-2. He was Elijah come-back (Matthew 17:10-13). Now, the teachers of the law knew Elijah was supposed to come back as it was already prophesied in Malachi, but they did not actually recognize him when he showed up. John the Baptist was the last of the Old Testament prophets, even though all his ministry is documented in the New Testament  (Matthew 11:11). After he baptized Jesus, the ministry of the Messiah began. How did Jesus begin His ministry? “Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”—Matthew 4:17. So, we do not see Jesus discarding the message of repentance preached by John the Baptist as “so-old-testament,” we see Him doubling down on that message. But why would Jesus start with this message when He was bringing grace ? Wasn’t He coming to abolish the requirements to obey the law and give us salvation through His blood on the cross ?

Jesus started by preaching repentance because it is a pre-requisite for forgiveness of sins. For sins to be forgiven by God—there are 2 requirements.

First, sin has to be confessed and repented. This means the sinner has to acknowledge that he / she is wrong and God is right. Then, the sinner must commit to forsake those sins. The sinner cannot have a plan B to return to those sins because that is not what repentance—turning 180 degrees means. Repentance is taking the opposite direction that the sinner had initially. Not 30 degrees turn, not 90 degrees turn, not 120 degrees turn, but a 180 degrees turnaround. Before repentance, the sinner is headed to damnation and destruction. After repentance, a U-turn takes place, and the sinner is headed to forgiveness and salvation. There has to be a clear difference between the life before repentance and the life after repentance. This has to be obvious to the sinner, those close to that person, and society at large. Christ demands total allegiance (Matthew 12:30; Luke 11:23; Mark 8:34-38; James 4:8; Job 17:9; Psalms 119:113; Isaiah 1:16-18; Isaiah 58:2-4; Hosea 10:2; 1 Kings 18:21; 1 Corinthians 16:22). A profession of repentance of sins and faith in Christ is questionable until it is demonstrably unquestionable. 

Repentance is twofold. It addresses the sins of omission and the sins of commission. The sins of commission are acts people commit that transgress the holiness of God. They are evil things that men should not be doing. Murder, for example, is a sin of commission. The sins of omission are the things that men avoid doing when it is their duty to do so. For example, Jesus taught that people couldn’t refuse to help their aging parents by giving offerings to God—claiming that what they owed their parents was “Corban” (Mark 7:11-13). That was a sin of omission. People must support their parents and give their tithes and offerings to the Lord. The same would be true about falling short in the love of neighbor as we see Jesus teaching in the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37). Loving your own parents or your own family is not evidence of repentance, even the ungodly do that. Thus, repentance that avoids negative things while not doing positive things is insufficient. Repentance that does good works but continues in the corruption of immoral things is also insufficient. God is not interested in sacrifices. Repentance must address both the sins of commission and the sins of omission. 

Jesus taught that forgiveness of sins would only be granted after repentance (Luke 24:47). So, after Pentecost, when Peter preached, he told people to repent in order to receive forgiveness and be baptized (Acts 2:38). After the healing of the paralytic, a little while after Pentecost, Peter preached again telling people to repent so that they can receive forgiveness and days of refreshing from the Lord would come (Acts 3:19). Revival only comes after repentance. Do you want to see days of refreshing that turn things around in all states of USA and around the world ? Well, then look at Acts 2:38 and Acts 3:19 and start practicing them. You do not get a great awakening because you think it is a great idea. You get it by living and preaching “as a dying man to dying men” (borrowed from Richard Baxter). That’s how it has always worked. Was repentance preached as an urgent message by Peter alone ? Not at all. Even Paul, the apostle of grace, taught that God commands all people everywhere to repent (Acts 17:30). Before the guilty can be declared just—or justified—that guilty one must be forgiven first. That’s a legal sequence.

Justification without forgiveness first is an undeliverable good promised to sinners with false hopes today. The slate has to be cleaned first through forgiveness before the guilty can be declared to never have done anything wrong through justification. It’s like the way it is done in the American criminal law, when people have a criminal record, they need to get their crimes pardoned and then get their records expunged so that even a background check doesn’t show that they have ever committed a crime. Pardon of a crime and expunging the criminal record are not the same. A person could be pardoned, and the record could still show that they have a criminal past. So, repentance and forgiveness must happen before imputed righteousness. Justification brings us into a place where we are like we have never ever committed any evil or omitted anything good. After justification, we become “perfect in Christ,” with Jehovah’s own righteousness being our own—Hebrews 10:14; Colossians 1:22; 2 Corinthians 5:21; Jeremiah 23:6.

Second, forgiveness of sins requires the shedding of blood. “Without the shedding of blood there’s no forgiveness.”—Hebrews 9:22. But where does the blood shed come from? In the Old Testament law of Moses, as part of teaching the Israelites what atonement for the forgiveness of sins meant, God instituted sacrifices through the blood of goats and lambs. This was to help them understand that sin results in death—and an animal had to be killed in place of the sinner—for the sinner to be forgiven. God had declared: “The soul that sins shall die.”—Ezekiel 18:20. Since all humanity is guilty, then all of us have to die for us to atone for our own sins (Romans 3:23; Romans 6:23). In God’s mercy, that was a price too high for humanity to pay. He decided to send His Son, Jesus, to die in our place. Jesus is the perfect Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, through the shedding of His own blood on the cross (John 1:29; Matthew 26:28; 1 John 2:2; 1 Corinthians 15:3-4; Romans 3:25; 1 John 1:9). The price was still too high but now the whole world could be saved through the death of one man—Jesus Christ. Since God has abolished the sacrifice of animals for atonement of sins, everyone must believe in Jesus Christ as their atonement for sins in order to have their sins forgiven by God. Only the blood of Jesus Christ is sufficient to cleanse the guilt of sinners (Acts 4:12; Galatians 2:21; John 14:6; 1 Corinthians 1:21; John 12:31; John 3:18). Only Jesus Christ is the perfect Obedient Son of God. Only the blood of the innocent can cover payment of the price for the sin of the guilty.

A problem arises once we understand this. Repentance precedes forgiveness but repentance is not easy to do. There are people who have tried once, twice, a hundred times, but they have not been able to repent. Jesus did in fact say that many people will be in this category, try and try, and not make it (Luke 13:24; Matthew 7: 22-23). Paul wrote that it was possible to confess knowing God while failing to repent (Titus 1:16). So, to be free of sins of commission and zealously avoid sins of omission is an impossible task from a human point of view. This is why repentance itself is a gift from God. Repentance itself happens by grace. It has to be. Repentance is both a command and a gift. 

In the Scripture that opens our reading today, we see that in Acts 11:18 the church leaders in Jerusalem who were concerned about Peter going to the house of Cornelius to preach to the Romans—the gentiles—were able to conclude that God had granted repentance to the gentiles. The Greek word used for “granted” in Acts 11:18 is “edoken.” Its root is also used in Matthew 10:1 where we read that Jesus gave the disciples authority to heal diseases and Matthew 14:19 where Jesus gave the disciples loaves of bread. So, it is a gift. Before the time of the gentiles to be brought into the kingdom of God came, the Gospel had been preached to the Jews in Jerusalem first.  Peter had proclaimed that Jesus grants repentance to Israel (Acts 5:31). The Greek word used in Acts 5:31 for granting is “dounai.” It shares the same root as Acts 11:18 “grant” and they are both G1325 “didomi” in the Strong’s concordance. It’s an offer, it is a gift. Christ has been exalted and grants repentance both to the gentiles and the Jews in Israel. 

It’s not just Peter and the church in Jerusalem that thought repentance was a gift of God, Paul also taught this very thing as we read in Titus 2:11-12. “For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age.” Since as we saw yesterday that the principle of sin dwells in the heart of the sinner, then the grace of Jesus Christ must touch the source. This doesn’t simply change outward behavior, it changes the innermost thoughts as well. This grace of God that gives us this repentance as Paul declares, turns us away from the sins of commission and infuses into us the zeal for avoiding sins of omission—leaving a wicked lifestyle behind and embracing a godly lifestyle going forward. In repentance, we say “No” to evil and say “Yes” to glory. It starts in the mind and then proceeds to action. We abandon sin and walk in holiness. We forsake the pleasures of the world and joyfully seize Christ’s character. In several other Scriptures, repentance is taught as a gift that God grants to sinners (2 Timothy 2:25; Acts 8:22; Lamentation 5:21; Isaiah 55:7; Psalms 80:3,7,19; Psalms 85:4; Luke 1:17; 1 John 4:19). So, sinners can start the journey of the kingdom with the confidence that the repentance that God commands them, He will abundantly supply and cause them to repent through His grace—when they call upon Him asking for this.

Acts 5:31, Acts 11:18, and Titus 2:11-12 differ from Romans 2:4, another verse used to teach that repentance is the grace of God given to us. What is the difference ? The 3 Scriptures mentioned above suggest repentance as a “good” delivered to us by the grace of God. Romans 2:4 simply asks a question: Or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness, forbearance and patience, not realizing that God’s kindness is intended to lead you to repentance? This is about God’s intention for the sinner in his patience to delay judgment. Romans 2:4 doesn’t actually support the teaching that repentance is a gift, only that God is kind to wait for the sinner to change and turn to Him. Because it is asked as a question “do you show contempt ?” —It suggests that the gift can be refused by the sinner and the patience of God is not indefinite.

Contempt for a gift is usually shown for 2 reasons.

First, it can be shown because the gift is not valued. Suppose someone gives $5 to a billionaire. Do you think he would be impressed by the amount ? People who reject salvation usually cannot tell its value (Malachi 1:13). They consider their present pleasures in the flesh and enjoyment of the world as better than eternity in a world they cannot see yet or even divine blessings in this life now. The problem with sharing the Gospel by telling sinners that God will bless them financially, for example, is that there are plenty of rich people who achieved it without God’s help. People don’t need God to make them rich because they can do it on their own. They just have to work hard for that. On the other hand, there are plenty of people God has given natural comfort or blessings of a good education to make them rich and yet they willingly sacrifice that to follow Christ. Saint Francis of Assisi is an example (2 Samuel 24:24; Philippians 3:7-10). This is also what Scriptures teach about the faith of Moses (Hebrews 11:24-28).

The second reason a person could despise a gift could be because of the giver. If the intended recipient has been offended by the giver in one way or another, the recipient could spit upon the gift, even if it was large enough to be valuable. People value their dignity more so than money. There are people who would be willing to suffer lack rather than receive gifts from those they despise. Wrong images of God can do that to sinners. There was, in fact, a supposedly gifted steward that Christ judges at His return because that steward thought the Lord was a hard master and buried his talent rather than traded it (Matthew 25:24-28). His view of God as a hard master led to inactivity. He did not trade the gifts and talents God gave him for God’s glory and profit. Those were sins of omission (Isaiah 43:22; Micah 6:3). So, the image of God people have in their minds could lead them to not accept His gift or even use the gift as intended once received. There are people who react to the prosperity Gospel by starting to preach things that are weird and unbiblical. They suffer judgment by preaching a Gospel of their own making just like the one they are reacting against (Proverbs 10:22). Our view of God and His Scriptures has to be thoroughly objective, not clouded by the hurts, disappointments, tragedies, or deceptions we have witnessed. Yes, God wants to bless people. But this works through His wisdom, not through the world’s wisdom ( Colossians 2:3; 1 Corinthians 1:27; 1 Kings 4:30-31; Luke 11:31; Luke 12:27; Ezekiel 28:3-7). That error is usually corrected by preaching the Gospel of the kingdom. When Jesus preached repentance, that’s what He was preparing sinners for. While the manifestations of all heaven’s glory and riches will not be fully tasted until Christ’s return, redemption has provided quite plenty for signs and wonders to reveal those to us in this age as Jesus and the apostles demonstrated throughout their lives. Divine wisdom to solve problems that benefit nations like Solomon and Joseph had in their generations is not restricted to the Old Testament. It is revealed in a greater and more glorious way in Christ now. 

How do we avoid showing contempt for God’s rich offer of repentance ? By receiving it joyfully, immediately. Everywhere in Scripture, the salvation and favor of God are declared as available for us to “today.” (2 Corinthians 6:2; Hebrews 3:15; Hebrews 4:7). This means you can receive the gift of repentance if you ask it of God, today. But no one would be able to guarantee how long that offer stands. It could vanish by tomorrow (Proverbs 6:15; Psalms 32:6;  Luke 21:36; 1 Thessalonians 5:3; Proverbs 24:22; Romans 10:21; 2 Chronicles 36:16; Isaiah 30:13-14; Proverbs 29:1; Luke 7:30; Psalms 73:18-20; Deuteronomy 28:63). Note how many times Scriptures say judgment or destruction can come suddenly. Eternity— the time beyond a quadrillion years is too big a thing to be gambled with like that. Today is the day of God’s favor and repentance should always be seized for that moment when God offers it. 

Prayer: Father God, all of us have sinned and fallen short of your glory and need to repent of our sins and turn to you. We confess that we have transgressed your law and we are not looking to malign its just demands but rather to repent fully and truthfully to walk as you ask us to. We pray Lord, that through the grace of Jesus Christ, you grant us repentance and help us to make the needed change. Forgive us our sins and bring us into the fullness of your salvation. In the gracious name of Jesus, we pray. Amen!

January 11th, 2021

He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification. Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Romans 4:25- Romans 5:1

 We will continue “The Grace of Jesus Christ” themed devotional for the second week of January by looking at the last verse of Romans 4 and the first verse of Romans 5—where justification by faith is taught.

In the last devotional we had seen that repentance precedes forgiveness and that the repentance that God commands us can be granted to us to lead us to eternal life. Repentance is both a commandment of God and a gift of God. This is the Good News of the grace of Jesus Christ. Repentance is our starting point, but it has to be followed by faith in Christ’s redemptive work.

When Paul summarizes his ministry in Acts 20:21, he said: “I have declared to both Jews and Greeks that they must turn to God in repentance and have faith in our Lord Jesus.” It is not one or the other. It is both. We had already mentioned that God had granted repentance to Israel first (Acts 5:31) and then later granted repentance to the Gentiles (Acts 11:18). Paul preached that repentance to both the Jews and the Gentiles. What we call salvation—as far as man’s response to the Gospel is concerned—has 3 conditions that have to be met for someone to be considered converted to Christ without any doubts. First, repentance of sins to turn to God and receiving forgiveness. Second, faith in the Lord Jesus Christ for justification or imputed righteousness. Third, the miracle of regeneration that occurs supernaturally when the Holy Spirit brings the new birth in the spirit of the new convert. A sinner is not saved until he/she is repentant, forgiven, justified, and born again. All these 3 happen by the grace of Jesus Christ. These three go in that order but they do not have to take weeks, months, or years to take place. They can all occur the same day, they can all occur the same hour, they can all occur in the same instant. However, considering the nature of repentance and the new birth—it may take time to notice “the fruit meet with repentance.”—Matthew 3:7-8 and “the fruit of the Spirit,” who has brought that new birth (Galatians 5:22-23). It may take several months for people to see evidence of change that happens after this salvation and recognize that they are in a state of grace. Even so, traditionally, the fruit of repentance has often been noticed in  short order—not in months or years—but usually in hours or days as people swiftly changed their course and took immediate action. (Acts 19:18-19; Luke 19:8; Acts 2:37; Acts 16:30).

The book of Samuel gives us one of the most illustrious discovery of how God gives repentance as we see how the heart responds when confronted by the Word of God about disobedience or rebellion—the penitent trembles and is contrite while the impenitent is like “whatever!”—we see this in king Saul and king David’s responses when they were confronted by prophet Samuel and Nathan, respectively. (1 Samuel 13: 10-15; 1 Samuel 15:19-26; 1 Chronicles 10:13; 2 Samuel 12:1-13; Psalms 51). We see it in our generation—that many people, even those who consider themselves “Christians”—do not take sin seriously and some of them are even proud of being sinful (Philippians 3:18-19).

After repentance, we must turn in faith and believe in Christ’s redemptive work. Paul writes that Christ was delivered for our sins. The blood of Jesus was shed for the cleansing of our sins (Matthew 26:28) and He rose from the dead for our justification. If Christ had died and not risen from the dead—He might not have been who He claimed to be. He could have been a great prophet or an impostor—but He wouldn’t have been a Savior. Prophets and impostors die alike. Christ, the “Lord of glory, ” was crucified, died,  and rose from the dead—Acts 2:36; 1 Corinthians 2:8. He had laid down His life willingly and nobody took it from Him as a weak human being, unable to protect Himself (John 10:18). He had the power to deliver Himself from danger but chose to die for our sins (Matthew 26:53;  John 18:11).  On the third day, He rose from the dead (1 Corinthians 15:3-4). His resurrection gives hope for our own resurrection—but it also has many other doctrinal ramifications—one of those is that He rose for our justification. The blood He shed washes our sins in forgiveness, but we need much more than pardon to be able to stand before God and be accepted—we need to be just—righteous—blameless—faultless—sinless—perfect—which we will never be able to be on our own, through our own endeavor, by our own works—whether in time now or in future eternity—it is utterly impossible. Only Christ is perfect and His perfect obedience is credited to us. 

Repentance and forgiveness of the sins of our disobedience are made possible by the cross. The cross deals with our past. Imputed righteousness, that is, credited obedience given to us, regeneration, and sanctification are empowered by the resurrection life of Jesus Christ ( Romans 3:25; Romans 6:4-14; Acts 22:16; 1 Peter 3:21;  Colossians 3:1-2; Romans 8:11-14; Hebrews 10:26-29; Hebrews 6:4-6; 2 Peter 1:9; 1 John 2:9).  The resurrection is the power source of our new life. The cross makes possible cleansing after salvation too, but this progressive cleansing presupposes that we are walking in the light already (1 John 1:7-9). “If we walk in the light…” is a conditional statement. After regeneration, our life is kept clean by walking in the Spirit—the light of His revealed will—quick, short accounts confessions of mistakes, errors, and sins of ignorance for cleansing—and continuing in the newness of life energized by His resurrection power.

The sins of ignorance are different from deliberate sins. One may be done with a clear and yet weak conscience, while the other reveals bad faith ( 1 Corinthians 8:9-11; 1 Timothy 1:18-19). A person who is deceived could be led into sin, for example, and that could count as a sin of ignorance. The person who does the deceiving is intentionally causing offense and is acting in bad faith (Hebrews 3:13; Luke 17:1-2). It is also called “wickedness.”  Interestingly, in Genesis 20, we see Abraham committing a deliberate sin of deception by calling Sarah his sister in order to save his own skin in a foreign land. The fear he could have been killed does not make the deliberate nature of it less significant. The fear of death is never an excuse for deliberate sin (Matthew 26:34; Luke 22:60-62; Matthew 10:26-28; Mark 8:34-38; Hebrews 12:4). Therefore, this same thinking would apply to Christian witness that involves deception, including false gospels, false lifestyle, or a denial of the knowledge of the Gospel altogether, for any reason, including threat of death. I know we may hate to think of the idea, but it is true. Could this mean that the threat of losing one’s life under persecution is not an excuse to deny Christ and one who is guilty of it would go to hell ? Absolutely ! People who deny Christ because they fear for their life were never saved. Thankfully, God intervened in Abraham’s case and He has intervened to shut the mouths of lions that were threatening His people several times. Both in the Old Testament and New Testament, these two types of sins, sins of ignorance and deliberate sins, were viewed differently (Romans 6:2; Leviticus 4:2,22,27; Leviticus 5:17; Numbers 15:24, 29, 30, Deuteronomy 17:2; Job 38:15; Psalms 19:13; Psalms 139:23-24; Psalms 119:104;  Luke 12:47-48; Jonah 4:11; James 4:17; Romans 14:23;  1 Timothy 1:13; Luke 23:34; Romans 2:12, 15; Galatian 6:12; Galatians 2:14; Proverbs 29:25; John 12:42-43; Luke 10:12-13; Acts 17:30;  Hebrews 10:26; 1 John 5:16-17; 2 Peter 2:20-22; Galatians 1:8-9; 2 Corinthians 11:3-4; 14-15; 2 Corinthians 4:2; James 3:1; Matthew 7:21-23; 2 Timothy 4:10; Jude 1:4). Deliberate sins are synonymous with being a reprobate. Grace is sweeter the moment we understand how easy it is to fall. We also realize the praises the saints owe God who keeps them from falling and richly gives them grace to repent when they do. The above Scriptures can help people who want to test themselves, whether they are in the genuine faith ( 2 Corinthians 13:5). Traditionally, no one who practices an ongoing, deliberate, and deadly sin was ever considered to be in a state of grace. 

The doctrine of justification was recovered by Protestant reformers in the 16th century—at the time, indulgences for the remission of sins were for sale. Since the masses had no access to Scriptures, they could be easily deceived as they did not understand that justification makes them righteous once and for all, “perfect in Christ,” the very moment they receive it (Hebrews 10:14; Colossians 1:22; Colossians 2:10; Hebrews 7:9). As dangerous as it may sound to some, “once and for all” or “perfect forever” means just that—the past, present, and future sins are all covered in justification. Rather than teach this truth otherwise, we should make sure that where people have confused this as a license to sin, there is an actual understanding of the 2 other doctrines crucial to salvation, namely, repentance and regeneration.

Justification differs from forgiveness in that forgiveness wipes away our negative while justification bestows upon us a positive. To be able to stand before God—we can’t just say we have been forgiven our wrong—which would be what a pardon achieves— we must be able to say, we have done everything right— but this is not true either in our past history or by projection of what we could achieve in the future—we must call things which be not as though they were—we need God’s righteousness as our own(Isaiah 33:14; Isaiah 64:6; Romans 3:23;  2 Corinthians 5:21;Colossians 1:22; Jeremiah 23:6; Romans 4:17-25). Since this righteousness is not our own, Christ graciously imputes it upon us when we believe in Him—which is why we call it the grace of Jesus Christ. Justification by faith happens instantly and we can absolutely have 100% certainty—assurance of salvation that we are perfect before God and blameless in His eyes and we will be resurrected on the last day and shall see Him face to face (Romans 10:9; John 5:24). But what if it fails? That’s not the language of faith. It will never fail. 

In Romans 4:16-22, Paul gives the example of Abraham, how he attained righteousness even before the law of Moses was written down. The righteousness of Christ that is available to Christians follows the same pattern. Abraham, whom we have found to be a deceiver, believed God to give him Isaac, the child of promise. He was 100 years old and Sarah was 90 years old when Isaac was born. Menopause is generally at age 50-53, so Sarah’s womb was infertile, from a natural point of view. Not only that, the risks of having children with Down syndrome are much higher in women who are older than 35-40 years old. But Abraham believed God and not only was Isaac born, but he was also totally healthy. He believed in the God “who calls things which be not as though they were.”- Romans 4:17. While this verse or statement may be used as a definition of what faith is in general—the substance of things hoped for, a title-deed or demonstration of things not seen—it is written in the context of explaining justification by faith. Since the righteousness that Christ gives to us is not our own—we claim it or appropriate it by faith: Christ pleased the Father completely. He is totally righteous and obeyed perfectly. Therefore, in Christ, I am righteous and perfect forever. Notice that God changed Abraham’s name from Abram—exalted father—to Abraham—father of many nations—before this promise was fulfilled and he carried this name calling himself something that he was not, something that had not taken place but he was believing God for. This is why I wouldn’t be against a believer being saved and justified instantly while waiting to see ” the fruit meet with repentance.” Because Abraham’s promise took long to manifest—he had to be persistent and “did not stagger in unbelief, being fully persuaded that He who had promised was able also to perform”—Romans 4: 20-21. It is because of that we are absolutely convinced that justified Christians are “God’s own righteousness.”—2 Corinthians 5:21. This is not a statement of arrogance; this is a statement of faith as handed to us by apostles.

Since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God. We no longer fear of being condemned on judgment day and thrown in hell fire for eternity.  “Who is he that condemns? It is God who justifies.”—Romans 8:34. We have peace with the Judge of all the earth. We can have confidence that when we stand before Him on judgment day—He will only see Christ’s unblemished righteousness—The Son in whom He is well pleased. No guilt in life, no fear in death, this is the power of Christ in me.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that I am the very righteousness of Christ and have become so because of your rich mercies and grace. I thank you for giving us this indescribable gift that ends all our striving for acceptance in your presence. I thank you for this reconciliation that has brought peace between us and gives us unfettered access before your throne, where we can come with boldness to ask whatever we desire in the name of Jesus. To you be the glory forever, in Jesus’ name, Amen !

 

January 12th, 2021

So don’t be surprised when I say, ‘You must be born again.’—John 3:7

 We will continue “The Grace of Jesus Christ” themed devotional for the second week of January by discussing the doctrine of regeneration.

In the last devotional, we had mentioned that there are 3 conditions that have to be met for someone to be considered to have salvation in Christ: repentance for forgiveness of sins, justification by faith, and the new birth or regeneration or being born again. We saw that repentance precedes forgiveness and that this should be followed with faith. Paul tells us about Abraham in Romans 4:9-22 to try to help us understand how justification by faith works. Christ’s perfect obedience is imputed upon us—credited to us—and we stand before God perfect with Christ’s own righteousness (2 Corinthians 5:21). We are blameless in God’s eyes because of that faith.

When James approaches this topic of justification in James 2:14-26, he shares a few insightful things and adds his own interpretation of the faith of Abraham different from what we read in Romans 4:9-22. There are Christians who see a tension between James 2:14-26 and Romans 4:9-22 or simply the entire chapters of Romans 4 and James 2, but when you study the entirety of Scripture, there’s no such tension. It’s very likely that the way we feel about modern Christianity and how the preaching of the Gospel is done was also felt in the early church and Romans 4 vs James 2 debate gives us a glimpse of that tension.

The fact is that when we discuss about “works” today we may miss context in certain situations. For example, when Paul introduces his teaching on the faith of Abraham in Romans 4, he talks about circumcision as one of the works of the law that Jews wanted to keep—alongside their new Christian faith. Paul said it was pointless since in the New Testament true circumcision is of the heart—a covenant between man and God that is centered on inward change more so than an outward sign (Philippians 3:3; Romans 2:29; Galatians 6:13). Paul also mentioned other things in the law of Moses that Jews had been holding onto that were irrelevant for Christians— such as believing that certain foods could make believers unclean, the keeping of the Sabbath rest on Saturday—the seventh day—and several other Jewish traditions. When Paul talks about “works” he is talking about these things. He wrote “I do not frustrate the grace of God: for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain”—Galatians 2:21. Because if he were to preach Faith + Works, it would be frustrating the grace of God. If he were to preach that Christ saves sinners by grace and yet also encourage circumcision, it would be counterproductive. If anyone could be saved by religious activities, festivals, ceremonies, traditions, sacrifices, and other similar works, then salvation could be attained by works, and Christ would have been crucified for nothing.

When Paul talks about “works” he is usually not talking about “the undefiled religion that is pure in God’s eyes”—James 1:27, that consists of helping the orphans and widows in their distress while also staying pure from worldly immorality. How do we know this? Because whenever we read Paul’s instructions for practical living in Ephesians 4-6; 1 Timothy 5-6; Acts 20; 2 Corinthians 8-9—we see that Paul was eager to do good works as evidence of true faith and encouraged others to do the same. Paul had a conference with the apostles in Jerusalem to discuss these matters and they settled on that agreement (Galatians 2:10). So, Paul had been misunderstood in the early church and he is misunderstood today. It’s understandable that there are always people who try to twist a preacher’s words for malevolent, macabre, and profitable ends (2 Peter 3:15-17).  The works that Paul wanted to get away from were mostly ceremonial in nature while the works that James is talking about are the things you could put in the category of doing justice towards the poor and vulnerable. The kind of things to do if you don’t want to end up with the sins of omission like we had discussed earlier on repentance, giving 2 examples of the Corban and Good Samaritan (Mark 7:11-13; Luke 10:25-37). Since Paul preached repentance as much as he preached justification by faith (Acts 20:21; Acts 26:20), he did address good works in such preaching. In Acts 26:20 we read: ” but declared first to those in Damascus and in Jerusalem, and throughout all the region of Judea, and then to the Gentiles, that they should repent, turn to God, and do works befitting repentance.”  Moreover, Paul sees true faith as bound to result in good works—and basically tries to show that good works flow from that faith and not the other way around (Ephesians 2:10; Galatians 6:10).

Yesterday, we saw how glorious the doctrine of justification is, the peace it brings to us, and how final it is in settling the issues of eternal security. However, I am afraid that the entirety of the New Testament record bears witness against the modern emphasis of this doctrine at the expense of repentance and regeneration. The consequences we see today would be expected. What happens if you give assurance of salvation to sinners without demanding change of heart and life as the Gospel commands ? Disaster, rather than revival, follows that preaching.

Faith without good works is dead. There’s no such a thing as faith that is not accompanied by good works. So, good works will be there when people repent their sins of omission and start to do good works (Acts 10:1-5), but those good works cannot complete a person before God for righteousness, just as they never saved Cornelius, even though God had taken notice of them—ultimately, Cornelius needed justification by faith alone—which is why he had to send for his men to go bring apostle Peter and he heard the Gospel of the grace of Jesus Christ. If giving alms to the poor had been enough for  Cornelius, he wouldn’t have needed to hear the message of faith preached by Peter. Once justification by faith comes, the good works done after repenting the sins of omission do not stop—instead, those works get a new fuel—they flow from faith itself, generated by gratitude in the generous redemptive work of Christ. Good works for repentance are done because of the fear of God and what He has commanded; good works that flow from faith, on the other hand, are done because what God has done is too much not to want to share it with the less fortunate, less knowledgeable, less blessed, less educated, and less privileged. When people who claim to be justified by faith are found to be cruel, stingy, jealous, immoral, selfish, greedy, lustful, and unkind—it is proof that they are not justified—they are deceived. They have no gratitude for the cross of Jesus. Faith in the blood of Jesus inevitably produces generosity, godliness, and good works (Hebrews 6:9). If we are overwhelmed by the love of Jesus, how can we not do something good for our fellow men (1 John 4:19-20; 1 John 3:17) ?

The culmination of these doctrines of salvation is the doctrine of regeneration. Jesus told Nicodemus, the Pharisee who had come to see him in secret, at night,  “you must be born again.”—John 3:7. This was a man who knew the law, probably did good works, and feared God—because, after all, his conscience had stricken him enough to come to Jesus to acknowledge that he was a teacher from God. While such an acknowledgement was encouraging, Jesus did not think that recognizing Him as a teacher from God or prophet was itself salvific. Even giving Him the title of “Lord” without due obedience does not impress Him (Luke 6:46; James 2:19; Matthew 8:29). Jesus declared “you must be born again.” What does that mean?  Nicodemus enquired about that too. It certainly does not mean going back to into the mother’s womb. First, Jesus wondered how Nicodemus can be an influential teacher in Israel without grasping such a truth. Sometimes Jesus attacked theological knowledge that wasn’t mixed with obedience (John 5:39-40; Matthew 23:23), but here we see that He doesn’t hold theological ignorance in high esteem either . Nicodemus was supposed to know these things (Hosea 4:6). The ministries of Jesus as a teacher, prophet, and healer should never be imbalanced in the church. It is true that some churches will exalt one above the other, but that splits up Christ and what He has come to do in the church and the world. Rather than bask in the glory of the compliment for his miracles, Jesus puts on a teacher’s hat and starts to expound on the doctrine of regeneration. The miracles had led Nicodemus to be inquisitive, but teaching was important to help him learn “how the kingdom works.”

As the conversation with Nicodemus goes on, we see Jesus clarifying that this new birth he was talking about was given by the Spirit of God. The Holy Spirit comes to indwell the person who believes in Jesus. “Flesh gives birth to flesh and spirit gives birth to spirit.”—John 3:6. What people need is a brand new life. The flesh—the old man—the weaknesses that sinners have had all along cannot give them that. Unfortunately, in terms of spiritual power, the only thing we can inherit from our parents is the sinful nature. Job once said “naked I came from mother’s womb” (Job 1:21), meaning that he had brought nothing into the world (1 Timothy 6:7). On that we may add that the sinful nature was attached to his soul the very moment he started to breathe as a baby (Romans 5:12; Romans 7:21; Psalms 51:5). This tragedy of sinful flesh we all share at birth. People can “reinvent themselves” or try to “renovate” or “improve” in their own flesh—in their own human strength—and yet they will continue to be flesh. It will not bring them close to God. It will not transform their lives for holiness. It will not give them salvation (Romans 7:23). Flesh gives birth to flesh. The doctrine of repentance teaches us that we have responsibility for our own thoughts, words, and actions. We cannot say that because we were born trapped in iniquity, we must continue that way. God calls us to turn to Him and gives us the grace we need to change. The doctrine of original sin teaches us that reform will not be enough. The old life cannot be reformed. The whole thing must be torn up, crucified with Christ, and a new self must arise from the dead. No one can attain the holiness Christ preached in the Sermon on the Mount while still in the flesh. Nobody would be able to go through the process of sanctification in the flesh. It requires the work of the Spirit of God.

Let’s go back to the analogy of the American criminal law we had mentioned when discussing the difference between pardon and justification. Suppose someone had heroin trafficking history and was arrested by police, taken to court, and charged with illegal drug trade activity—convicted and then sentenced for 10 years in prison. In the 5th year of imprisonment, that person is blessed to have a pardon from authorities and is released from prison. Once out of prison, he tries to apply for jobs and finds a job at a pharmacy he is interested in. He would be handling narcotics at the pharmacy. The pharmacy does a criminal background check before giving him the job and finds that this person has been in prison for trafficking heroin. The criminal record is still showing his past when a background check is done. The pharmacy is aware that this is a high risk hire because he could steal narcotics from the pharmacy or abuse drugs after being hired. Unless this person’s criminal record is expunged, the criminal past will follow him in such situations. But what if the record is expunged and he gets hired at such a pharmacy—because they were not aware of his past? If his life has not changed, he might be tempted to get some Oxycodone for himself—and then more—and then even get some for his friends—illegally. He could end up in jail again. It is called recidivism. So, pardon was good, expunging the criminal record was helpful, but the person ended up in prison again because of recidivism. His old life had not changed. This is how salvation works too. Forgiveness of past sins is good, justification by faith credits to us righteousness—giving us a new perfect record of righteous obedience we did not have—and yet we still need a new life to be able to maintain our freedom. We must be born again. That child of God, the new spirit-man, is “created in righteousness.” (2 Corinthians 5:17; Ephesians 4:24).

After the new birth, we are free. We are no longer under the same bondage of natural birth in the flesh. Now, we can soar as high in the spiritual life as the greatest prophets and apostles, because we carry zoe, the eternal life of Christ Jesus Himself, inside of us. From this Zoe, this abundant life, flows everything good we never had in our flesh before being born again: sanctification, spiritual blessing, love, faithfulness, joy, a sound mind, physical health, righteousness, freedom, fruitfulness, victorious living—in short, the very life of God Himself (Philemon 1:6; 1 John 5:11; Ephesians 1:3; 1 Corinthians 2:9-11; Ephesians 2:1-10; John 10:10; 1 John 3:8-9; 1 John 5:18; 3 John 2; 2 Timothy 1:6-7; Romans 5:17; John 8:36; Galatians 5:1; 2 Corinthians 3:17; Romans 8: 1-14;  Romans 14:17; Isaiah 32:15; Galatians 5:22-23; 2 Peter 1:3-11). This truth is so powerful and glorious that once you get hold of it, you can literally sell all your possessions, give them to the poor, and follow Jesus, preaching this regeneration till death. 

Why should Nicodemus have been intuitively knowledgeable about regeneration when Christ made mention of it ? The mystery and miracle of the new birth had been prophesied in the Old Testament.  “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.”—Ezekiel 36:26-27. It is a mystery because as  Jesus said “The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going.”—John 3:8. Parents cannot give you this new birth. Preachers cannot make you born again. You cannot give yourself regeneration. It happens by the power of the Spirit of God (John 1:12-13).  While there’s nothing we can do to be born again—to receive this Spirit of God to come indwell us and it is 100% supernatural—God still commands us to do our part and He gives us the grace to receive what He has already revealed—repentance for forgiveness of sins and faith for justification. Once we do those 2 things, we receive eternal life because God wants us to be born again much more so than we desire it ourselves. When we receive His grace to do our part in believing Him, He will be faithful to do the supernatural part of regeneration (John 3:15-16). The Holy Spirit comes to indwell an already clean vessel. From that moment on, we become a temple of the living God, and continue to live accordingly (1 Corinthians 3:16-17; 1 Corinthians 6:13-20). When we have been washed by the blood and perfected in the righteousness of Christ by faith, the Holy Spirit is pleased to regenerate us—and He raises the fallen spirit-man from the dead—making us new creatures in Christ. As the wind blows over our new life, we are astonished by the changes the Holy Spirit brings to us. That transformation by the Spirit of God testifies that we have indeed become children of God Most High because we couldn’t have possibly made it happen (Romans 8:16). With joy, praises erupt from our born again spirits as we join Charles Wesley in singing: “Thine eye diffused a quickening ray; I woke, the dungeon flamed with light; My chains fell off, my heart was free, I rose, went forth, and followed thee”

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that I am a new creation by the grace of Jesus Christ and have this new life, eternal life, flowing inside of me. Father, I thank you that I am forgiven, justified, and regenerated—that I will spend eternity in your presence. I pray, Lord, that your Holy Spirit will have a free hand in my life—so that my new heart that you have given me after removing the old heart of flesh—will commune with you and receive nourishment from you—and will be moved to follow your holy will and obey your decrees. Help us to put on the new spirit-man, Christ’s own nature, so that we can soar with you to become all that this power flowing from our new life has come to bestow upon us and accomplish inside of us. In the gracious name of Jesus, we pray. Amen!

January 13th, 2021

 I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.  Galatians 2:20

We will continue “The Grace of Jesus Christ” themed devotional for the second week of January by starting to look into sanctification.

Since “without holiness none shall see the Lord”—Hebrews 12:14, and considering that the entire religious endeavor is about going to heaven, not about living comfortably on earth as the primary goal, then holiness is the ultimate destination for the Christian faith on earth.

What is holiness? It can be defined in many ways—but I think a good way to get a complete picture of it is to read the entirety of the Sermon on the Mount: Matthew chapter 5, chapter 6, and chapter 7. That is Christ’s own definition of holiness. At the end of Chapter 5, He says:  “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”—Matthew 5:48. That’s the holiness we will need to be able to see the Lord.

Someone could say—wait a minute—I thought that justification by faith makes us perfect in Christ—credited with God’s own righteousness—do we really need to be holy anymore? Notice what Christ said “as your heavenly father is perfect.” It’s like we read in the law of Moses “Speak to the whole congregation of Israel and tell them: Be holy because I, the LORD your God, am holy.”  (Leviticus 19:2; Leviticus 20:7-8 ). Peter repeats this same command in 1 Peter 1:15-16.

When we are born again, we become children of God by regeneration and our new nature is righteous; since God reproduces after His own kind, holiness should be a byproduct of the new birth. Wherever that’s missing, someone could rightfully worry whether regeneration did, in fact, take place. Now, it may take a while for the new believer to begin to show the “fruit of the Spirit”—Galatians 5:22-23 that should accompany regeneration, as the Holy Spirit begins the work of sanctification, but there should be an immediate strong desire, an earnest pursuit, and passionate race towards holiness. There should be increasing sorrow for sin, hatred of all things that are ungodly, and deeper appreciation for the cross of Jesus, His blood, and His church. There should be a greater longing for God’s presence, going to heaven, and being perfect like those who are in heaven are perfect (Hebrews 12:18-29). So, rather than look at the words “be holy because I, the Lord your God, I am holy” —as a burdensome command or an unattainable standard—we should look at it as a decree that empowers our sonship identity. What God commands, He enables. Since we are His children, we bear His likeness, His image, without striving. The best expression that can help us understand this effortless transformation is the proverb ” like Father, like son ”  (Romans 8:28-30; John 5:17-20; James 1:23-25; Hebrews 12:10; 1 John 3:1-3; Romans 9:23; 1 Corinthians 2:7; John 17:22-24; 2 Corinthians 3: 17- 18; 1 Corinthians 15:49; Ephesians 4:24). Regeneration makes sanctification possible. 

Repentance of sins turns away the wrath of God. In repentance we flee from the wrath to come. Justification makes us accepted in the beloved. We are blameless and righteous in God’s eyes. Regeneration raises the fallen spirit-man from the dead—we are born again with God’s own nature—have the life of God inside of us, the “zoe” which is eternal.  It is that life of God that begins to bring in the fruit of the Spirit—the attributes of God—His holiness in our lives.

God has designed both the cleansing of sins by the blood and the sanctification process by the Spirit to have  crisis-entry points and progressive-growth phases. Our initial cleansing after we are saved gets us started but it is not the end. We need to be cleansed every day. This is why John writes: “ If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”—1 John 1:8-9. John is writing for those “who walk in the light as He is in the light.”—1 John 1:7. So, this is a progressive cleansing that takes place daily in those who are already born again. Those who are not saved are not considered to be walking in the light—they are in outer darkness. Sanctification also has an entry point and a progressive phase—this means sanctification has a positional state and experience state. Everything is perfect the day we are born again—from a positional point of view. “And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus.”—Ephesians 2:6—This is the positional state of every born again Christian, but it is not the experience of every single believer. Paul did go to heaven while he was still alive—2 Corinthians 12:2-4—but he did not stay there and sit in heaven. He returned to the earth—continued ministry and died like every other Christian. So, our seat in heaven is positional. There’s also a positional state of sanctification that gets us started in the process—being crucified with Christ.

Paul says “I have been crucified with Christ.”—Galatians 2:20. This is not a statement of super-spirituality. It is not something that an apostle alone can claim. It is the very definition of how sanctification starts. In Romans 6, the chapter that follows Paul’s writings on justification by faith, Paul talks about this positional state of our sanctification—and how understanding it affects the way we live out the experience of a holy life. “knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin.”—Romans 6:6. Clearly, this is not a grace available just for Paul, it is for all of us. It is one of the mysteries of the new birth. The new birth gives us a new life, but since we do not want the old life following us into the future—that old man has to die. By God’s grace—He included that in our salvation plan—when He included all the members of the church—all the saints—into the cross of Jesus. So Jesus died for us and Jesus died as us. “For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died.”—2 Corinthians 5:14. A person who likes to swear or is addicted to listening to impure songs or watching unholy things or using cocaine or any other physical enslavement in the body could say—I really do not feel like my old man died— But would that change what the Scriptures say ? All died ! Paul said that people who are controlled by their flesh couldn’t really consider themselves saved. “Their destiny is destruction, their god is their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is set on earthly things.”—Philippians 3:18. A person simply cannot be a Christian and be unsanctified at the same time. The body does not rule the saints anymore. This should make us appreciate even more God’s salvation plan. If the old man had not been crucified with Christ—how many more Christians could be under the dominion of sin, having difficulty with the sanctification process ? Our crucifixion with Christ is the basis of the consecration of our bodies to God (Romans 6:13-14). 

Christ cannot be our Lord if our stomach or our body is still our god. So the old man had to be crucified in order that the body of sin might be done away with. Once that’s settled—once we receive that by faith—then we begin to live for God. We begin the process of surrender. Sadly, since many Christians have been deceived that justification by faith is the only thing they will ever need— they never get to this stage of Christianity. They are stuck in a positional perfection and do not want to know about the walk of holiness in their new life.

“I no longer live but Christ lives in me. The life I live, I live by faith in the Son of God…” in that, Paul is acknowledging that when his old man died, a new man was raised to life. The born again life is powered by the resurrection of Jesus Christ. We may love the stories of the resurrection of Jesus with the angel rolling away the stone, an earthquake, the soldiers who were guarding the tomb to prevent Christ’s body from being stolen by the disciples falling down as half-dead, and all other events surrounding the resurrection (Matthew 28:2-4)—because this is the hope of the Christian faith—as it assures us of the resurrection of our own bodies—but the resurrection also has many more implications for the life of the Christian believer—just like the cross does have many more implications. One of the implications of the resurrection is that it is its power that flows into the new man to be able to walk in Zoe—the life of God. That’s what Paul encourages us to do when he says “that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.”—Ephesians 4:24. The old man was crucified and done away with—but the new man has to be put on, as God begins to write His laws on our hearts and move us to obey His decrees by the Spirit.

We are new creatures in Christ Jesus and our new nature reproduces God’s holiness in us.  All the symbols of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus—not just as acts of our salvation 2000 years ago —but also as pre-enactment/basis of our sanctification process (Romans 6:4)—make any thought of looking back—or “going back to Egypt”—a pretty scary thought as Christ can only die once (Hebrews 6: 4-6; Hebrews 10:26-27; Hebrews 10:38). Do people get baptized twice ? No, they cannot. There’s only “one baptism“— Ephesians 4:5. Since baptism means being buried with Christ, then the life of the Christian believer after that should be one of not looking back; believers should be zealously walking in the newness of life. Christ is not going back to the tomb, believers are not going to be buried again, they should be looking upward and heavenward only. So, sanctification and holiness are not even an option for the born again saint—they are imperative.

Knowing what we have been called to be is one thing—the big question is—how do we do that ? The new life we have in Christ—this zoe—that produces holiness, can only be lived by faith (Romans 1:17; Hebrews 10:38; Habakkuk 2:4; Ezekiel 18:9; Matthew 16:8). Many Christians fail to realize that the flesh of the old life is not just the body, but also the fallen soul, that was ” corrupted by sinful desires“— Ephesians 4:22. Even though the old life was crucified with Christ and buried during our baptism, the new birth remains a spiritual experience, not a physical transplant of a new brain. Therefore, the general experience of born again Christians is that there will often be ideas that come from the new spirit-man and there will be ideas that come from the old self. We cannot trust that or rely on carnal reasoning or a fleshly mind after the new birth and be able to experience the light, peace, joy, strength, power, holiness, and fruitfulness of our Zoe at the same time (Romans 8:6-8; Galatians 6:14; Philippians 3:20; 1 Corinthians 2:9-11).

Suppose a rich person approaches someone and hands that person $1 million and if one thinks that’s small, let’s make it $5 million. What do you think would be the reaction ? Knowing how American culture reasons, and I would bet the whole world in general, the reaction would be to jump and celebrate. Often, circumstances like these happen, so it is not something we can consider to be improbable. But what if such a gift came from a deadly source ? Alas ! Experience tells us that majority of Christians would be in that category of naïve exuberance. Haven’t we heard of stories of supposedly Christian politicians who were corrupted by donations from unscrupulous people and in turn betrayed the promises they campaigned on ? How many Christians do you know stand firm in Hollywood ? (Mark 8:36-37; 1 Corinthians 3:1; 1 Corinthians 14:20; 1 Corinthians 13:11; Hebrews 5:14 ; Matthew 4:8-10; 1 John 2:15-17; Mark 4:19;  1 John 5:19; 1 Timothy 6:9-10). Some could call this pragmatism, but just like money itself, pragmatism is a neutral thing that could change in shape, depending on situations. The more convenient and extravagant those circumstances present themselves, the more discernment and caution are required. Christians should be aware that temptations do not disappear after the new birth. Becoming a son or daughter of God does not make Satan and his schemes go away. 

The devil is still at large in this world—condemned, yes, but still deceiving those who obey him as well as Christians who are immature (Ephesians 2:2; 2 Corinthians 11:3-4;14-15; 1 Peter 5:8; 1 Kings 13:11-26; Genesis 3:4; 1 Timothy 4:1; 1 John 4:1; 1 Corinthians 12:10; John 16:11; Colossians 2:15; John 12:31; 2 Corinthians 2:11; Revelation 12:12; 2 Thessalonians 2:11). Satan is filled with fury against the saints but it is not uncommon that he presents himself in a pleasant, yet deceptive way—as an angel of light. Since the born again saint is no longer in darkness, the most challenging tests are not between outright wrong and obviously right, but between hazy or grey areas. A curse could look like a blessing while a blessing may look like a curse (1 Samuel 16:7; Genesis 13:10-13; John 7:24; 2 Corinthians 5: 7,16; 1 Kings 3:7,9,28; Colossians 2:3; Ecclesiastes 7:19; Proverbs 23:5; Jeremiah 15:19; Proverbs 31:10; Psalms 62:10) . If our long term vision, current attention, and daily satisfaction are not firmly rooted in “the things above”—Colossians 3:1-3—where our new life is hidden—then we can easily become Satan’s prey (Hebrews 8:1; Hebrews 3:1; Hebrews 12:2; Psalms 110:1; Hebrews 10:13; Romans 14:23; Matthew 24:35; 2 Corinthians 4:18; James 1:24; Romans 6:11; Colossians 2:12; Lamentation 1:9; Philippians 3:14; Revelation 1:5-6; 1 Peter 2:9; Romans 5:17; Luke 10:19; 1 John 4:4;  Proverbs 3:15; Job 28:18; Proverbs 8:10-11; Psalms 63:3; Philippians 1:21; Psalms 73:25-26; Romans 8:18; Song of Solomon 3:4; Matthew 6:13; Luke 22:40; John 17:15; 2 Thessalonians 3:3).

Our minds have to become captive to the revealed will of God entirely (2 Corinthians 10:3-5). To help us get started, we can begin by meditating on those verses of “things above” paragraph, to fix your eyes on Jesus, and get hold of our identity and destiny in the kingdom. Christ is our mighty deliverer now and the greatest treasure not just in eternity but also in our present life on earth.  Where doubts come in circumstances we face and choices we should make, we should fast and pray for clarity so that nothing will move us from this Rock ( Isaiah 54:10; Psalms 62:6; Hebrews 8:11; 1 John 2:27; Jeremiah 31:34; Psalms 89:34; Jude 1:21; Romans 8:14; Psalms 32:8; Isaiah 45:19; Joshua 9:4; John 16:13; Proverbs 20:18; 1 Chronicles 10:4; Isaiah 11:2-3; 2 Chronicles 22:4; Proverbs 24:6; Isaiah 9:6; Jeremiah 33:3; 2 Kings 5:26; Proverbs 11:4;  Matthew 17:20-21). This is the faith of our fathers that has stood the test of time. Think of the heroes of faith we read in Hebrews 11, the desert fathers, the puritans, and other saints of the church age that we love, they all won victory by fixing their eyes on the Lord.  Christ promised that no one can snatch from His hand those He has redeemed; however, we must make sure we stay vigilant to live by faith. In that way, we will be able to fully possess all the Lord’s promises of this new life (John 10:28; 2 Peter 1:3-4; Acts 26:18; 1 Corinthians 1:30; John 1:5; John 15:3;John 17:17; Ephesians 6:10-18).

Prayer: Father God, I thank you for your grace in including us in Christ when He was crucified so that we would die to sin and including us in His resurrection so that we would be raised with His own life—and now have your very life flowing in us and propelling us to holiness and glory. We pray that we will have our eyes opened to understand all the mysteries of the cross and resurrection, so that we will not be living below the standards of all the possibilities that the resurrection of Christ can afford us now. We pray that the eyes of our hearts will be enlightened, so that we can have understanding and discernment in the new life you gave to us. We ask that our spiritual senses will be sharpened to be able to interpret things that happen in our personal lives, our environment, and the world with the mind of Christ. In the glorious name of Jesus, we pray. Amen. 

January 14th, 2021

 For it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure-Philippians 2:13.

 We will finish “The Grace of Jesus Christ” themed devotional for the second week of January by trying to complete our meditations on how sanctification by grace works.

As Paul shows us in Romans 6, the sanctification process starts with the consecration of the whole body to God so that everything we do is done for His glory. The born-again believer does not have to cut off the hands and throw them away, fearing that those hands can take him/her to hell (Matthew 5:30). That’s the advice that Jesus gave for those who found their bodies of death enslaving them in sin and wickedness. It was for sinners who had not found the law of the Spirit that frees them from the law of sin and death (Romans 8:2-4). Once you have freedom in Christ, that’s not for you. After all, Jesus taught that it was better to lose hands than to have the whole body thrown in hell fire. Jesus was not trying to scare anyone with that advice. He spoke as someone who knew the glories of heaven and the torments of hell. Since the Christian believer has been crucified with Christ and knows this for a fact (Romans 6:11), and has surrendered his whole body to the Lord’s service (Romans 6:13-14), knowing that he/she no longer has claim on himself/herself but belongs to God completely, the next stage of sanctification becomes that of the soul—the mind, the emotions, and the will. The believer must learn to walk in the Spirit. It is the law of the Spirit and zoe life in Christ Jesus that sets us free from the law of sin and death. Passengers in an airplane cruising at maximum altitude don’t go screaming, fearing that the law of gravity will pull them and crash the airplane. They trust that the laws of aerodynamic will work to free the airplane from gravity and keep them in the air until it is time to land safely. .

When Adam sinned against God and fell from glory, what God had warned him about happened—he died. “But you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.”—Genesis 2:17. This is a quote from the NIV, but in the ESV and KJV the translation of “when” is “for in the day that,” the death took place immediately—the same day. As soon as they ate of that tree, they discovered they were naked and had already lost God’s glory. But in Genesis 5:5 we read that Adam lived 930 years before he died. So, what death took place in Genesis 3 after eating of the tree? It was a spiritual death that occurred the same day. Disobedience brought immediate death. The death of the physical body did not take place until hundreds of years later on (Romans 5:12).

Regeneration that takes place at our new birth raises this fallen spirit-man from the dead (Ephesians 2:1, 6). The resurrected spirit is eternal as is the soul—this is why we have eternal life flowing from the “Zoe”—the life of God we receive when we are born again—and yet our bodies still die at 60 years- 70 years-80 years- 90 years. For some Christians, unfortunately and regrettably, even earlier than that. It shouldn’t be the case, but it is reality. These are the effects of sin in the world because of the Adamic race in general and because of the peculiarities of the lives of people associated with their choices. If people cannot control their diet and get diabetes, they will die young because of their choices. This is the nature of the “bios” life after the fall. Even though bodies still die after we are born again, Christ has promised to resurrect all who believe in Him (John 11:25; 1 Corinthians 15:47-54). In the meantime, sanctification must address all the issues of our fallen nature—body, soul, and spirit.

In 1 Thessalonians 5:23-24, Paul writes: “May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do it.”  We have our regenerated divine Zoe life in our spirits, we have the bios life we were born with in our bodies, and we have the decision-making psuche life in our souls. We must be sanctified through and through. If we give attention to the bios life while ignoring the zoe life, our limit is the 50-90 years here on earth, fearfully waiting to stand before God to give an account (Romans 8:13; 1 Timothy 5:6; Hebrews 9:27; 2 Corinthians 5:10). If we refuse the way of the cross and self-denial, and try to save the psuche life by conforming to the world, pursuing worldly safety and riches, we will lose our psuche life (Matthew 16:25; Luke 9:24; Mark 8:36-37). The Zoe life we received in our spirits at our new birth should be so abundant that it will flow and exude through the soul and the body (John 10:10).It must conform us to the image of Jesus Christ—spirit, soul, and body

Do you remember the story of germs dying whenever they were placed upon the palm of John.G.Lake where he had gone to be a missionary in South Africa ? That phenomenon, as he himself describes it, can only be explained by the presence of the Holy Spirit that was on the palm of his hand. Deadly bacteria and viruses are inconsistent with Zoe life we receive after the new birth. Sanctification is not just meant for the soul or just for the body or just for the spirit, it is meant for the whole person, spirit, soul, and body. God’s presence and His own life must penetrate and fill every fibre of our being, every cell in our body, every recess of our minds. The day a Christian is born again, that Zoe life may only be mighty in the spirit (2 Corinthians 5:17; Ephesians 3:16; Ephesians 4:24; Romans 7:22; Colossians 1:11;27). The soul could still be thinking carnal things (Philippians 3:18-20; Romans 8:6-8). The body could be still craving to feed on death (Romans 8:13; Romans 6:23; Colossians 3:5-6; Ephesians 5:18) . As the spirit-man is edified, built up, saturated, and the saint starts to pursue Christ daily in meditations, prayers, and fellowship, things begin to change from glory to glory (2 Corinthians 3:17-18). The saints do not remain what they were before salvation. The fruit of the Spirit will be seen as the work of the Holy Spirit to bring transformation begins. 

The entire purpose of sanctification is to “ be conformed to the image of His Son“—Romans 8:29 in order to “make election sure”—2 Peter 1:10. God called us to sonship, He also called us to holiness (Hebrews 12: 6,10,14; 2 Peter 1:3-4; John 1:12-13; 1 Peter 1:15-16). You can’t make election sure by avoiding the hard truths and confessing yourself saved simply because of justification by faith. Are you holy, right now ? It’s like that old hymn by Elisha Hoffman that asks: Are you walking daily by the Savior’s side? Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb? When the Bridegroom cometh will your robes be white? Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?” Imputed righteousness is given to you without you doing anything at all, but sanctification requires your cooperation—though this is still a work of grace as we see in our opening Scripture of Philippians 2:13. God draws us with the cords of His love to sanctify us and we gladly submit to His leadership and joyfully follow Him in that process (Jeremiah 31:3,33-34; Hosea 11:4; 1 John 2:27; Revelation 14:4; Psalms 119:32; Hebrews 12:1; John 15:3; John 17:17)

The sanctification of the soul or psuche begins with the renewing of the mind. 

We must start to think the way God thinks. “Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is–his good, pleasing and perfect will”—Romans 12:2. We see 3 things in that verse. The first thing we see is that we can no longer conform to the pattern of this world if we want to be sanctified in our minds.  The Greek word used is “syschematizesthe”—from its root we get schema in English. Making a copy of something, being fashioned alike. Who informs your mind and helps you make decisions? Is it God or the world? Unsaved family members, worldly and carnal friends, Impure songs, ungodly movies and TV shows, newspapers with false narratives, magazines with unbiblical promotions, TV commentators with a well-argued and yet demonic agenda—worldly influence on the minds of many Christians is real. Jesus did not want us to be taken out of the world (John 17:15)—because if sanctification meant being without these things completely—He would take us home immediately after being saved. He wants us to be protected from the impurities of the world. We must be set apart. We can still read newspapers—but not take it as the Word of God—rather critique the narrative using Scripture. Everything we are exposed to, whether written material or video content, must be judged by the Word of God.

The Word of God is the best tool we have for the renewing of our minds so that we do not get choked by the world without even realizing we are being fed lies, deception, and destruction. When we are born again—no matter the age of the new birth—15 years old, 20 years old, 30 years old, 50 years old—we are considered babies in the Spiritual realm. Scriptures say “Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation.”—1 Peter 2:2.  We need the Word of God for our nourishment to be able to grow in the Spiritual life after we are born again.

Let’s imagine an analogy of someone who has worked in the news industry and is born again at age 50. He goes to a Bible study of 20 people and one of the church pastors is in the study. The Bible study is about affirming Biblical truth regardless of the consequences. The man who is experienced in the news industry says that is not practical because he could end up losing his job. Sometimes the whole truth and nothing but the truth is not popular. He has an argument with the pastor. He is offended. What is going on here? Is he being driven by experience in the world or by the revelation of the Word of God? This may be just an analogy but the reality of it plays out daily all around us.

Besides Scriptures, I have found that old hymns and new contemporary worship music are effective tools for the renewing of the mind. If I wake up singing Don Moen’s song “What a mighty God we serve” or Fanny Crosby’s hymn “He hideth my soul ” or “Let the peace of God” of Hillsong or Terry MacAlmon’s “Holy are you Lord,” I find that those tunes may follow me all morning. Over the years, I learned to sing more than 5,000 songs. The truth sets us free from the world, the flesh, and Satan (John 8:32-36)—it’s neither healthy nor wise to have just enough of God’s truth to check off our to-do-lists, we must be saturated with the Word of God (Colossians 3:16). I find it less likely to think about any earthly thing and more likely to think of heavenly things just by singing one song in the morning and letting its melody follow me throughout the day. Of course, on week-ends when I have more time for worship, I could go 8 hours singing worship songs and soaking up God’s presence. Paul says, rather than be drunk on alcohol, we should be drunk in the Spirit—be carried with heavenly worship in the Spirit—“speaking to one another with psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit. Sing and make music from your heart to the Lord”—Ephesians 5:19. This can help the emotions as well as the mind. Sadness can be sinful sometimes, which is why we are commanded “rejoice in the Lord always.”—Philippians 4:4. Circumstances are irrelevant. This is a divine command. Godly songs can ease the battle to stay positive and joyful.

The endgame of renewing of the mind is to be able to test and approve God’s perfect will. There’s a difference between God’s perfect will and God’s permissive will (1 Corinthians 6:12; 1 Corinthians 10:23). For example, Jesus had a debate with the Pharisees in which they talked about divorce. The heart of the matter was that the law of Moses had allowed divorce for some reasons that were not God’s original intent of marriage—rather to accommodate the hardness of people’s hearts (Matthew 19:3-12). Jesus then clarifies the narrow way and few situations that could make divorce acceptable. Paul further clarifies these teachings in the famous 1 Corinthians 7 chapter, giving us insights into how certain difficult circumstances could be handled using the Word of God. This is not the only practical subject where people could be confronted with choosing God’s perfect will and God’s permissive will. There are many such situations and every choice of the permissive will results in untold eternal costs in terms of what a Christian would have received in heaven’s rewards—as we will have to account of everything we have done in the body at the judgment seat of Christ (2 Corinthians 5:10). We must make sure we win those battles in the mind and the decisions made by our will, long before there are physical manifestations of evil. Thankfully, Christ’s grace for sanctification also covers our will. So, we can be confident that we are going to make some awesome and godly choices, even in the midst of overwhelming challenges. The will of God can also be subdivided into the sovereign decretive will, prescriptive will, and dispositional will— but discussing this in detail may require a full week of devotional dedicated to that theme alone.

Does this mean we become infallible through sanctification ? Christ commanded us to be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect (Matthew 5:48), but infallibility is not taught in Scripture as something we will attain (1 John 1:7-9). Even the Catholic church that believes in papal infallibility can be found to have many false doctrines that contradict God’s Word, including but not limited to the doctrine of purgatory. Scriptures tell us only about heaven and hell and no other place in-between in the after-life. As you stand today, you are going to either heaven or hell.  The reason we cannot attain infallibility is two-fold. First, we will continue to commit sins of ignorance simply because “we know in part.”— 1 Corinthians 13:9. Second, we get out-of-step with the Spirit from time to time (Galatians 5:16). We are not talking about bondage here because that’s inconsistent with the new birth. We are talking about unintentional lapses. Those who are in bondage have no regeneration testimony. Pursuing the perfection and holiness commanded in Matthew 5:48 and Hebrews 12:14 means that we shun deliberate sins by obeying what we already know—the 10 commandments, the sermon on the mount, and the whole counsel of God of Scriptures (Exodus 20; Matthew 5-7; Acts 20:27). Even this is not easy because, as we are aware, there are denominations that may consider something good while other churches think it is bad. For example, whether God intends prosperity for the saints in this world, and how that is achieved like sowing seeds financially to give money to ministries,  that is a doctrine disputed among Christians. It is clear that since both camps cannot be right, some will be found sinful on judgment day—despite having had the whole counsel of God to search God’s will on that topic. Maturity consists of mastering the whole counsel of God, shrinking the gap between what is revealed to us now and what we shall know in glory, so that we can obey God fully. Maturity bring us to perfection and perfection brings us closer to infallibility (Philippians 3: 12-14; 2 Peter 1:8-11; James 1:4; 1 Timothy 4:6; 1 John 4:16-18; Ephesians 4:13; 1 John 3:1-3).

We must acknowledge that all this transformation is the work of divine grace. “It is God who works in you both to will and to do according to His purpose.” Notice that this is according to what Scriptures deem worth working towards. I like to interpret everything regarding the purposes of God in this world through the lens of the great commission. Evangelism and discipleship are God’s grand purpose for every Christian believer (Mark 16:15-20; Matthew 28:18-20). Through discipleship in the body of Christ, we “grow in the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.” — 2 Peter 3:18. Fellowship with the saints in the church is crucial for our discipleship and sanctification. We will also find that our faith will be established like a fortress when we even go beyond Sunday worship and have mid-weekly Bible studies, devotionals, accountability partners, spiritual mentors, prayer partners, and are constantly challenged by other believers to follow after Christ (Hebrews 10:25; Matthew 18:18-20; Matthew 16:19; Acts 2:42; Hebrews 3:13; Proverbs 13:20; James 5:16; 1 Corinthians 5:4). Evangelism is how we share with others the joy we have received in Christ. Evangelism is the lifestyle of every true disciple of Christ. Now, the saints do not look to be affirmed by the world in these disciplines. The world may even suggest that those things are wrong but God commands us to do those things. We cannot look to the world or unsanctified/carnal Christians to determine if our choices are in the direction of willing and doing God’s will. If they do not speak according to this vision, there’s no light in them (Isaiah 8:20). If God’s kingdom is going to come and His will is going to be done on earth as it is in heaven, we are going to partner or co-labor with Him. We won’t be able to do so by accepting instructions from those who have already rejected the wisdom of Scriptures. We can only achieve that by allowing the Holy Spirit to inspire us, teach us, guide us, and fire us up to do what the Lord has revealed to us to be His perfect will for our lives. Christ said that He is the vine and we are the branches. We can only bear much fruit by remaining plugged on the vine (John 15:4-7). It will not be possible by doing our own things in the flesh, accepting unspiritual, soulish, and worldly solutions. If we agree that it is His resurrection life that powers the New Man— then this is what we should solely depend upon in order to will and to do according to His good purposes. Life for us now flows from His throne. We reject all other thoughts and ideas and gladly embrace the mind of Christ revealed in Scripture (Ephesians 4:21). There are times I have forgotten to charge my cell phone at night and drove away in the morning leaving the charger behind, only to have the phone battery die on me by 11 am. Such is the fate of the Christian life that is unplugged from the vine, that has been separated from the sanctifying words of Christ and the work of the Holy Spirit. 

This complete salvation plan from grace to grace, from repentance to justification to regeneration to sanctification—that changes us from glory to glory—makes anyone who goes to hell to be without excuse. If God does it all—why would anyone not take the offer ? 

Prayer: Father God, I thank you for giving us your Holy Word to help us renew our minds and not be taken by this world’s dead philosophies. We thank you for tens of thousands of hymns, praise, and worship songs that we have to help us make melody to your precious name and keep us planted on Christ, the Solid Rock. We pray, Lord, that you quicken your Word in our hearts by the Spirit, so that we will hear your voice in the decisions we have to make. We want to know your perfect will—and take the correct steps to do what you have planned for our lives in your perfect will. In the All-Satisfying name of Jesus, we pray. Amen!

Devotionals, January Beginning Of Year

January 1st, 2021

 Get rid of the old yeast, so that you may be a new unleavened batch–as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed.  1 Corinthians 5:7

In this devotional of the first week of 2021 New Year, we will have the theme of “New Journey Begins.” At the beginning of the new year, we often set goals and make resolutions. We desire to see progress by the end of the year. I felt impressed to look at such a new beginning as a new journey of “co-laboring with God.”—1 Corinthians 3:9. I do not just want to set goals and make resolutions, I want to work with God throughout the year. I want Him to take my hand and lead me. I want the year to be dedicated to Christ. I want it to be about discovering God’s unfolding plan, finding my role and place in that, and then do my best to fulfill my calling in the body of Christ.

One of my inspirations for the beginning of the new journey is Israel leaving Egypt under the leadership of Moses. The book of Exodus is a thrilling drama of what God can do when He wants to take His people from Place A to Place B.  From servitude to a land flowing with milk and honey. From a place of idolatry and darkness to a place of worshipping God and living in the light. “For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves“-Colossians 1:13 and “Thou hast caused men to ride over our heads; we went through fire and through water: but thou broughtest us out into a wealthy place“- Psalms 66:12, remind us of that.

When recording how they came out of Egypt, Moses says “So the LORD brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with great terror and with signs and wonders.”—Deuteronomy 26:8. Wouldn’t this be a great way to start a new year ? Looking forward to the God of wonders taking us out of a pandemic year to a year of freedom in businesses, work, travel, church, restaurants, schools, and all other things people may be looking forward to return to?

For Israel to leave Egypt, the journey began with the Passover lamb and I think that’s the way I feel impressed with starting the 2021 year. The story of the First Passover is recorded in Exodus 12. We read in Exodus 12:2 “This month is to be for you the first month, the first month of your year.” I am well aware that the  Gregorian January 1st is different from  the 1st of Nisan, which actually corresponds with March-April, the time we celebrate Easter—another feast we could say that it reminds us of the Passover. Israel was instructed in Exodus 12 verses 3,7, 11, and 13  “Tell the whole community of Israel that on the tenth day of this month each man is to take a lamb for his family, one for each household…Then they are to take some of the blood and put it on the sides and tops of the doorframes of the houses where they eat the lambs…This is how you are to eat it: with your cloak tucked into your belt, your sandals on your feet and your staff in your hand. Eat it in haste; it is the LORD’s Passover…On that same night I will pass through Egypt and strike down every firstborn of both people and animals, and I will bring judgment on all the gods of Egypt. I am the LORD…The blood will be a sign for you on the houses where you are, and when I see the blood, I will pass over you. No destructive plague will touch you when I strike Egypt…”

This is what the Passover meant for Israel in Egypt and it is the image that Paul wanted us to have in mind when he wrote “Christ is our Passover” in the 1 Corinthians 5:7 we are looking at today.

First, Paul says to get rid of the old yeast. The Passover was part of the Feast of Unleavened bread and there was reason for the bread to be unleavened. It had a spiritual meaning. For example, in Luke 12:1 Jesus tells us: “Be on your guard against the yeast of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.” This may sound obvious if someone is a disciple of Jesus but at one-point Paul confronted Peter as we read in Galatians 2:13, “As a result, other Jewish believers followed Peter’s hypocrisy, and even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy.” Hypocrisy does not just ruin the carrier’s right standing with God, it tends to spread like gangrene. A church member in Corinth who had “the old yeast” could affect the entire body. This is what Paul was warning against.

As we see in Peter’s behavior in Galatians 2, the “Old yeast” can be any sin that is inconsistent with the Gospel. It does not have to be the Corinthian-level scandal of a Christian who had taken his father’s wife. Many Christians may never do something like that and yet still practice what Peter did. We are commanded “love must be without hypocrisy”—Romans 12:9, and in that, Peter was falling short. Lest we think we are safe, let’s consider the implication of what Peter was doing. He was showing favoritism because of his cultural preferences at the expense of the Gospel. What does the Bible say about partiality and favoritism ? In James 2:1we read: “My brothers and sisters, believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ must not show favoritism.” He goes on writing a long passage of why this is inconsistent with the Gospel in James 2:1-10. In America, even in the church, the James 2:1-10 passage could convict pretty much majority of people. Now, James taught these things perhaps because he had observed them in the local church in Jerusalem or some other churches were reported to have this behavior—so it is a sin that has been around for thousands of years.  If favoritism was hypocrisy that Paul confronted in Peter as sinful, that James says dishonors the name of the Lord and breaks the moral law, then this is the kind of yeast of the pharisees we are to guard against in the new year. This is one of many potential sins and hopefully the light of the Holy Spirit will show us even many other areas that we do not want to carry the “old yeast” into this new year of 2021. Christ is our Passover and His blood has covered our sins, delivering us “from the wrath to come.”—1 Thessalonians 1:10 and we dare not carry into 2021 the very things the wrath is coming down to judge (Colossians 3:6). Just like Christ rose from the dead and has regenerated us into a new living hope, we are determined to “walk in the newness of life.”—Romans 6:4.

The good thing about the new birth and the freedom we have in Christ is that you can only have the “Old yeast” by choosing to have it—not because it has power over you. The question is—why would anyone want to be under a yoke of slavery? (Galatians 5:1; John 8:36). When Israel was freed from Pharaoh, they didn’t even take time to think whether it was in their best interests to get out of there. They ran into freedom singing praises to God. Let us seize the offer that Christ has freely given to us in the new birth with great excitement and live to glorify Him and advance His kingdom in this new year. Let the adventures of the 2021 new journey begin! Happy New Year everyone!

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that you have given us Christ as our Passover—so that just like Israel was led from the land of bondage with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm we may be led into the freedom and abundant life that Jesus has come to bestow upon us as your children. We pray, Father, that as we begin a new year—you will unfold the mysteries of the Gospel to us—not just to our hearts and minds—but also in practical experience in the life we live and the world around us will get to taste the blessing that flow from such Christian liberty. In the name of your precious Lamb, Jesus, we pray, Amen!

January 2nd, 2021

 These are the journeys of the children of Israel, who went out of the land of Egypt by their armies under the hand of Moses and Aaron.

Now Moses wrote down the starting points of their journeys at the command of the LORD. And these are their journeys according to their starting points:

They departed from Rameses in the first month, on the fifteenth day of the first month; on the day after the Passover the children of Israel went out with boldness in the sight of all the Egyptians. Numbers 33:1-3

We continue our “New Journey Begins” themed devotional for the New Year looking at this Passage in Numbers 33:1-3. Yesterday, we had seen that Christ is our Passover and we are to get rid of the old yeast. For the Feast of Unleavened Bread in which the Passover was celebrated, Israelites had been instructed, “whoever eats anything with yeast in it from the first day through the seventh must be cut off from Israel”—Exodus 12:15. No wonder Paul was so firm in his letter to the church in Corinth where we read 1 Corinthians 5:7 verse. We must understand that the doctrines of redemption and salvation are never standalone. They are fitted together into a seamless cloth we have to wear, or we will be naked, like those kids in the third world who walk wearing shorts showing their butts, because of holes we have permitted to be in that cloth through selective doctrinal beliefs. For example, the doctrine of justification by faith does not replace the doctrine of regeneration. Over the years, I have observed that people who overly emphasize justification by faith at the expense of regeneration end up with false believers who don’t really understand what it means to be born again. The same would be true with forgiveness taught without teaching repentance. No single reference in the New Testament where people are taught that they can be forgiven without repenting fully, truthfully, unequivocally, with no plan B to go back to their sin (Romans 13:14; Acts 19:18-19; Acts 2:38; Acts 3:19; Luke 24:47; Acts 17:30). Ultimately, the only proof that we are justified is that we have been born again. If our faith does not transform us from the inside-out, we are being deceived.  Pardon and justification are legal terms that free people from their bondage and have no benefit for those who wish to remain in prison. If people do not want to part with their sins, their sins will remain (2 Timothy 2:19; Titus 1:16; John 20:23). It’s good to ensure people have a sound conversion rather than be quick to proclaim that Jesus has justified those who wish to continue in their enmity with God. Is there such a thing as Progressive Christianity vs Conservative Christianity in the Bible ? None. It’s either true or false. There’s only one Christianity. Only “one faith”- Ephesians 4:5. Anything outside of what is truthful is not Christianity. Period. 

Christ is our Passover. It is not just a single day of celebration for the Christian. He is our ongoing Passover. We read that the day after the Passover, the Israelites started their journey and their first travel was from Rameses to Sukkoth (Exodus 12:37). In Numbers 33, we are given the names of all the stations where the Israelites travelled and camped as they followed Moses. They had the pillar of cloud by day and pillar of fire by night before them. The journeys are not random and the Lord made sure that Moses recorded them at His command.  After they reached Sukkoth they camped, and from there they went to Etham. From Etham they went to Pa-hahiroth. From Pa-hahiroth they crossed the Red Sea.

God chose the direction they would take because He knew that this would increase their chance of success. “When Pharaoh let the people go, God did not lead them on the road through the Philistine country, though that was shorter. For God said, “If they face war, they might change their minds and return to Egypt.”—Exodus 13: 17. This should remind us the wisdom of God in charting the path of our lives as saints. There are hardly paths we shall take that will not involve battles of some kind at some point in our lives, but God does not want us to fight unnecessary battles. God is omnipotent, we are not. If we can make our journeys to our destination without battles in between, we should praise God for that. Scripture says “as thy days, so shall thy strength be.”—Deuteronomy 32:25 and here we are learning something else—as thy strength, so shall thy battles be. God did not want them to fight when they were not yet ready.

Another reason for the journey they seem to have taken was because God had one last act to do against Pharaoh, and as they camped in Pa-hahiroth, God hardened Pharaoh’s heart to pursue them, falsely believing that they were stuck at the Red Sea and had become an easy prey (Exodus 14:1-4). We should never forget the cost of our freedom. We should never forget that Satan, the enemy of our souls, will never let go of us after we are free (1 Peter 5:8; 2 Corinthians 11:3).

So the first phase of the journey seemed to be about putting in place rules: God would lead them by a pillar, day and night, they would move when He moved and stop when He stopped. Without trust in Him and His presence, such a journey would be impossible. The pillar that led them reminds us of what Paul writes in Romans 8:14: “For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God.” There might be many directions we could take in our lives, but we must make sure each way we go we are following the leading of the Holy Spirit. The Word of God illuminates our path—helping us to recognize light from darkness, right from wrong, truth from error, insight from deception (Psalms 119:105; John 8:12). Because the big decisions of life we make require knowledge of the Word of God to be able to walk in the light, we cannot underestimate the importance of God’s Word. In addition to that, God promises us steady leadership by His Spirit “I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will guide you with My eye”—Psalms 32:8.  

There are simply too many stages of our journey to Canaan;  too many situations, circumstances, and challenges that no matter how much we know in the Word of God, we will find that even insufficient. Times when we need God’s supernatural eye and hand—times when we need to pray earnestly for His direction and interventions. The Word and the Spirit are in an inseparable union for those who want to walk in the Spirit and thrive. How did Paul know that he was supposed to preach to Europe rather than Asia? The Holy Spirit had an agenda and guided him (Acts 16:6-9; Isaiah 30:21). That decision, literary, had an impact on the course of world history. Apostle Thomas would eventually make his way to India, but God’s plan for Paul was to spread the Gospel in Europe.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that you lead us by your word as a lamp unto our feet and by your Spirit as we make difficult decisions in life. In all things we need you, we depend upon you, and we desperately cry for your continued guidance for our progress to be fruitful for the kingdom and ultimately lead us to our heavenly home, where we long to be for our final rest. In the gracious name of our Chief Shepherd, Jesus, we pray, Amen!

January 4th, 2021

 When they came to Marah, they could not drink its water because it was bitter. Exodus 15:23

Then they came to Elim, where there were twelve springs and seventy palm trees, and they camped there near the water. Exodus 15:27

The whole Israelite community set out from Elim and came to the Desert of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month after they had come out of Egypt. Exodus 16:1

The whole Israelite community set out from the Desert of Sin, traveling from place to place as the LORD commanded. They camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. Exodus 17:1

As we continue the “New Journey Begins” themed devotional for the New Year, we see that after Israel crossed the Red Sea, the first place where they camped was Marah. They had just been singing praises to God because of His mighty deliverance as they escaped Pharaoh at the Red Sea (Exodus 15:14-15). What could possibly go wrong? They were already anticipating many more victories ahead of them. Then, they arrived at Marah and found bitter water, so they could not drink it. This was soon followed by Elim, where they had more than enough drinking water. Then, later on after camping at Rephidim, we see them quarreling with Moses because they had no water. This is the place where God tells Moses to strike a rock and the water of that place was called Massah and Meriba (Exodus 17:1-7).  What we see in this journey is a pretty consistent pattern in Scripture: “sorrow may last for the night but joy comes in the morning.”- Psalms 30:5; “unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.”- John 12:24; “…He made himself nothing…he humbled himself….therefore God exalted Him and gave Him a name above every other name.”—Philippians 2:7-11;  “…there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe…they were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands.”- Revelation 7:9. Night comes before the morning, sorrow before joy, emptying one self before exaltation, death before resurrection, tests before testimonies, and trials before triumphs. Bitter water is a prophetic symbol of hardships while palm trees are prophetic symbol of triumph over the world, the flesh, and the devil. One of my fond memories of the word “Elim” is Elim church founded by the Welsh Jeffreys brothers in the UK. In addition to many amazing testimonies they have, there’s the story of a young Reinhard Bonnke graduating from the Bible school founded by Rees Howells in Swansea, Wales, stumbling by the house of the aging George and asking him to pray for him shortly before he died. The rest, as they say, is history.

Why did God include such a place as Marah in their stations ? The Lord, who chose their path, had put this place Marah on their road because He was training them. Today, when we think of spiritual training, we think of going to Bible school, participating in ministry at church, and other religious exercises that help us grow. However, in Hebrews 12:7-8, we see that there’s another kind of training that is called “discipline.” It is a training for sonship. Somehow, we are accepted first, and then vetted later. But the vetting process is not a study material to satisfy our intellectual curiosity. We often think that when Paul told Timothy to study to show himself an  “approved workman.”—2 Timothy 2:15, it meant the study of the Word and meditations, and to a certain extent, that’s part of it. But it goes a step further into making wise decisions, often after intense and painful testing, beyond what one could consider simply rigorous Bible study. Christ’s obedience took Him to such lengths, and though He was  the perfect Son of God, He cried “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me ?”—Matthew 27:46. We, ourselves, are far from being perfect sons. Of course, we know that what Christ endured was simply the punishment for our sin He had accepted. We were the ones who should have been abandoned by God and He was forsaken in our place so that we can be accepted and have fellowship with God. If God’s perfect Son needed to be perfected “through suffering,” it’s unlikely we, who are naturally carnal and slow to learn spiritual realities, would become perfect without tests, trials, and discipline. (Hebrews 2:10, Hebrews 5:8-9). This is not the type of theology millions of Christians hear in their churches or even Bible schools. Of course, we are aware that there are also Christians who abuse the theology of suffering to advance a the false theology of defeatism, false persecutions, and unbelief in divine healing (John 9:1-3; Mark 9:23-29; Acts 5:14-16; Acts 19:11-12; Hebrews 13:8; Psalms 2:2-12; Hebrews 10:12-13; Acts 4:25-31; Acts 5:19; Acts 12:5-7; Acts 16:25-30). For God, suffering has perfecting value in the kingdom. Attaining perfection is a major goal of the Christian faith and is in fact proof of the purity of one’s faith because “the trial of your faith, being much more precious than that of gold ” 1 Peter 1:7, attests the character of your faith (Job 23:10). The Christian who comes out of suffering is a triumphant Christian. Sickness is not one of the acceptable Scriptural sufferings since it was paid for by Christ on the cross as part of redemption. Christ never turned away a single sick person and yet he told the disciples that they would have many tribulations in the world. So one type can be expected, another one was always redeemed in His presence (Isaiah 53:4-5; Matthew 8:16-17; 1 Peter 2:24; John 16:33; Matthew 10:22; 2 Timothy 3:12). Now, you have to understand, being hated and being defeated are two different things. You can be hated and still be victorious. You can be persecuted and not be crushed. Instead, you can go from strength to strength, in a triumphal procession, despite all of that (2 Corinthians 4:8-9; 2 Corinthians 2:14; Psalms 84:7; 2 Samuel 3:1; Luke 1:74; Deuteronomy 3:24; Jeremiah 1:19; Psalms 66:3; Psalms 111:6; Matthew 24:14; Psalms 110:1-2)

Most of us do not start our journeys planning for that. We do not start our journeys thinking “I sure hope I will get some bitter hardships.”  Not when we are kids dreaming of a future as adults. Not when we turn 18 years old and enter adulthood. Not at the beginning of the year in January when we are planning what our goals are for the year ahead of us. For the saints of God, those seasons will knock uninvited for many—though I have heard a number of saints who courageously pray for God to deal with them that way. I don’t think we need to pray for them, the Word says if we are legitimate children, we will have them. “Everyone undergoes discipline.”—Hebrews 12:8.  Since one of the weaknesses of humanity is thinking “why is everyone else having it easier?” It should encourage us to know that the way heaven perceives such tests goes contrary to the way a natural mind understands it.

We are assured that illegitimate children in God’s eyes would not have that kind of discipline. No wonder James opens our eyes regarding the purpose of trials by saying:  “ Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.”—James 1:2-4. The Greek word for the NIV translation of “mature” is “teleioi” while the one for complete is “holokleroi.” Since teleioi can also mean complete, they could have even translated “that you may be complete and complete,” but that would have been tautology. Translators chose mature for the first, which would be complete as a whole; and then complete for the other, which means in every part, perfect. Our whole and our details. The bigger picture and minor items. Well-rounded and meticulous. What God considers lacking nothing does not seem to align with what modern man considers lacking nothing means. Today, this has largely become a materialistic assessment. But God’s concern is first of all our character and other things are only secondary. “Seek ye first the kingdom of God.”—Matthew 6:33.

I also find it interesting that between Marah and Elim is where we see God’s first unmistakable promise of divine healing. God does not present healing as a benefit of redemption outside of His name, rather He presents healing as emanating from His nature, “I am the Lord who heals you.”—Exodus 15:26. He is Jehovah Rapha/Rophe. Divine healing shouldn’t even be a debate. It shouldn’t have buts. It should’t have “what abouts.” All these responses are not appropriate for what seems to be a generous offer that should cause us to wonder. Wow!  “I am the Lord who heals.” This is actually His name? Then, we need the Healer, not a healing. It is understandable that there will always be genuine questions, like every doctrine we study by making an enquiry, but not with the doubtful mind of Zacharias, the father of John the Baptist, rather with the submissive mind of Mary, the mother of Jesus. Both saw angel Gabriel, both heard a mystery, but their “how can …?” carried different meanings. For Zachary, an angel speaking it was not enough proof to provide certainty. He asked: “How can I be sure?” For Mary, being a handmaid of the Lord meant accepting and agreeing with what God had said without staggering at the Word of God. God’s promises of supernatural works are indeed impressive for our small minds, but there seems to be people out there who just wish Good News was not good news. They will find ways to ruin it somehow. Good News is too good to be true for their unbelieving minds, therefore, it has to be tweaked to fit into a certain narrative.

Going  back to the original Israel’s journey, we see that it was the time they camped in the wilderness of Sin that God rained manna and quail and provided food for them. “Man ate the bread of the angels.”—Psalms 78:15. It took them a long time to learn the lessons God was trying to teach them (Deuteronomy 8:3). When Jesus faced the same temptation to provide for himself bread after fasting in the wilderness, He immediately won the victory by declaring “man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”—Matthew 4:4, thus triumphing over bodily needs with the acceptance and enjoyment of the Word of God. He was hungry, it was only natural to desire food, and find a way to get that whatever the cost. He refused. He is our perfect example in trials and temptations. Have we come to the point where we treasure His words like that ? (Job 23:12)

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that you are our Teacher, Trainer, Healer, and Provider. You are a good Father and we are safe under your care. Lord, we pray that you open our eyes to the mystery behind each challenge and discipline we face so that we can endure them with joy and attain the intended training for our maturity as your sons. In the name of your Obedient Son, Jesus, we pray. Amen!

January 5th, 2021

They all ate the same spiritual food, and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ. Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them; their bodies were scattered in the wilderness. Now these things occurred as examples to keep us from setting our hearts on evil things as they did.

1 Corinthians 10:3-6

As we continue the “New Journey Begins” themed devotional for the New Year, we will follow up from where we reached yesterday—when they camped in Rephidim—where the children of Israel drank water flowing from a rock and those waters were called Massah and Meriba. There was contention and quarreling at that time. We see Paul writing in 1 Corinthians 10:4 “they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ.” Now, that’s really powerful. We know that actually the rock that Moses hit with his staff was a real, physical, wilderness rock. But Paul here is saying that it was a spiritual rock. This rock had been following them all along and this rock is Christ. Here we have a pre-incarnation evidence of Christ’s presence in the Old Testament. The truth is that Christ is everywhere in the Old Testament but we need revelations like this Paul shares in 1 Corinthians 10 to be able to see Him and what He is doing.

We see something else happening at that rock that was Christ. “Then Moses raised his arm and struck the rock twice with his staff. Water gushed out, and the community and their livestock drank. But the LORD said to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not trust in me enough to honor me as holy in the sight of the Israelites, you will not bring this community into the land I give them.”—Numbers 20:11-12. Moses later remembers this moment with great sorrow as it cost him entry into the promised land saying “The LORD was angry with me because of you, and he solemnly swore that I would not cross the Jordan and enter the good land the LORD your God is giving you as your inheritance”—Deuteronomy 4:21. Moses didn’t have to strike it. He did so under duress. You do not need to hit Christ in order to get water to drink. You do not need to yell, flagellate yourself, or have a fit like someone who is really desperate. You do not even need to multiply words for Christ to hear you (Matthew 6:7). Christ hears prayers and you can talk to Him and find abundant life in Him. He answers prayers. But Moses did not understand the mystery behind the rock, he did not realize that the rock was Christ. Cruel Christians today would say that Moses is a bad leader who refuses to take responsibility. Why is he blaming Israelites for his judgment by saying “because of you?” Entering Canaan would have been a dream come true for him. But because of what happened at that rock, when God told him to speak to it, instead he did his own thing and struck the rock twice, which God had not asked him to do, he was prevented from entering Canaan (Numbers 20:8). There are certain things we have to be soft on and understanding, knowing human nature. If we were under the same pressure that Moses was under, how would we have reacted ? To be honest, Moses’ attitude at that time was not good—and granted, he should have known better to refrain from anger even under pressure, but still, this is something that could occur to any of us in the same circumstances (Numbers 20:10). Leaders have to watch over themselves so that they do not get contaminated by attitudes of those who are rebellious. There are people in the “faith community” who just have a mind set on death no matter how much of God they witness. We cannot partake in their sins. We all need to develop an internal fortress so that regardless of what comes from our environment, we will maintain our focus on Christ and preserve our peace.

From Rephidim where they drank water from that spiritual rock, they set for mount Sinai where they received the 10 commandments. They heard the thundering voice, they saw the earthquakes, they saw billows of smoke, it was a terrifying sight. That was the time the prophetic and teaching ministries were introduced because people were terrified. “When the people saw the thunder and lightning and heard the trumpet and saw the mountain in smoke, they trembled with fear. They stayed at a distance and said to Moses, “Speak to us yourself and we will listen. But do not have God speak to us or we will die.”—Exodus 20:18-19. Well, but would they listen to Moses ? Paul reminds us: “Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them; their bodies were scattered in the wilderness.”—1 Corinthians 10:5. For example, after a contentious argument between Miriam, the sister of Moses, and the man of God (Numbers 12:1-8), she developed leprosy and we read: “So Miriam was confined outside the camp for seven days, and the people did not move on until she was brought in again.”—Numbers 12:15. She would later die in the wilderness (Numbers 20:1). What we learn here is that honor is an inside thing and blood-connection and family ties themselves are not necessarily immune to dishonorable behavior. Indeed, they might create a dangerous familiarity—even when Jesus was still on earth, his brothers would make ridiculous comments about him and his ministry strategy (John 7:2-10). Sometimes what God considers dishonor may not be what man thinks it is. Sometimes what man thinks is dishonor might be appropriate in God’s eyes (John 5:44; Luke 16:15; Matthew 23:8-11). To walk in proper honor, we all must have reverence for God’s presence, follow the leading of the Holy Spirit, and thoroughly know the Scriptures so that we do not fall into the same trap they fell into.

Two events are of note during that season of the wilderness when they set out from mount Sinai after receiving the 10 commandments:

The first occurred at the place they would later call Kibbroth-Hattavah. “ But while the meat was still between their teeth and before it could be consumed, the anger of the LORD burned against the people, and he struck them with a severe plague. Therefore the place was named Kibroth Hattaavah, because there they buried the people who had craved other food.”—Numbers 11:33-34. This is what Paul refers to when he says “Now these things were our examples, to the intent we should not lust after evil things, as they also lusted.”—1 Corinthians 10:6. God had given them manna but they grew tired of eating manna. They wanted meat and God was angry when they became irritated and agitated demanding meat (Numbers 11:5-13). What is wrong with desiring meat? I love ordering ribs at restaurants. Because of working hard to be healthy and make sure I keep my cholesterol as low as possible, I do not go to KFC and MacDonalds that often, but every once in a while, when I miss fast-food French fries and burgers, I will go there. I love meat and I am pretty sure there are many people who love meat. There’s no divine commandment to be vegetarian. Yet, what happened in Numbers 11 is not about choosing between meat and bread; rather, it was about satisfaction with God’s provision and the attitude they had in trying to request more. Everything they asked for, they were demanding. Like that Numbers 11:5 verse is scary. “We remember the fish we ate in Egypt at no cost.”—Numbers 11:5. This is like a dog returning to its vomits. This is like a Christian who longs for the things of the world and the flesh. This is what happens when God’s people lose satisfaction in the heavenly things and yearn for earthly and carnal things. It was not about meat, it was about the inclination of the heart. Would they trust God to provide?

The second thing happens 2 chapters after that, when Moses sends spies to Canaan.  “The Lord said to Moses, “Send men to explore Canaan, which I’m giving to the Israelites. Send one leader from each of their ancestors’ tribes.”—Numbers 13:1-2. As we know, when those 12 men returned from their exploration they reported bad news. “They spread among the Israelites a bad report about the land they had explored. They said, “The land we explored devours those living in it. All the people we saw there are of great size.”—Numbers 13: 32. Because of their bad and negative report, the people wailed and complained that they were not ready to die in battle because of that. Even worse, those who gave bad news were greater in number than those who gave good news: 10 vs 2.Thank God that His rule is not a democracy. They would have forfeited the “Good Land” altogether through such voting, both the willing and unwilling losing in the process. If it was about voting, the bad news reporters would have won in a landslide. It is at that time the Lord becomes angry. “How long will this wicked community grumble against me? I have heard the complaints of these grumbling Israelites. So tell them, ‘As surely as I live, declares the LORD, I will do to you the very thing I heard you say: In this wilderness your bodies will fall–every one of you twenty years old or more who was counted in the census and who has grumbled against me.”—Numbers 14:27-29. So they perished in the wilderness because of their unbelief.

Understanding mystery and following the Lord’s instruction would have saved Moses and allowed him to enter the land. Avoiding gossip and walking in honor would have saved Miriam from leprosy. Looking to the Lord for provision and turning eyes away from evil things of Egypt would have saved those who died demanding meat. And those who were 20 years or older who were told they would never enter the land could have entered by simply listening to the Good News of Joshua and Caleb and trusted God to give them victory as He had already helped them defeat the Amalekites. They knew the name of the Lord as Jehovah  Nissi—the Lord our banner/victory—Exodus 17:15. But they did not trust Him. They had no faith, so they died. “Now these things occurred as examples to keep us from setting our hearts on evil things as they did.”—1 Corinthians 10:6.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that you have called us with a great calling in Christ for a heavenly inheritance and Christ is preparing for us mansions in heaven. We pray, Lord, that you sanctify our hearts from all things that would make us unholy and displeasing in your eyes. We pray that you illuminate our hearts and minds to understand mysteries in your Word and perceive the truth as it is in Jesus, in our spirits, as we live and walk and have our being in your presence. Deliver us from evil. In the name of Jesus, we pray. Amen. 

January 6th, 2021

But even the archangel Michael, when he was disputing with the devil about the body of Moses, did not himself dare to condemn him for slander but said, “The Lord rebuke you!” – Jude 1:9

As we continue the “New Journey Begins” themed devotional for the New Year, we will try to go from the Wilderness of Zin where Miriam was buried (Numbers 20:1), to the time Aaron and Moses died in the mountains, and when Israel reached the Jordan river.  Miriam had been struck with leprosy because of her Lashon hara against Moses. And Moses himself had been rebuked by the Lord because he had angrily struck the rock at Rephidim, rather than speak to it, like God had commanded. We have seen that the rock was, in fact, Christ Himself. Christ is the rock that no one can afford to stumble upon and He is definitely the rock you do not want falling on you (Matthew 21:44). If you read New Testament Scriptures to get to know Him and find some of His words not what you like, be careful. At the end of the day, He is the rock of the ages and we are the “grass that withers.”—1 Peter 1:24.

The explorers or spies that Moses sent to check out the land of Canaan went up from that wilderness of Zin (Numbers 13:21) and returned to report to Moses 40 days later not far from that station at Kadesh in the desert of Paran (Numbers 13:26). When the Israelites heard the bad report from the 10 spies and believed them and started to rebel and wail, the Lord judged them, saying that they would not be able to enter the land. They tried to repent and wept before the Lord, but God refused to see their tears and forgive them. They got stuck in Kadesh, the very place they had received and believed the bad report (Deuteronomy 1:45-46). This judgment can seem harsh, and yet remember, Paul warns us that this happened to them as an example for us to learn. “Now all these things happened to them as examples, and they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages have come.”—1 Corinthians 10:11. So, being quick to dismiss it as “Old Testament,” is a sure way to miss the intended lessons. The fact is, God had forgiven them several times and Moses interceded for their forgiveness (Exodus 32:31-35) and though some of them were punished, God said “there would come a time to punish them all.” So they had not yet filled up the measure of their sin. This is not just an Old Testament doctrine, we see it also in the New Testament (Matthew 23:32; 1 Thessalonians 2:16).

Mercy is really and always a window of opportunity (Isaiah 55:6; Proverbs 1:28). The goodness of God leads to repentance, but this is always a time-sensitive offer. Delaying repentance in such seasons of mercy is showing contempt for God’s kindness (Romans 2:4; Proverbs 6:15; Psalms 32:6;  Luke 21:36; Proverbs 24:22; Romans 10:21; 2 Chronicles 36:16; Isaiah 30:13-14; Proverbs 29:1; Luke 7:30; Psalms 73:18-20; Deuteronomy 28:63; Hebrews 3:14-19). The day of God’s favor is today. The day not to harden hearts is today. Plans of change or repenting any other time are always presumptuous. So, even though God proclaims Himself as compassionate, gracious, forgiving wickedness and rebellion (Exodus 34:6-8), those who are obstinate and persistent in deliberate sin  may want to see that as a sign, not of favor, rather that God has not been gracious to deliver them (Psalms 50:21; Ecclesiastes 8:11). Their window of mercy can close in a short time (Luke 13:24; Hebrews 10:26-29). That, really, is not the kind of thing we want to read in Scriptures, but it is written. The sin of the rebellious Israelites had reached its fullness. It was time for judgment. Prayers and weeping would not be answered.

It is after they left their wandering in Kadesh that they came to Mount Hor, where Aaron would die and be buried (Numbers 20:22-24). Aaron and Moses’ death are both called as “gathering to their people.” I find that very interesting and encouraging. In modern times, we see death as a lonely thing. That’s probably even more so in the age of a pandemic like COVID-19. But the Lord calls it “gather to his people.” In other words, they join the crowd of witnesses that had already gone—Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—their fathers. Jesus introduced even a less frightening term of death as “sleeping.”—John 11: 11-13. The kind of sleep that Jesus promises us to wake us from and therefore we should not look at death with fear like people who have no hope (1 Thessalonians 4:13). We fall asleep and rest from our labors. That’s actually a pretty dignified term of death (Revelation 14:13; Numbers 23:10; Psalms 116:15; Isaiah 57:1-2). For the saints, death is more like a prolonged bed time.

After Aaron died, Moses would soon follow him and be “gathered to his people” dying at Mount Nebo (Deuteronomy 32: 49-50). Though Moses was not permitted to enter the land of Canaan, he was allowed to see the whole land from Pisgah at the top of Mount Nebo (Deuteronomy 34:1). It is at this mountain he died we get the strange quote from Jude in our opening reading today, about what happened after Moses died.

There was actually a war between Satan and archangel Michael over the body of Moses at mount Nebo.  How was Satan going to get the body of Moses? What did Satan intend to do with the body of Moses? Did Satan have the capabilities of transforming himself into a physical form and carry the body? Was he going to deceive the Moabites to come and pick it up? We don’t know how, but we know that Satan was interested in Moses’ body. This should wake us up again to the reality of the spiritual realm all around us with angels and demons continually at war in this dark world. There are Christians who simply do not take this reality seriously enough. There are also Christians who exaggerate this reality. A balanced view is one that acknowledges its reality and deals with it in a biblical way. We see that even in the way that archangel Michael fought Satan, he had certain limits to how he approached the spiritual warfare. While we do have to wage spiritual warfare with Satan’s forces of wickedness, there are certain practices that are allowed and those that are not allowed. Only God maintains judgment and rebuke over Satan. As to why Satan may have been interested in Moses’ body—we are not certain—though potential use for idolatry or other malevolent ends could have been the purpose.

The Deuteronomy does not record this supernatural aspect of Moses’ dead body but an early church father named Origen, when he was writing in the 3rd century, suggested that Jude quotes this from the book “The assumption of Moses”—which the early fathers still had at that time but which we do not have in the current cannon of Scripture. It’s incredible that Satan would be interested in a dead body, it should be a warning  to us what he would want to do with a living body. Even in its fallen state, the body is precious, and when it is the temple of the Lord— it is a supernatural tabernacle.

After Moses died and Joshua became the leader of Israel, they made it to the Jordan river as we read in Numbers 22:1. Coming very close to Jericho, ready for the final push into the promised land. As sad as the story of Israel in the wilderness is, we can be thankful to God for allowing their children to enter the land. If one generation fails the purposes of God, the following generation of God’s people may receive the promises that the previous generation or generations did not receive. What if we were to be the generation that gives the Lamb the rewards of His suffering—to the full measure? (Matthew 24:14; Isaiah 53:12; Colossians 1:23; Matthew 12:21).

Prayer: Father God, we thank you for your enduring love for all generations of your people and your great promise that those who have been gathered to you while dying in Christ will be resurrected on the last day.  We pray, Lord, that we who are still alive and are in this raging battle with the prince of darkness, will be strengthened with the power of your might so that we can finish our course of bringing Christ the reward of His suffering—in the salvation of souls. In the majestic name of Jesus, we pray. Amen ! 

January 7th, 2021

Not one of all the LORD’s good promises to Israel failed; every one was fulfilled—Joshua 21:45

Today we will conclude the “New Journey Begins” themed devotional for the first week of the New Year, as we follow along with Israel, seeing how God fulfills His promises to bring the nation He had called out of Egypt to inherit Canaan.

The verse above is a good ending for our “New Journey Begins” theme for the obvious reasons. Let us think of all the things that God has promised to us in His Scriptures and write down those we feel are missing in our lives and take up the challenge. How many of those things we wish would come to pass in 2021 ?  Now just imagine that you could have all of those things. How would your life change for the better ? How would the lives of those you can bless in 2022 change with the blessings that God gives you in 2021 ? Now, we must be careful about this. There’s a difference between a desire a person has and a promise of God. Granted, even our desires are covered under God’s promises as Scriptures say “Delight yourself also in the LORD, and He shall give you the desires of your heart.”—Psalms 37:4. But there are times when people’s desires can be off mark.

it is not bad to have desires that we contend for in God’s presence, hoping that those desires will be fulfilled. But I like to consider this as a bottom-up approach. This is an approach I would say fits those who are young Christian believers or not yet mature. They develop plans or an agenda and then they bring that plan to God and ask Him to bless them and make it come to pass. He may do so or He may not do that. Why? Because when we do a bottom-up approach, it is easy that we could either have plans or desires that are contrary to Christ’s will for our lives or we could have plans or desires that pursue a path that Christ has not intended for us to reach the destiny He has planned for our lives. For those who are mature, this is not a major concern, because in John 15:7 the Lord promised to do what we will. When you know God’s Word thoroughly and are submitted to His lordship, you know that your perfection in Christ has the greatest value. Your prayers are kingdom-focused because Christ’s “words remain in you.” Though Christ has given us authority—exousia—to pray in His name and get what we ask for, the saints walk in differing levels of authority based on obedience. Some Christians get their will done while others do not get their will done because Christ’s words do not remain in them. Have you ever wondered why I teach on Christian perfection so much ? For 2 reasons. First, it is the only way to guarantee heaven, according to Hebrews 12:14. Second, it is the only way we can make much of Jesus in this life, get our prayers answered and our will done, according to John 15:7.

Many Christians fail to realize that this belief is literally how the Bible defines faith. The word translated as “confidence” in Hebrews 11:1 and “reality” in NLT and “assurance” in ESV and “substance” in KJV is “hypostasis / hupostasis” in Greek. It can also mean “proof or title-deed.” I see things I pray for as my entitlement. I know I did not pay for them. That’s why I thank the Lord. Christ made the purchase (Romans 8:32). Now, when another Christian, who is virtually an unbeliever, has an issue with that, it doesn’t stop me from believing this. In fact, I, too, have an issue with the contrary. In many cases, I convince many of the truth of this before they ever manage to convince me other beliefs on faith and answered prayers (1 John 5:4-5; Ezekiel 2:5; 1 Kings 8:56).

As we saw earlier in this New Journey Begins devotional, God did not just promise Israel to bring them to Canaan, He also chose their path—avoiding battles with the Philistines early on—even though they were battle-ready (Exodus 13:17-18). It is possible to be ready for battle and still want to save your energy. This is not about opposition or ease to follow a certain path, it is about acknowledging God’s wisdom in choosing our paths and battles.

The best way to see God’s promises fulfilled is to have a top-bottom approach rather than a bottom-up approach. What does this mean? We must learn the Word of God thoroughly first and get to know what God’s general desires are for all mankind. We should be familiar with what God’s eternal purposes are for the whole world in general and the church in particular— we may call this “the big picture.” Then, we can even narrow that down to know what God’s desires are for the times and seasons we are into and also the geographical locations He has placed us. In Acts 17:26-27 we read: “From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands. God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us.” From this we read that God not only chose our geographical locations—He also chose our appointed times. There’s a reason we were not born in 1850. The Greek Word used for “appointed times” is Kairos, which is different from the chronos—another Greek word used for time in the Bible. From the Greek chronos we get chronology or chronological in English, and this is a general time in which events occur. Kairos, on the other hand, is a very specific time in which something significant takes place—outside of that window period—it becomes impossible to do. For example, God has certain things that He will have available for you throughout your entire life and also certain opportunities that will only come at certain junctures—Kairos moments—and if you miss those Kairos moments—they may never come back.  So, now we can see why the top-bottom approach is very crucial. God designed things this way so that we can reach out to Him, seek Him, find Him, and discover our delight in Him. Without walking in the Spirit daily, it is impossible to seize the Kairos moments God has set up for us. Christ’s will is only possible in Christ. 

Now that we understand the difference between promises of God and our own desires—and also the bottom-up approach vs the top-bottom approach; let’s see the promises that God had given to Israel that Joshua is writing to have been fulfilled in great detail and how this can inspire us in the journey we have ahead of us this year and see God’s promises fulfilled in our lives. In Numbers 36:7 we read “No inheritance in Israel is to pass from one tribe to another, for every Israelite shall keep the tribal inheritance of their ancestors.”—Numbers 36:7. So, for example, the tribe of Judah could not get the land that belonged to the tribe of Zebulun. This means that each tribe had to be able to fight and get their own allocated land. Considering that Israel had 12 tribes, we can see how powerful it was to not have a missing inch for all of these tribes.

All the tribes of Israel helped each other to fight but each one had their own land. In Numbers 32, we read an interesting story of the tribe Ruben and Gad asking Moses while he was still alive that they would be given inheritance in Gilead and Jazer. This was a bottom-up approach because they had large flocks and herds and they had needs that other tribes did not have—and they presented their desire to inherit that particular location that would maximize their productivity. Moses granted their request on the condition that they would fight along the other 10 tribes. The Levites did not have inheritance because they were priests of the Lord (Numbers 18:24; Deuteronomy 10:9; Deuteronomy 18:2)—so we could say that what Moses really meant was for Ruben and Gad to help the other 9 tribes. In any case, because the land that the Rubenites and Gadites were asking was closest and they could have it without fighting hard as it was east of the Jordan river—they were commanded to assist their brothers who still needed to fight for their own portion on the west side. That’s why Moses warned them “But if you fail to do this, you will be sinning against the LORD; and you may be sure that your sin will find you out.”—Numbers 32:23; in other words, the Rubenites and Gadites couldn’t cheat on their brothers who still needed to fight for their inheritance by refusing to assist them in battle. If they did, it would have been sinful and their sinful behavior would catch up with them. This is why we see the very first thing that Joshua does when he begins to give command to the armies after Moses died is to remind the Rubenites and Gadites their end of the bargain (Joshua 1:12-15).It has an application for the church because “we are one body.” (Romans 12:5; 1 Corinthians 12:20,27; Romans 15:26). None of God’s people or tribe will be left behind. In America, I tend to have this picture in mind when praying for churches that are in different states. For example a church in South Carolina may face different challenges from those of a church in California. I strongly believe in a victorious global church and my hope is to play my part to help those I can to be victorious and removing whatever mountains or obstacles they have in their paths. Knowing that we are one body, it has never occurred to me to think that what happens to some Christians is “their problem.” I have always felt that it was my problem too. The wellbeing of the whole church is my wellbeing. 

The first city the tribes of Israel attacked was Jericho—but they did not fight physically—they only marched. We read the story in Joshua 6:1-27. After they marched 7 days and blew their Shofar—God brought the city down. God probably was training them to trust Him and depend upon Him by bringing the city down all by himself—when they were doing nothing but blowing trumpets. Scriptures declare a principle that would apply here and everywhere else: “Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit,’ says the LORD Almighty.”—Zachariah 4:6. The weakness of human nature is that, if we achieve something great and we are visibly sweating to get it—we may miss God’s involvement in that,even though our very breath and strength comes from Him. We could end up glorifying ourselves and not honoring Him as the Giver of all things (John 3:27; James 1:17). Whether things that happen are visible miracles or invisible graces, God is behind it all.  So Joshua’s first victory happened without any archers shooting or excavators breaking the city wall. The Lord wanted Israel to witness His raw power unleashed—without any human involvement. This way, they could trust Him when He actually told them to fight themselves.

After taking Jericho, something awful happens in the following city of Ai as Israel is defeated (Joshua 7:1-26). Joshua goes to God asking why they were defeated and God told him about the sin of Achan who had created a breach by taking the spoils from Jericho when God had forbidden that and commanded them to destroy them. After they cleaned up that mess, God would help them in the next battle (Joshua 8:1). What we learn here is that, even though God had given them promises—they still had to play by the rules established by Him—and those rules would be communicated step by step. They had to be attentive to His voice all the way because they couldn’t just say “God has promised us to win and we shall win no matter how behave.”  We see that when they ignored God’s instruction at a certain point—like Achan did in Jericho—then they faced severe consequences. Now, I have heard some Christians say that because we are under the New Covenant—the promises of God are no longer conditional. After all, Scriptures declare: “For no matter how many promises God has made, they are “Yes” in Christ. And so through him the “Amen” is spoken by us to the glory of God.”—2 Corinthians 1:20. They point to this verse to say that there are no more conditions on God’s promises. But a quick glance at the reality many Christians live in the world tells a whole different story. Let’s take for example Psalms 103:3 “…the Lord….heals all your diseases.” This is clearly a promise that God heals all our diseases. Christians can have that in Christ. Jesus healed everyone who came to him (Matthew 4:23-24; Matthew 9:35; Matthew 12:15; Acts 10:38). But are all Christians healed today? They could be—potentially—but they are not always. I know some who died of COVID-19. There are others who die prematurely for other reasons. So why not healed ? Simply because conditions on promises—are in fact—still in effect (John 15:7;  1 Corinthians 11:30).  This is not to say that all Christians who die are sinful— after all, even Lazarus that Jesus rose from the dead died again eventually— we all shall die— it is to mean that many Christians do not enjoy the promises of God for healing simply because they are not meeting the conditions to inherit them. All promises are fulfilled in Christ and we can have them as long as we are in Christ entirely—walking in His will—being filled with His words and practicing what they instruct us to do. Outside of Christ in anyway, living in disobedience to revealed Scripture, and those promises have no fulfillment. Many Christians simply don’t understand what it means to be in Christ and it is not uncommon to find those who consider themselves Christians when they are barely what you would call “Almost Christian.” There are even people Jesus asked “why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord’ and you do not do what I say ?” —Luke 6:46. It’s not enough for someone to claim to know Christ, do demons know you as sold-out to His cause ? (See 1 Corinthians 10:21; 2 Corinthians 6:15-16; Acts 19:13-15; James 2:19). Does Christ acknowledge you ? So now we understand why even though God had promised Israel victory, they lost the battle in Ai on their first attempt.

After Isarel defeated Ai on their second attempt, they attacked the Amorites, taking the city of Jerusalem, Hebron, Jarmuth, Lachish, and Eglon. They defeated their kings: Adonizedek, Hoham, Piram, Japhia, and Debir (Joshua 10:1-27).  It is during the war with these 5 kings that Joshua commands the sun to stand still (Joshua 10: 12-14) so that they would continue to have the light of day and pursue the fugitives. This miracle is as powerful as crossing the Red Sea. It had never happened before and it has not happened since then. After that, they went onto taking Makeddah and Libnah (Joshua 10:28-29). After the victories of the South, they fought at the waters of Merom, defeating king Jabin who led the northern alliance. This was something that apostle Paul could have called a “ triumphal procession.”—2 Chronicles 2:14.  So, now we understand why Joshua said ”Not one of all the LORD’s good promises to Israel failed; everyone was fulfilled.”—Joshua 21:45. They went from victory to victory until they took all the land.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that you are a promise-keeping, faithful, miracle-working God. We are encouraged that you do not faint or grow weary and you shall continue to fight our battles until the end of time. Lord, we pray that in our appointed times in history, we will hear your voice showing us the way so that we can follow the path you have designed and fulfill your destiny for our lives. We also pray that you plant your desires and visions in our hearts—so that we can pursue them in the anointing of the Holy Spirit. In the victorious name of Jesus, we pray. Amen!

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                                                                                                                                 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Devotionals, December End Of The Year

December 26th, 2020

He sendeth forth his commandment upon earth: his word runneth very swiftly. Psalms 147: 15

 In the remaining days of this year, we will finish the year with meditations I am giving the title “Contending To The End,” in our end-of-the-year devotional. This is to help us to pray through things that may need divine interventions before the end of the year. It is for us to finish the year strong, standing firm in our faith.  We do know that “He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion.”- Philippians 1:6. This is Paul’s assurance about our salvation, of which we are neither the authors nor sustainers. Christ is the author and the finisher of our faith. As such, things that pertain to spiritual growth for our salvation are not under a quarterly or annual schedule. He keeps working in the sanctification process, growth, and maturity of the saints. Even things that are not salvation related, whether careers, jobs, families, illnesses, social upheavals, lockdowns, security concerns of any kind, church activities, friendships, businesses, and all other things that we seek God about and pray to see His perfect will accomplished, do not necessarily fit into a weekly, monthly, or annual schedule. God can work at any time and perfect those things. If anything is not complete by December 31st, we do not turn our eyes from Jesus, the author of what we have trusted God for and the only one who can really bring them to completion. With that being said, we also tend to need motivation to bestir ourselves to hold onto Him and if the end of the year week brings us to that place when we call upon Him earnestly because of looming deadlines or ebbing hopes of what we longed for, that should be an opportunity for us to use those days to do all we can to contend to the very end. After all, “His word runneth very swiftly.”

The scripture before us assures that God sends forth His command upon the earth, His word runs swiftly. In other words, when God speaks, it does not matter if the time left is short, He can accomplish what He has spoken in a brief moment. The meditations of the Christmas season that we have just left behind have taught us this. When angel Gabriel told Mary she would have a child as a virgin woman, she said  “Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.” And the angel departed from her.”- Luke 1:38. I cannot stress enough how I emphasize hearing from God in everything I do. I have had to deal with so many things that were “mountains” in my own eyes and unless I had the Word of God I would never have even made a serious attempt to go from Place A to Place B. But each time I waited upon the Lord and heard from Him, I also received an impartation of faith to see it through (Isaiah 40:31). What Mary was believing for here had never been done before. No woman had ever been pregnant without a man involved.  Scientifically and naturally speaking, this is pure craziness. There’s no measurement to even begin to describe the size of how gigantic the miracle of virgin birth is. We are talking about carrying to term a 46-XY chromosome man-child from an egg with 23, X chromosomes. No wonder the things of faith are so difficult for people of science, because to believe such things takes the work of God.

Mary had not read in a Bible what she heard from Gabriel . She might have been familiar with Isaiah 7:14. We can assume that she was not a random choice. God knew that she was a person of eminent holiness, faith, and assiduous pursuit of the heavenly things. But what she heard was from an angel and she believed. God has many ways to speak to us. I love putting Scriptures above all other forms of God’s words but I am well aware that God will use many ways to speak to us. In Numbers 12:6 we read:  “Listen to my words: ‘When there is a prophet among you, I, the LORD, reveal myself to them in visions, I speak to them in dreams.’ “ I have heard many people talk about a few prophecies of Kim Clement this year. He died in 2016 and went to be with the Lord but some of his prophecies are still with us. I know him to have had many prophetic words that were fulfilled. Well-here is the thing- while I can say that each word he has spoken has to be tested like all other prophecies are to be tested (1 Thessalonians 5:19-21)- if people believe that those prophecies that they have been talking about are true, then they have to contend before God to see them fulfilled. We know that if God sends His word, He means good for His children. We can trust Him for that. Praying to contend for prophecies is consistent with believing the Word of the Lord.  Paul once urged Timothy not to relax because of prophetic words he had heard, expecting them to be fulfilled no matter what- but rather to be stirred into contending: “This charge I entrust to you, Timothy, my child, in accordance with the prophecies previously made about you, that by them you may wage the good warfare.”- 1 Timothy 1:18.

We know what God is capable of and His words can be trusted. “By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, their starry host by the breath of his mouth”- Psalms 33:6, “By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible”- Hebrews 11:3, “Who can speak and have it happen if the Lord has not decreed it?”- Lamentations 3:37. In an age when people are skeptical about Christianity and its claims, believing only in cause-effect relationship of things that they can control physically, it is time for the saints in Christ to believe that Jesus can do what we proclaim He can do. What if Jesus could do all the things we read in the New Testament ? What if He was the same yesterday, today, and forever? Well, He is (Hebrews 13:8). When Jesus gave the Word that the servant of the Centurion who had come to him would be healed, “the servant was healed that moment.”- Matthew 8:13. He giveth His commandment and His word runneth swiftly. He has done it before and He can do the same today.

Prayer: Father God, we thank you that you have given us the grace to reach the end of this year. There are many brothers and sisters that you have called to yourself this year. Some preachers have departed from this earth this year. Other people who did not know you at all also died. We have also seen tragedies, treachery, and trials of many kind. But Lord, in all of this, we want to finish this year strong. We pray that the words of God we have heard whether spoken by your prophets in years past or those we heard this year will be fulfilled swiftly. Let your angels be dispatched to execute those prophetic words. The promises and invitations we received from you this year also, let them not go to waste or be aborted this year. We contend that they will be made manifest and be brought into perfect fulfillment. In the mighty name of Jesus, we pray. Amen!

December 28th, 2020

“The days are coming,” declares the LORD, “when the reaper will be overtaken by the plowman and the planter by the one treading grapes. New wine will drip from the mountains and flow from all the hills.”-Amos 9:13.  

As we continue our “Contending To The End,” in our end of the year devotional, one of the Scriptures that had come to my mind was Psalms 138:8 “He will perfect that which concerns me,” but this is usually a Scripture I have used when I am praying for God to bless me a certain way. I did not feel it was going to apply with what I was sensing happening in the weekend. God has blessed me. I have a lot of awesome work to do, and in a pandemic, what greater blessing do I need? If there’s something I am contending for—getting work to do in the remaining 3 days of the year is not one of them. Rather, I want to be more productive and achieve more with the work I am doing that God has already blessed me with. So I decided to pass on that verse to look for this one in Amos that would get me stirred up to see that I accomplish all I desire to achieve in the work I have before me. I also believe there are many people who are in this category—people who feel like—God has blessed them, they are not looking for more blessings—they want to be better stewards of the blessings that God has already given them.

In Amos 9:11, we see this prophet starting to talk about Israel’s restoration. In verse 14, he talks about the return of the people of Israel from exile. Amos was a pre-captivity prophet, so you can apply this prophecy to the time they would come back after Cyrus said they could go back and rebuild the temple. However, in verse 15, we see that He says “I will plant Israel in their own land, never again to be uprooted from the land,” which does not seem to fit into a post-captivity era as they would return to the land of Israel for just 600 years only to have Jerusalem captured by the Romans in 70 AD.  So verse 14-15 are far more applicable to the present moment after the rebirth of the nation of Israel in 1948, with Jews from exile making Aaliyah. This is the context in which we see Amos 9:13 we study for our devotional today.

“The days are coming,” we are in those days, “when the reaper will be overtaken by the plowman.” The first beautiful thing I love about this is because reaping is associated with “harvest.” The Hebrew word used here is “Baqqoser /Qatsar” and can also mean harvest. And what is a better time for harvest than the end of the year? When you file taxes for next year, you will be accounting for your income up to December 31st. So this is the time you get a picture of how much you have earned in the past 12 months. It is also a time many students are on Christmas break. It is a time when stocks in financial markets are going to record how far they have come at the end of this year. Whether we like the idea or not, there are many deadlines that come up at the end of the year and we do not want to miss out on what God can do in the remaining days. Maybe someone could feel that the remaining days are not going to make that big of a difference and this is exactly why we need a word like this. Because the Lord says “the reaper will be overtaken by the plowman.”  The reaper has had a time to sow and now is the time for harvest (Ecclesiastes 3:2). The reaper has invested in outcomes for a period of time and the plowman is just getting started. So how is it possible that the reaper will be overtaken by the plowman? Have you noticed that, even though the rebirth of Israel is pretty recent, the new nation has overtaken many others in the region that did not have the same history ?

I have noticed that there’s an unhealthy fear of what is called “competition” among Christians. And to certain extent, it’s possible that some Christians could have a wrong view of competition. However, in trying to resolve such concerns, Jesus told the disciples a secret: greatness in God’s kingdom will be determined by service (Matthew 20:26). If we want to be the greatest, not only Jesus says our holy life has to be perfect as our Father in heaven is perfect (Matthew 5:19; Matthew 5: 48), we also have to roll our sleeves and invest time in serving His people and those who are still lost out there (Matthew 24:45-46).  If you are not holy, you can’t be great. Not according to heaven’s standards. But that’s not enough, you must serve the saints. Jesus is not worried about the topic of greatness, He is simply concerned that we get the right perspective of what it actually means to be great. It is under this light we should see the plowman who overtakes the reaper. God shortens the duration the plowman needs to wait to see a harvest for his own efforts. It’s like one accomplishes the same or even more by starting later than the one who started earlier and had to sweat longer. It’s the divine grace to overtake. Whenever I have sensed that God wanted me to do something, I have never had to fret how long I may need to wait to do it if He had me do other work. But I always sensed that when I get finally to do that—I would become unstoppable—and even if you were to try to get my attention to take a break, I wouldn’t stop for a second.  There’s this interesting story I saw posted on social media by a Haitian friend who used to be a coworker : “Every morning in Africa, a gazelle wakes up, it knows it must outrun the fastest lion or it will be killed. Every morning in Africa, a lion wakes up, it knows it must run faster than the slowest gazelle or it will starve. It doesn’t matter whether you are a lion or a gazelle, when the sun comes up, you’d better be running.”

God wants to train us as competitive athletic runners. There are plenty of Scriptures that teach us to think that way like:

1)   “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.”—Hebrews 12:1. Every now and then, I get a feeling that the saints who have gone before us are watching us here as “witnesses.” I am like, Reinhard Bonnke is really gone. What is he thinking up there? I’d better be running. Because in this Hebrew 12 verse the race is about perseverance, it is more like a marathon.

2)   “Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize.”- 1 Corinthians 9:24. We may even consider sprinters here since  we do not have a picture of whether it is 100 meters or 42 kilometers run. Someone like Usain Bolt would know that every second counts in sprinting 100 meters. The man flies. Do we have such a sense of urgency with every minute we have ? There are days in which what is required of you is the endurance of a marathoner, there are days what you need is the speed of a sprinter. Paul talks about how he disciplines himself for such a race.

3)  If you have raced with men on foot and they have worn you out, how can you compete with horses? If you stumble in safe country, how will you manage in the thickets by the Jordan?- Jeremiah 12:5. Let’s try to get this out of spirituality a bit. What about secular work? I hear people say, H1B Visa holders immigrants working as software engineers are taking American people’s jobs. But if you are an American engineer and you are getting beaten in such circumstances in a land of opportunity, how will you handle it if things could get worse—like say China overtakes USA technologically and forces US companies to do certain things ? What if more companies move to India and you have even less chances of getting employed? Think of yourself competing with Huawei, Google, and Facebook—and they are working against your interests. And this is not even hypothetical. In many ways, they are. God knows the odds may be against you in many areas. But God says, if you are beaten in a such competition, can you really talk about greater things of advancing the kingdom of God ?  If you are outsmarted by human beings, how will you be able to know the schemes of the devil and the traps he lays to steal, kill, and destroy? If you are defeated in the things you can see, how do you succeed when the unseen realm is involved ? If you lose in the days of prosperity, how will you survive in the days of famine ? In a pandemic ? Are you one who cries about being cheated or the vigilant who cannot get cheated ? God wants us to sharpen our senses spiritually, sharpen our minds intellectually, and be physically fit-sleep well, eat well, and take care of ourselves—so that we can be out there doing the most for His glory.

“New wine will flow from the mountains.” That’s perhaps where some vines will be planted. The church age is the age of Pentecost. It is the age when we should expect newer and newer invasions of the Holy Spirit that fill us with divine power to accomplish what we have to do in whatever calling He has called us. New anointings to save the world and subdue the earth. We can’t just look to the outpourings of 1906, 1947, 1970s, 1990s, and say “Oh my, that was good. I wish I had that ” New wine is supposed to be for our time and this season. “Mountains” do not necessarily mean that you will get that “new wine” in a certain church. You could be serving God as a culture commentator on TV and receive that “new wine.” You could be working as a doctor and get that “new wine.” There’s grace for the beginner to overtake the experienced and new wine to flow from the mountains and satisfy us with God’s good pleasure.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that when I feel like time is short and the tasks are many today, you will give me the grace to outrun horses, gazelles, and lions and achieve more than I anticipated today.  Lord, I pray that you open the eyes of your saints, that they will not be outsmarted by the world but even those who may have started late in a certain field, they will be able to overtake the most prominent in their industries. In the majestic name of Jesus, we pray. Amen!

December 29th, 2020

 When David and his men reached Ziklag, they found it destroyed by fire and their wives and sons and daughters taken captive. So David and his men wept aloud until they had no strength left to weep. 1 Samuel 30: 3-4

David was greatly distressed because the men were talking of stoning him; each one was bitter in spirit because of his sons and daughters. But David found strength in the LORD his God. Then David said to Abiathar the priest, the son of Ahimelek, “Bring me the ephod.” Abiathar brought it to him, and David inquired of the LORD, “Shall I pursue this raiding party? Will I overtake them?” “Pursue them,” he answered. “You will certainly overtake them and succeed in the rescue.”  1 Samuel 30: 6-8

He led David down, and there they were, scattered over the countryside, eating, drinking and reveling because of the great amount of plunder they had taken from the land of the Philistines and from Judah. David fought them from dusk until the evening of the next day, and none of them got away, except four hundred young men who rode off on camels and fled. 1 Samuel 30:16-17

Today, In our “Contending To The End” themed devotional for the end of the year, we will be looking at this passage of 1 Samuel 30 when David who had been a refugee in the land of the philistines experiences devastating loss and then God tells him to overtake and recover what had been taken.  Yesterday we had seen the Amos 9:13 verse about the reaper being overtaken by the plowman, the one who is in the harvesting stage being overtaken by the one who is in the stage of sowing seeds, and the experienced being overtaken by the beginner. Somehow last night—about 10:00 pm EST—God gave me an amazing sign that I will not share—that proved me in a shocking way that He had actually inspired that Amos 9:13 passage I picked over Psalms 138:8 for what I had assumed were personal reasons. This gives me even greater boldness as I approach 1 Samuel 30 this morning.

What happened in Ziklag is the story of man on earth since the fall. Amalekites attacked, burned the city, took hostages, and killed. In our Christmas season devotional we had said that the reign of David is a type of the reign of Christ during the church age and though at this point David had been anointed and not-yet-crowned- the story confirms what we know about this age, when Satan comes to steal, kill, and destroy (John 10:10). We cannot be like those who promise peace to the world in a deceitful way (1 Thessalonians 5:3). We do pray for peace, for men who are in authority to govern righteously in ways that will promote peace in the nations and among different people groups (1 Timothy 2:1-5), but we also know that before the millennial kingdom of Christ, there will continue to be wars and rumors of wars upon the earth.  And to a certain degree, it is not always the government leaders who create such chaos. It is simply the nature of the fallen world that some people will be deceived by Satan, and in orchestrated events that leaders may find hard to control, catastrophe happens. Man is not omniscient or omnipotent. Even when technology allows so much to come to light sooner, there’s always a gap in knowledge, deficiency in wisdom, shortage in resources, and inadequacy in power. This unforeseen assault should also be a warning for those who sleep over the wheel or are nonchalant in matters of defense and national security. As we see here, even David was not spared from surprise attacks, like a thief in the night. Even in his place of refuge away from Saul’s henchmen, he was still under threat from Amalekites.

What was worse for David is that even his soldiers were talking about stoning him. He did not coordinate the attack that happened and the loss they suffered, with some of their wives and children taken captive, but they were outraged against him because he was their leader. Leadership is a serious responsibility and some of the demands placed upon the leader can seem to be irrational. Within man dwells sin, and even when endowed with the best leaders in the world, there will be dissatisfaction, contention, slander, and in some cases outright rebellion.  “David strengthened himself in the Lord.” He had helped Saul calm his spirits and chase his demons away by playing music for him and this was his time to fight off discouragement by singing praises. In his songs of praises, he might even have interjected supplications like we see in Psalms 18:18 “They confronted me in the day of my disaster, but the Lord was my support,” and  Psalms 18:28 “ You, Lord, keep my lamp burning; my God turns my darkness into light.” It is also at this time, he enquires of the Lord and God gave him the green light: “Pursue them,” he answered. “You will certainly overtake them and succeed in the rescue.”  And so, those plunderers who had reaped where they had not sown would be overtaken by the plowman who finds strength in the Lord.

When David found these Amalekites, they were celebrating their loot. Eating, drinking, and making merriment. He had pursued and overtaken them and now was the time to “recover all.” They would quickly find out how the triumph of the wicked is short-lived.  “But if he remains silent, who can condemn him? If he hides his face, who can see him? Yet he is over individual and nation alike, to keep the godless from ruling, from laying snares for the people.”—Job 34:29-30. David had sought the Lord and the Lord had not hidden his face.  David had strengthened himself in the Lord and not in the power of his military strategies. The wicked can only rule and plunder where man has not humbled himself and sought God with an honest and earnest heart. Why do you seek to be blessed? Why are you mourning your business losses because of a pandemic lockdown? Why are you weeping over your layoff from job and an insufficient government hand-out of a few hundred dollars? Is it because you are simply entitled to happiness, wealth, and freedom? Or is it because you want to advance the kingdom of Christ and glorify God? Well, if it is about you, then God will hide His face and there will be no recovery. But if it is about the glory of the Lord, not only you will be able to overtake and recover what unjust rules might have destroyed in your business, you will also be able to harvest sevenfold from what you had before (Proverbs 6:31). It is good to weep over loss, but it is not good to be in despair.  Let us be among those who find strength in the Lord and be powerful in His might in the days of evil (Ephesians 6:10, 13). Evil days here is “ponera” in Greek and means “malicious, wicked, bad, slothful.” That’s what the power of the Lord is for. To overcome those seasons.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that even in this dark world where we will suffer devastating losses because of a pandemic, bad leadership, and cheating—we can find strength in you Lord and you will be our shield and sword, protecting us and defending us. Open your fire and let the breath from your nostrils, and your terrible swift sword, overtake and punish Leviathan and his collaborators. We pray that your people will rejoice in the victory of the Lord. In the triumphant name of Jesus, we pray. Amen!

December 30th, 2020

 Dear friends, although I was very eager to write to you about the salvation we share, I felt compelled to write and urge you to contend for the faith that was once for all entrusted to God’s holy people. Jude 1:3

Today, in our “Contending To The End” themed devotional for the end of the year, we will be looking at this verse in Jude. Because Jude really has one chapter, usually 1:3 is not added, but just the verse 3. But for those who are not familiar with this, I prefer to write this way, like longer epistles are quoted.

It is not uncommon to hear despair in the voices of many Christians in USA and Europe, whether they are leaders or lay people. In one of my not-yet-published books, I have a chapter where I documented some of the concerning issues that may be causing such despair. There are news that over 6,000-10,000 churches in America close every year. This was before the pandemic, in the “good times.” Many churches have embraced the sexual revolution and it is not uncommon to hear some “Christians” who are more in tune with the perishing world’s views on sexual matters than what the Bible teaches, a departure from the teachings of the first church council in Jerusalem (Acts 15). Church baptisms, conversions, and attendance numbers do not look good. The numbers of those who say they have no religion in America is increasing. There are plenty of resources from the Barna Group to Christianity Today to many other publications that will give details into this phenomenon.

These heart-breaking things are happening in America, which is much healthier spiritually than Europe. Things are bad in USA but not as bad as they are in Europe. Is there hope for Western Christianity?

When Cyrus gave a green light for the Jews in Babylon to go back to their ancestral land and rebuild the temple (Ezra 1:2), they started to rebuild, with Zerubbabel being the manager of the temple rebuilding project as well as the secular leadership, while Ezra was the priest who taught people the law of Moses that many of them had forgotten. There was resistance initially because there were bad men who had now been entrenched in the land that was formerly Israel, with a lot of power, and sometimes they would even forge letters to say that authorities have demanded the work of rebuilding the temple to stop. Even with the good wishes of Cyrus and his donation of articles to rebuild (Ezra 1:7), they still got harassed by lower-ranking officials who did not want to see the temple rebuilt (Ezra 4:1-5).  Bribery of local officials was their weapon of choice since Cyrus was firmly behind the rebuilding project. After Cyrus died, the following king was not in the same helpful mood like Cyrus, so Zerubbabel faced hardships (Ezra 4:6-21). Even before such hardships, not all Jews in Jerusalem temple rebuilding project were excited.  We read in Ezra 3:12: “But many of the older priests and Levites and family heads, who had seen the former temple, wept aloud when they saw the foundation of this temple being laid, while many others shouted for joy.” The former temple they were making comparisons is the one built by Solomon in the book of 1 Kings 6-9. But God was not as discouraged as the older priests. After all, we are assured: “Indeed, he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.”—Psalms 121:4. So after false starts, discouragement, attacks, briberies, and cease-and-desist edicts from authorities, 15-20 years later, they were able to restart the abandoned project and it is during that second phase we see Haggai prophesying: “The glory of this present house will be greater than the glory of the former house,’ says the LORD Almighty. ‘And in this place I will grant peace,’ declares the LORD Almighty.”—Haggai 2:9.

Why go through all of this ? It is because this prophecy of Haggai is important for our times. It’s easy to look at the statistics of the collapse of Western Christianity and start to believe that this is the future of the church. I have seen many pastors who believe it is. Should we be weeping and interceding for the church like those older priests wept when they saw the low-grade foundations that were being laid in the second temple ? We should be weeping over the church’s lost glory like Jesus wept over Jerusalem (Luke 19:41). But this prophecy of Haggai gives us hope, and like many prophecies of restoration of the post-captivity era, it was also pointing to the church as the “latter house, ” not necessarily just the second temple in Jerusalem. Jesus would even eventually challenge people of his day to destroy it and see Him rebuild it in 3 days (John 2:16-19), meaning His body. It is through the prism of this background information that we are to see Jude 1:3. Should we just accept the collapse of Western Christianity as fate or are there better days ahead ? What does it mean to contend for the faith delivered to the saints? Why do we contend for the faith? How should we contend?

Jude felt that there were plenty to write in his epistle and like Peter, John, and Paul, he could have written a lot of doctrinal material. Rather than do so, he urges us to contend for what was already written. The Greek word used there is “epagonizesthai,” which means “to struggle.” Literary this flies in the face of everything we believe about Christianity. Couldn’t that explain why the last 40 years have been associated with the first generation to see a decline rather an explosion of the Christian church? Struggling is just not our thing. While the recovery of the cherished doctrine of justification by faith and not by works has provided assurance of salvation for many Christians, and soothed the souls of those burdened with guilt as they rejoiced in the blood of the Lamb and joined Fanny Crosby in singing : “redeemed how I love to proclaim it, redeemed by the blood of the lamb, redeemed through His infinite mercy, His child and forever, I am.”—they also tended to forget that they would never have known that Good News they sing without the struggle, sweat, and works of their fathers to get that Gospel not just to them but also to the whole world. They also forgot all the Bible encourages us to know about works (James 2:26; Matthew 5:16; Galatians 6:10; Revelation 19:8).

Now that we understand what contending means, why should we contend? Every why in the New Testament duties of the saints can always be answered by love God and love your neighbor. When we love God, we obey His commandments. If God says that He wants us to fight for His truth, then that’s what loving Him means. If our neighbors are headed to eternal burning, how can we say we love them without helping them avoid such damnation? The why can also be summarized by the great commission that Jesus gave His disciples before ascending to the Father (Mark 16:15; Matthew 28:18-20). Jesus proclaimed “This Gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.”—Matthew 24:14. We owe the world not just contending to the end for the purity of the doctrines and practices of the Gospel, but also for the continued expansion of the kingdom and growth of the church.

How do we do this? There are definitely “how to do it” and “how not to do it.”

First, let us look at how not to do it.

1) In Galatians 5: 26 we read: ”Let us not become conceited, or provoke one another, or be jealous of one another.” It is not uncommon to see Christians who are conceited, congratulating themselves on success when the statistics we have quoted above say a different story about where the church is headed.  

2) It is not uncommon to see Christians provoking one another over trivial matters that aren’t in the category of “damnable heresies.” I have been blessed to have the influence of both the Reformed Calvinist/Baptist and Pentecostal/Charismatic movements and I will be eternally grateful for the heartaches this seems to have saved me. It is not uncommon to see fights in those 2 camps. Some for good reasons and some for bad reasons. While I believe in contending for the Gospel, I try to minimize my involvement in the fights of those 2 camps for just one reason: I know where each side is right and where each side is wrong and I would rather contend to encourage both where I find agreement than participate in their rivalries.

How do we contend now that we know how not to do it ?

Paul talked about the importance of intercessions and supplications for everyone and that seems to be a good start (1 Timothy 2:1-5). Then make sure we continue to preach, teach, publish, and broadcast—the Good News in its purity, untainted—loving God and loving our neighbors. Persevere in watching over the holiness of our walk, as well as correctness of our doctrines, to make sure we are sound in our faith and lead our hearers to salvation (1 Timothy 4:16). Make sure the Gospel continues to spread unhindered (2 Thessalonians 3:1) and give it our all—best years of our strength and energy—our hearts and minds and bodies—and our financial resources. If we can do that, I believe the best days of the church are ahead of us not behind us. Our eyes will see the glory of the Lord and the glory of the latter house will be greater than the glory of the former.

Prayer: Father God, these are perilous days of trial, famine, sword, and apostasy—and we need your help every hour of every day. We need your help more than ever.  Jesus, you promised to build your church and we confess we are at the end of the ropes as we see churches closing instead. We pray that you teach us, guide us, fill us with your Spirit, give us the strength, wisdom, skills, and resources we need to be able to contend for the faith—both in doctrine and practice—and not just do it right but also do it efficiently. Father, we ask for this, in the Holy name of your precious Son Jesus. Amen!

December 31st, 2020

And so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead. Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead. I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. Philippians 3:11-14.

As it is the last day of the year we will conclude our “Contending To The End” themed devotional  with this passage in Philippians.

There are many things we have to contend for as Christians but at the end of all things we will die and Christ’s promise is that those who believe in Him will be resurrected (John 11:25). Paul’s hope in contending for the faith was to attain to that promised resurrection.

When Paul wrote this letter, he had experienced a lot as a Christian and had done a lot of work for the kingdom of God. So why does he say “not that I have obtained all of this or have already attained?”- because he had not yet arrived at the ultimate prize—the resurrection. And even though he had the assurance of salvation as he declared “I know whom I have believed that He is able to keep that which I have entrusted to Him.”—2 Timothy 1:12— he still did not consider himself to have arrived at the final destination. So, by writing that he has not already attained all of what his faith promises, he is not talking about being uncertain about his destination. The fact is, until our final breath when we die in the Lord, we will not be able say in a credible way that we have attained. If the thief on the cross could change his eternal destination in his last few hours, it is possible for someone to ruin all of heaven’s promises in his last few weeks. We do know that men tend to die the way they live and those who faithfully live for the Lord need not fear that somehow they will be strangely drawn to the dark side in their final moments. We look to the Lord’s keeping power to sustain us until the end (Jude 1:24). The one who took hold of us does not grow weak in His hands to hold us even tighter. But still, we understand that finishing the race means reaching the very end of one’s life. Until then, we are not done yet. As long as Paul lived on earth, he wanted to continue to pursue Christ and His kingdom, looking forward to attain all of what God promised.

There are other things that Paul mentioned before the resurrection of the dead. Remember he is saying “not that I have attained all of this.” So, it is more than one thing. He had mentioned about knowing Christ, knowing the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship with His sufferings. The Greek words used for attained and made perfect are “elabon/lambano” and “teteleiomai/teleio,” respectively. One means to seize or lay hold of. The other means to be made complete or be accomplished. There might be certain things that we have not seen happen this year—that may be we trusted Jesus for certain miraculous demonstrations of His power and we did not see those things. This does not mean that the power of His resurrection is diminished, it means that we have not yet tasted those things. We have not yet experienced the manifestation of those things. We have not yet attained all we have to discover and enjoy in the power of His resurrection. Paul hadn’t either. Peter hadn’t either. John hadn’t either. So, this is not a reason to be discouraged. We can learn what Paul did in following his example.

“One thing I do: forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead”—this seems to be a good practice when we enter the New Year tomorrow. We do not have to remember or regret the things that happened in the pandemic this year. We do not have to hold onto frustrations, losses, or failures of the previous years. Satan may want us to remember that in order to use it as a hook on our soul and make us lose our joy in Christ, but we do not have to take the bait. Rather than be stuck with “coulda, woulda, shoulda” of things that did not happen as we thought, we are called to press toward the goal. The Greek word used for straining is “Epekteinomenos” and it means “reaching or stretching,” while the word for press toward is “Dioko,” which means “pursue or persecute.” That persecute translation is interesting because it implies “aggressively chasing.” It is also translated as “zealously hunt down.” And I like the word he used for “goal.” It is “Skopon,” which is related to the same word from which we get “Skeptical” The goal is hidden, we cannot see it. We know in part. Yes, we do know whom we have believed, but we know in part about the kingdom to come.  Sometimes, it can feel like the prize we are reaching for is vague but we know it is there and we know it is wonderful. That’s really the definition of faith when we walk by believing unseen things of God’s kingdom. Things become clearer and clearer the more we continue on pursuing. “But the path of the just is like the shining sun, that shines ever brighter unto the perfect day.”—Proverbs 4:18. Our Christian walk is supposed to be like the sunrising upon us in the morning and increases in intensity—or at least in the rays of the sun we receive—until noontime when it is at its zenith. There’s no reason why the glories of the “Sun of righteousness”—Malachi 4:2 that we know should remain stagnant every year—with our knowledge of Him and experience with Him remaining stuck in the same spot for years. We have to clear out whatever may stand in the way of the sun to give its full light so that we can follow the Lamb wherever He leads (John 8:12; 1 John 1:7). The Lord wants us to grow into Him and reach out for higher things in Christ, with whom we are already seated, positionally, in heavenly places at the right hand of God. When we reach out towards that prize, we are really seeking to stand where we already belong. We will be able to attain that as we chase Him more aggressively. That sounds like a good way to contend to the very end. Raise thou me heavenward, O power of my power!

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that you have allowed us to reach this final day of the year and all the wonderful things that you have taught us about you and your kingdom. We pray, Lord, that you give us the wisdom and the strength to chase you and your kingdom more aggressively today and tomorrow. Give us the grace to let go of the past and anointing we need to fulfill our tasks today. We want to see the Sun of righteousness at His zenith in our lives. A demonstration of your power in an unrestrained, scorching, and unlimited way. In the glorious name of Jesus, we pray. Amen !

Devotionals, December Christmas Season

December 15th, 2020

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God- John 1:1

As we start the third week of December, we will be doing meditations about the wonder of Christmas. “The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us.”- John 1:14. So, the dates of December 15th-25th every year will be dedicated to remembering the birth of our Lord Jesus here. For this year, we will title this Christmas season’s meditations: “Hail The Incarnate Deity” Taken from the hymn “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing!” The second verse goes like this:

Christ, by highest heav’n adored, Christ, the everlasting Lord: Late in time behold Him come, Offspring of a virgin’s womb. Veiled in flesh the Godhead see, Hail th’ incarnate Deity!  Pleased as man with man to dwell, Jesus our Immanuel.

Apostle John presents somewhat a genealogy that is different from what Matthew and Luke present when it comes to Christ’s origins. Matthew and Luke focus on His humanity, as they look at the family tree that Jesus was born into; while John is focusing on His divinity. He starts by declaring His eternal existence. He also introduces a rather interesting concept “The Word.” Think about all the other things he could have used. For example, he could have said “God the Son ” existed from the beginning and was with the Father. After all, many of the claims of Jesus Christ centered around the fact that He was the “Son of God.” One of the highlights in the Gospels is when Peter points out His identity that way “You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God.”- Matthew 16:16. Even though this would have been true, it is not what the Holy Spirit led John to write.

“In the beginning was the Word.” He existed from eternity. “He existed before anything was created.”- Colossians 1:15, NLT. He is the Alpha. He starts everything. Creation is His work. “In Him all things were crated.”- Colossians 1:16 and “Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.”- John 1:3, remind us that all creation, in all its majesty, from the galaxies with their stars and planets, the roaring oceans, the mountains, and the complex human body, soul, and spirit were all created in Him and through Him. He is eternal. There’s no question that time is one of the greatest inventions of all. I always marvel at time. You can’t stop it, you can only redeem it. You cannot manufacture and sell it. You cannot go back in time. You can only use the days that were given to you to the best of your ability. Christ as the Alpha, standing in the beginning, reassures us that the mystery of time is in His hands. All of history and its exhilarating stories belongs to Him. He saw it, He knew it, He orchestrated it. We get the privilege to celebrate that on Christmas. 

He is the “Word.” In Greek, it is Logos. “His name is called the Word of God.”- Revelation 19:13, John writes in the book of Revelation. Often the passage of personified Wisdom of Proverbs 8:22-36 is interpreted as the mystery of the eternal Word. After all, “In Him are hidden all the treasures of Wisdom.”-Colossians 2:3. He is the eternal Word of wisdom. Logos may be translated as “reason, thought, speech, expression.” He is the way God expresses Himself. “He is the image of the invisible God.”- Colossians 1:15. “The exact representation of His being.”- Hebrews 1:3.

“The Word was with God and the Word was God.” When Moses starts the book of Genesis, he writes “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”- Genesis 1:1. The way John starts his Gospel is reminiscent of that. The Word was with God and the Word was God, creating all of those things in the beginning. “And God said, ‘let there be light,’ and there was light”- Genesis 1:3. He is the Word of God in those words of creation. The co-existence of the Father and the Son was one of delight and harmony. They had perfect unity. In Proverbs 8:30 we read: “I was constantly at his side. I was filled with delight day after day, rejoicing always in his presence.” No wonder that the first place they created for humanity to dwell on earth was “Eden,” which means “delight” or “pleasure.” Whenever we are so full of God’s presence and sense that delight and pleasure in His presence, we know He is there. Wherever strife originates, we can sense that God’s presence and light are not there. Though God is “a man of war”- Exodus 15:3, that’s His response to rebellion. In the beginning, there was no rebellion. In the end, there will be no rebellion. Strife is not in His presence. Neither is His presence where you find oppression. Those things are not delightful. The Word was with God and they dwelt in eternal delight.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that you loved the world so much that you gave us your only begotten Son so that whosoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. I am amazed by such a gift we did not deserve. This Christmas season, I pray that you open my eyes to see the mystery of the incarnation of Christ in a deeper way so that I can be more and more thankful of this gift you have given to us and live my life as a delightful gift to you. In the name of Jesus, I pray. Amen !

December 16th, 2020

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth- John 1:14

In the Nicene Creed that is held by both Catholics and Protestants, there’s this statement of faith on the Holy Spirit that I love: “We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son. With the Father and the Son He is worshipped and glorified. He has spoken through the prophets.” It has often intrigued me how it was always easy to make this confession in congregational worship and yet in “real life” it would seem many Christians did not actually practice worshipping the Holy Spirit. It is only recently that this seems to have changed. In the same way, it seems this applies to the Word of God as God Himself. Do you hear people say “we worship you, O eternal Word of God?” There might be some who do so, but it is not something we commonly see. Though, of course, we could say we worship you, Jesus, and it is the same person we would be addressing, it is good to note that difference. John did not start his Gospel by naming the Word, Jesus; or any other name or title. This was a mystery that had become a reality to him and he felt comfortable to do so. That may explain why some Christians have difficulty worshipping the Holy Spirit. He remains a mystery that has not yet become reality to them and therefore they have trouble worshipping Him.

We worship you, O Eternal Word of God!

As we continue our “Hail The Incarnate Deity” theme for this Christmas season, we have John 1:14 today. In this we read that the “Word became flesh.” In this phrase, John summarizes the entire virgin conception, birth, and human life of Jesus Christ. For it was the Word becoming flesh when Mary got pregnant by the Holy Spirit and power of the Almighty. The Word had become flesh when Mary went to visit Elizabeth and John the Baptist who was still in the womb could not stay still. We read: “When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit.”- Luke 1:41. Sure, the flesh might have been a fetus at that time, it was flesh, nonetheless. It was the Word becoming flesh when Mary delivered the child in an animal stable. With all the stinking, terrible odor, that we could imagine might have been there. I used to go to cows stables at my Grandpa’s farm as a kid and they weren’t the best smelling places in the world. The Word became flesh in a place like that, coming from the womb to the world. By the time Jesus called John to be one of His 12 disciples, the flesh had grown up into an adult, though he had never known “the works of the flesh.”- Galatians 5: 19. He was fully human and yet He did not sin. Jesus tells us that this is one of His qualifications to judge us on the last day (John 5:27). Because He trod where we tread, He dealt with the issues we deal with, and was tempted in the same way we get tempted. He is the Son of Man. Our perfect and sinless Savior lived a human life and experienced several aspects of humanity that we are all familiar with. 

“Made His dwelling among us.” The Greek Word here is “Eskenosen” and it means to set up a camp or tabernacle. John probably used it to allude to the tabernacle of divine Shekinah in the wilderness that Moses had set up in accordance with God’s instructions. Christ tabernacled among us, carrying the divine glory and presence. The One “in whom are hidden all the treasures of Wisdom and knowledge”- Colossians 2:3. The One who “upholds all things by the power of His Word”- Hebrews 1:3, walked among men and they could see, hear, and touch with their hands (1 John 1:1). What a message! What a story of hope and joy He is ! What had He come to do here? It is a common observation that when a dignitary is expected to arrive at a location, say a president, prime minister, or attorney general, the people or institution those leaders are visiting are under maximum pressure to prepare very well. Things that need to be cleaned up are cleaned, the speeches are practiced and polished, decorum and protocol are a sight to behold. Now the Lord of the universe had come to the earth He had created. Was Israel ready? Are we prepared? Let every heart prepare Him room!

“We have seen His glory, the glory of the one and only son.” They saw His glory indeed. When Peter asked Jesus if he could build a tabernacle for Him, Moses, and Elijah, he had seen His glory. He even mentions that event again in 2 Peter 1:18: “We ourselves heard this voice that came from heaven when we were with him on the sacred mountain,” he reminds us. But for 3.5 years, they saw a whole lot more than that. They saw Him turn water to wine and that first miracle is what John calls the first in which He showed them His glory (John 2:11). They saw Him raise Lazarus from the dead after 4 days. And what did Jesus say to Mary who cautioned to open the tomb because Lazarus’ body might have been stinking ?  “Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?”- John 11:40. And a moment later, He was calling Lazarus to come forth. No god, no magician, no religion could claim to be able to raise a dead person from the dead like that, after 4 days. Only Jehovah can do that and Jesus did it. The Greek Word used for “the only son” is monogenous, which clearly shows us that there’s a difference between the Son of God who came from heaven and the sons of God He has come to raise from the earth: “born that man no more may die, born to raise the sons of earth, born to give them second birth.” We are blessed as sons of God but we are not the only begotten Son.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that you sent your Son to this earth to be born in the humblest circumstances and oddest situations. I thank you Lord, Jesus, that you came down here, leaving your eternal glory and made your dwelling on earth and showed us that living for God’s glory is indeed possible, and where we fall short, you were committed to make the ultimate sacrifice, to die for our sins on the cross, so that we may be cleansed and reconciled with the Father. We pray that this Christmas season, you help us to know more about your presence and reach out to those who do not know you so that they can share in our joy. In the name of Jesus, we pray. Amen !

December 17th, 2020

Though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. Instead, he gave up his divine privileges; he took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being. When he appeared in human form, he humbled himself in obedience to God and died a criminal’s death on a cross. Philippians 2:6-8- NLT

 As we continue our “Hail The Incarnate Deity” meditations for this Christmas season, we will be looking at this passage of Philippians 2:6-8 today. The words translated as “though he was God” in the NLT are “who, existing in the form of God” in the American Standard Version and Christian Standard Bible. I like the “existing” translation here because I see the Greek word used is “hyparchon,” which is also used in 1 Corinthians 11:7, where we read: “man ought not to cover His head, since He is the image of God.” It is also used in the passage where Paul confronts Peter: “You are a Jew and yet you live like a Gentile, not a Jew.” -Galatians 2:14. That’s a pretty strong, emphatic, statement of identity. Who would deny that? Jesus was in very nature God and undeniably so. The Word of God that became flesh was “God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made; of the same essence as the Father,” as we confess in the Nicene Creed. It is this identity that makes the remaining part of the passage powerful.

First, He did not think equality with God as something to cling to. We know that the redemption Christ brought was not something decided overnight at some point after Israel’s failure in the wilderness. It was not like “oops, my bad, man can’t save himself. We gave him the law and he has failed miserably.”  In God’s eternal counsel, man’s fall was foreknown, and his sin was provided for. Christ is “the lamb slain from the foundation of the world.”- Revelation 13:8.  So in eternity past, Christ had already decided He would give up His equality with God. He loved us, long before creation. He humbled Himself, long before there was rebellious man to redeem. His glorious throne, endless heavenly worship, and thousands upon thousands of angels that praised and adored Him in heaven were great to have, but they were not things to cling to. That speaks to the self-giving and sacrificial love He has for us as far more compelling to Him than His own status. He has never wanted to have a glory He did not share. When he had accomplished His mission, he prays: “And now, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began”- John 17:5, to return to the glory of God and equality with God He had relinquished for a few years on earth.

Second, He gave up His divine privileges, took the form of a servant, and was born as a human being. We saw the demeaning circumstances of His birth in an animal stable. Then, just when he was still a baby, a jealous king felt threatened and wanted to get him killed in infancy. We read in Matthew 2:13: “An angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. “Get up,” he said, “take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.” Spending his childhood in a foreign country as a refugee, running for dear life. He was not an economic immigrant, trying to pursue “the Egyptian dream.” He did not go to Egypt because He wanted to, He went there because He was forced to flee. Also, He was not an ambassador, representing the government of His country. That would have been an honor. He was a poor refugee. These are not the kind of things people generally aspire to be. Then as He grew up and returned to Israel, He was subjected to the same limitations of man. At the beginning of His ministry, “He was hungry.”- Matthew 4:2. One could say, well, that was a self-imposed fast. Again, He was “hungry.”- Matthew 21:18. So hungry and disappointed in that fig tree, that it had to be cursed dry. Once in Samaria, he was weary and tired from walking a long distance ministering (John 4:6). Another time, he was denied entry into Samaria because of political rivalries between that city and Jerusalem (Luke 9:52-53). What about what He says a few verses after that, answering someone who wanted to be a disciple: “Foxes have dens and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head” -Luke 9:58. What about the time people in his village did not like His sermon and tried to throw him off a cliff? (Luke 4:29). It’s not like He quickly grew wings and flew away from them. He stood there with all the emotions we can imagine He was feeling. Even before He died, He had the option of requesting hundreds of thousands of angels to demolish his attackers, and He did not do that because His death was for the redemption of the world (Matthew 26:53).Notice in that verse that Jesus did not say, he could have summoned or commanded angels. He said that He would have requested. Even if he wanted to be delivered, He had entirely submitted himself to a plan of dependence upon the Father. In the end, He accepted to die on the cross.

Third, He served God and man. He said: ”For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me.”- John 6:38. Serving the Father, meant only to follow the Father’s will. Serving man, He demonstrated His love to the very end. He taught, fed, protected, provided, cared, healed, encouraged, washed feet, and did many other things in the service of man. This is our God, the servant king!

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that you sent your Son to show us the way to you. Lord Jesus, I thank you for all that you have done for our salvation. Your teachings are amazing but your death on the cross is breathtaking. Thank you for washing our sins in your precious blood. Father , we pray that you help us grow in humility like your Son and selflessly serve those around us, teaching them about your Kingdom, healing those who are sick, and helping those in need. In the name of Jesus, we pray. Amen. 

December 18th, 2020

 For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich. 2 Corinthians 8:9

In this fourth meditation of our “Hail The Incarnate Deity” theme for the Christmas season, we will be looking at the 2 Corinthians 8:9 verse.

The context of the passage as we read in 2 Corinthians 8:7 is that Paul is encouraging believers in Corinth to be generous. “But since you excel in everything–in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in complete earnestness and in the love we have kindled in you –see that you also excel in this grace of giving.” In a way, this speaks to our modern concept of Christmas. Giving is not in short supply during the Christmas season. Christians and non-Christians alike lavish gifts to their friends, families, and the less privileged. It is the “Christmas spirit.” 

The way the verse of 2 Corinthians 8:9 is written should remind us of the passage of Philippians 2:6-8 we read yesterday. We saw that “though He was God” in that passage and here we see “though He was rich.” We have seen quite a lot about the limitations and deprivations that Christ had to accept in becoming a man. We saw Him as a refugee baby. We saw Him hungry. We saw Him tired after long ministry journeys on foot. We saw Him saying that the foxes have holes, birds have nests, but the Son of man had no place to lay His head. We saw how in His human life on earth he was far from being rich. So what wealth is Paul talking about in 2 Corinthians 8:9?  These are His pre-incarnation riches. There’s no doubt that God is rich and Christ was exceedingly rich. Though we could say “God is rich in mercy.“- Ephesians 2:4 and that would be true, the 2 Corinthians 8 chapter is pointing us to something more. Scriptures like Psalms 50:9-10: “I have no need of a bull from your stall or of goats from your pens, for every animal of the forest is mine, and the cattle on a thousand hills,” and “The earth is the LORD’S, and the fulness thereof”- Psalms 24:1, and “The silver is mine and the gold is mine,’ declares the LORD Almighty”- Haggai 2:8, all these tell us about divine riches. From a material point of view, God is exceedingly rich because everything in the world is owned by Him. But these are visible things.

There are also invisible things that God possesses. For example, we know that in Christ are hidden “All the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.”- Colossians 2:3. The “sophia” used in Colossians 2:3 is not limited to spiritual wisdom in terms of getting saved (1 Corinthians 1:30; 2 Timothy 3:15) but also wisdom in a practical sense of daily work, employment, innovation, business, and life (Ephesians 5:15-16; James 1:5; Proverbs 24:3-4; Proverbs 8:21; Proverbs 21:20; 2 Thessalonians 3:11). In Christ are hidden both the wisdom for eternal salvation and practical living on earth. This should be easy to understand in the age of Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Apple, Tesla, and Gilead Sciences. Nearly every invention that has produced billions of dollars in wealth has not started as a material product. It started as “knowledge or wisdom,” and then was converted into monetary yield as those ideas changed the way people did their businesses and life on earth. But this is still how wealth is perceived on earth. There’s even much more invisible wealth than what is hidden in Wisdom. After all, Jesus encouraged us: “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.”- Matthew 6:19-20 and He promised us “In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.”- John 14:2. These are mansions in heaven, so we cannot compare their values as real estate properties in Southern California or Manhattan. Where will Jesus get mansions for more than 2 billions of people who have believed in Him, if we count those who are alive today and those who have passed into glory the last 2000 years? Because He is rich. So, Christ was and is indeed wealthy.

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ means that He had to give up all that. It is what we read yesterday in Philippians 2:7 : “but emptied himself.” The Greek word used there is “Ekenosen,” and it means to deprive of content, to abase, to make empty.  Christ emptied Himself of all His divine glory in order to redeem man. If you have a cup of water and you pour water in a sink to empty the cup, all the water will go into the sink.  God’s plan for man has been to pour blessing “I will open the windows of heaven for you. I will pour out a blessing so great you won’t have enough room to take it in.” – Malachi 3:10 and “Blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.”- Ephesians 1:3 and – “I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh.“- Acts 2:17

Throughout history, there have been different concepts of answering Christ’s call. There are people like Francis of Assisi who felt that their calling to follow Christ would mean to give up everything like Christ and live in poverty like Him. There are multitude of others who have done differently. The calling of God does not require that all people should follow the same path, rather that they should follow the path God has charted for them ( 1 Corinthians 7:20).  What matters is becoming disciples and following Him. This promise that Christ gave to His followers applies to all: “’ Truly I tell you,’ Jesus replied, ‘no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age: homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields–along with persecutions–and in the age to come eternal life.’ ”- Mark 10:29-30.  Everything that disciples leave for Christ is returned a hundredfold in this present age and in the age to come they are rewarded eternal life. Those are the riches Christ has come to give us.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that you sent your Son as a weak human being so that through His poverty we may have access to your glorious riches. Jesus, we are grateful for all you have done for our salvation and for the mansions in glory that you have prepared for us. This Christmas season, we pray that you help us to appreciate and understand more fully all the blessings and riches you have brought to us so that we can be a testimony of all that your heart has desired to give to the world. In the name of Jesus, we pray. Amen !

December 19th, 2020

Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel. Isaiah 7:14

This verse is quoted in Matthew 1:23 as the fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy. Clearly, the prophecy that prophet Isaiah gave to king Ahaz had a dual fulfillment. The word “Almah” used in the Hebrew Bible does not necessarily mean virgin in the sense we understand it in the English language, which makes the dual fulfillment easy to understand as any young woman in Isaiah’s days could have had such a child as a sign for the prophetic word that was given to Ahaz.

The context was that Judah had been attacked by an alliance of 2 nations, Israel and Syria, as king Pekah of Israel and king Rezin of Aram-Damascus had joined forces to attack Jerusalem. God sent prophet Isaiah to reassure Ahaz, who is otherwise not a very notable king. His reign is detailed in 2 Kings 16, where we read:“Unlike David his father,he did not do what was right in the eyes of the LORD his God. He followed the ways of the kings of Israel and even sacrificed his son in the fire, engaging in the detestable practices of the nations the LORD had driven out before the Israelites.”- 2 Kings 16:2-3. So why is Jehovah going out of His way to send Isaiah to give an encouraging word to this abhorrent king as we read in the verses that precede Verse 14 in that Chapter of Isaiah 7? Today, if someone did what Isaiah did, I am almost certain he would be branded an ugly name. Ahaz was not the kind of king you would want to give an encouraging prophetic word.

My impression on why this prophecy was given is because of 3 reasons:

The first reason is because of the covenant God had with the house of David. God’s character stood fast even in the midst of unfaithfulness in the house of David. Sure, even David was not perfect, but he is always taken as the standard when the prophets compare how his descendants lived and reigned and how David lived and reigned. God remained faithful to his descendants who were not as faithful to Him. 1 Samuel 12:22 says: “For the sake of his great name the LORD will not reject his people, because the LORD was pleased to make you his own,” and Psalms 94:14 adds: “For the LORD will not forsake His people; He will never abandon His heritage.” God was determined to remain faithful even in the midst of Judah’s unfaithfulness. The sake of God’s own name is always a safe anchor when men have no good works to speak of.

The second reason is because of the boasting of Syria and Israel against Jerusalem. We read their plans in Isaiah 7:6 as written: “Let us invade Judah; let us tear it apart and divide it among ourselves, and make the son of Tabeel king over it.” This is when the Lord gives His own assurances in Isaiah 7:7 as we read: “Yet this is what the Sovereign LORD says: “‘It will not take place, it will not happen.” Whenever God’s people were provoked and those who attacked were boastful or belittled the God of Israel, the Lord seemed to make it His business to frustrate the enemies of His people (1 Kings 20: 23-29). This was not always the case when Judah was the one doing the attacking and the boasting, especially when provoking their brothers in Samaria (2 Kings 14:8-12). So, somehow,  since Judah was attacked in this passage of Isaiah and those who attacked were boastful, God decided to defend Ahaz despite his unworthiness.

The third reason is because the prophecy had a distant application as we read in Matthew 1:23 concerning the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ. In that fulfilment, Mary is a true virgin, and the conception of Jesus occurs without human involvement by the power of the Holy Spirit. Somehow the prior applications of the prophecy in Isaiah in the days of Ahaz seem to carry a Gospel meaning for the fulfilment of that prophecy in the birth of Jesus. Our Lord is indeed God with us, despite our unworthiness. We may not have sacrificed our children to Molech like Ahaz and yet each sin “is exceedingly sinful.”- Romans 7:13 as it offends the heart of God and rebels against the most tender divine love. Little sins would have been enough to get Christ crucified. God’s holiness demands that. We were also fighting against a powerful enemy, the devil, “who prowls around looking for someone to devour”- 1 Peter 5:8, using all sorts of schemes and alliances to try to ruin our souls and destroy God’s work. But “If God be with us, who can be against us?”- Romans 8:31.

Immanuel-God with us-is truly a precious reality we have in Christ. There are no words to express all the grace, blessings, privilege, peace, joy, and trust that name inspires. There’s something about that name!

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that you sent your Son Jesus Christ to die for our sins while we were yet sinners, ugly, rebellious, and abhorrent. We thank you for Immanuel, God with us, assuring your presence with us until the very end of the age. We pray, Lord, that you would continue to reveal to us more and more of your Son so that we can get to know Him, love Him, and serve Him more. In the name of Jesus, we pray. Amen !

December 21st, 2020

For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Isaiah 9:6

This prophecy in Isaiah is probably one of the most commonly read Christmas Scripture. Along with the other Isaiah 7:14 we saw in our last “Hail The Incarnate Deity” devotional, they are read Christmas after Christmas. If you are blessed to start celebrating Christmas as a kid, you get to memorize them by the time you are an adult . In the Isaiah 7:14 prophecy, we had seen that Christ was the prophesied Immanuel—God with us. That He is “God with us” despite our unworthiness. He is “God with us” amid the flood and battle. If one of the most abhorrent Jewish kings, Ahaz, could have Immanuel prophesied over him, then no one is too far from God’s mercy and grace. Christ has come to reconcile us with God regardless of how deep our miserable condition may be. Apostle Paul can testify that. The thief on the cross can testify that. Saint Augustine can testify that. Throughout history, millions of saints can testify to God’s great grace that transformed them from sinners to saints, no matter how far from God they had been.

“To us a child is born, to us a Son is given” is for all of us. Isaiah 9:1 starts talking about Galilee of the gentiles, the land of darkness. We may go into the details of those starting verses of this chapter during a future Christmas devotional, but let it suffice to point out today that those verses demonstrate the fact that the child was for both the Jews and Gentiles. He was given to all mankind.

“Government will be on his shoulder” reminds us the purpose for which Christ was born. Since man fell from glory in the garden of Eden, man lost government authority on earth as it ought to be. He gave the reins over to Satan who has swayed political empires and kingdoms and wrecked havoc throughout history. All authority in heaven and on earth would be given to this child who is born for us. He would defeat the devil, crush his head, and take the keys of hades and death. He reclaimed the government of earth for man, to be administered in justice and peace. Though the Hebrew word used for government in Isaiah 9:6 is “Hammisrah,” which is different from “Radah/Weyirdu” used in Genesis 1:26, they carry a relatively close meaning of ruling and dominion. Redemption may start with cleansing man from sin, but ultimately, it is about restoring righteous government on earth.

“He will be called Wonderful Counselor.” The Hebrew word for Counselor here is “Yowes” and it means to exchange counsel, to advise, to consult, to deliberate, to devise a plan. It reminds me of David. He liked to take counsel with the Lord every chance he got. “Shall I go up to the Philistines ?”- 2 Samuel 5:19. It’s like He did not want to do anything without involving the Lord and taking His guidance. This is marvelous considering the complex nature of life and the decisions we have to make in which we do need more than human ideas of problem solving. Few years after I got saved, I started serving in ministry, and like many other young ministers, I attended several leadership training seminars. There always seemed to be plenty of advice offered in terms of church growth, team work, and goals setting in those meetings, and yet I also seemed to sense that many of the modern church leadership courses gave the impression that the book of Acts was out-of-mode. It seemed to me that many Christians had resorted to the counsel of management experts in the world rather than the Wonderful Counselor who exploded Jerusalem, Samaria, Antioch, Damascus, Alexandria, Rome, and Macedonia just few years after Pentecost. We do need many advisors and counselors in the church project, but ultimately, we have to make sure that the Wonderful Counselor is in our midst steering the ship and building His church.

“Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.” The Son who is born for us is God Himself. His name is above every other name, because who has a greater name than that of Jehovah? He is the Lord God Most High- Jehovah El-Elyon. He is the Son who is the image of the Father. The Father is in Him and He is in the Father. They are in a mysterious, inseparable union. How could we ever say “show us the Father?”- John 14:8. He is also the Prince of Peace. Christ made a rather powerful declaration when He said “my peace I give to you.”- John 14:27. This is interesting because He had warned the disciples “Do not think I have come to bring peace on earth.”- Matthew 10:34. So which is it ? Did He come to bring peace or not? If we pay attention, we will see that John 14:27 and Matthew 10:34 are not the same. In John 14:27, He is addressing the disciples, it is given to them, not to everyone. As a matter of fact, He differentiates His concept of peace and the concept of peace that the world has. “I do not give to you as the world gives.”- John 14:27. The world gives with arms stretched and flexed, capriciously. It’s unpredictable because it has no fixed morals about what is right or wrong. The world calls evil, good; and it calls good, evil. So, of course, that cannot be understood as bringing peace on earth. But why do angels sing “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests”- Luke 2:14? It is because God wishes ill no man. He came to destroy the sin that was destroying man. He loved the world so much that He was willing to step into its mess and bring the peace that is available through the cleansing with His precious blood. For that peace to be real to us, we have to allow Christ to be the ruler of our hearts and lives (Colossians 3:15). We will experience the peace that surpasses understanding available for those who walk in the Spirit (Romans 8:6).  It is an internal peace even when there might be outward turbulence. There’s no shadow of turning with Him, so that is the peace that has come to abide for those who are in Christ. It is upto the world to take that offer. World war I and World war II are pretty recent, but world history is marked by many catastrophic wars, that took peace from the earth and killed millions of people. The reason war persists is because this peace through Christ’s blood is solely on His terms. The world still hopes it has an alternative solution to peace. That’s why everlasting peace will not be celebrated on earth until He returns as a victorious king and mighty conqueror—bringing in His millennial kingdom on earth.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that unto us who were far from you, a Son was born. That unto us who were destitute, a Son was given. Unto us who were confused and direction-less, a Wonderful Counselor was given. Unto us who had impossible problems, a mighty God came to dwell with us. Unto us who needed families, we were given the Everlasting Father. And unto us who were troubled, we were given the peace that surpasses understanding in this prince of peace. We pray, Lord, help us to sanctify and revere Christ as Lord, so that His kingdom will continue to grow within us and be revealed through our consecrated lives. In the name of Jesus, we pray. Amen !

December 22nd, 2020

Of the greatness of his government and peace there will be no end. He will reign on David’s throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever. The zeal of the LORD Almighty will accomplish this- Isaiah 9:7

 This verse follows Isaiah 9:6 we saw yesterday in this “Hail The Incarnate Deity” themed Christmas season devotional. We had seen that unto us a child is born and government will be upon His shoulders.

The Hebrew word “Marbeh” translated as “greatness” in NIV is also translated as “increasing” in other versions. It can also mean abundance. The translation has a significant impact on the understanding of the meaning because, if Christ has only a great millennial government that starts after His second coming, then that would be the best word to use. But if His reign has already started after ascending to the Father, then the increasing of His government would be an ongoing thing right now and would culminate into the consummation of the marriage with the bride—the church—and His final establishment of the millennial kingdom on earth. This passage itself does not favor either “greatness” or “increasing” translation and we would have to rely on several other Scriptures to understand the best way to take this.

When Mary went to visit Elizabeth after she had received the prophetic word from angel Gabriel about the birth of Jesus, she sang the song known as Magnificat. In Luke 1:52 she sings: “He has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble.” Mary knew that Jesus was born for greatness and would sit on the throne of His father David as Gabriel had announced that: “He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David.”- Luke 1:32. So, for Mary, this was already a done deal. The child she was carrying was king. The Lord had brought down rulers from their thrones and enthroned His own Son. When she sang “He has brought down rulers,” she used a form of past tense. But Jesus was still in the womb, so we see no realization of His reign at that time. As He grew older, we see him approaching Jerusalem on the day we celebrate as Palms Sunday, sitting on a donkey, and we see people expectantly celebrating his coming kingdom: “The crowds that went ahead of him and those that followed shouted, “Hosanna to the Son of David!” “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” “Hosanna in the highest heaven!“- Matthew 21:9. In  the Gospel of John’s account of this event in John 12:13, he records: “They took palm branches and went out to meet him, shouting, “Hosanna!” “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” “Blessed is the king of Israel!” But they were only singing prophetically. He was not the king yet. They might have been wishing to make Him one there and then, but it was not yet to be. When reviewing the charges against  Him, Pilate pointedly asks this question: “’Are you the king of the Jews?’ ‘You have said so,’ Jesus replied.”- Luke 23:3. Jesus did not deny that He was king. But He also clarified what His kingdom was and what it was not : “Jesus said, ‘My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jewish leaders. But now my kingdom is from another place.’”- John 18:36. So Jesus was already king but His kingdom was not of this world. Even in His humbled state as a man on earth, standing before trial, He did not shrink from declaring that He was a king. But where was His kingdom from then?

40 days after Jesus rose from the dead, He ascended to heaven before the eyes of His disciples: “After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight.”- Acts 1:9. As He had commanded the disciples to wait for the promise of the Holy Spirit, they did wait, and on the day of Pentecost, Peter preached Christ: “Exalted to the right hand of God, he has received from the Father the promised Holy Spirit and has poured out what you now see and hear.”- Acts 2:33. It is after that verse in Acts 2:34 that we see one of the first New Testament interpretations of Psalms 110:1, where it is written: “ The Lord said to my Lord, ‘sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool.’” Of course, Jesus Himself had once alluded to that Psalm as we see in Matthew 22:41-46. So in this book of Acts sermon, Peter recognized that this was about Jesus. He had ascended to take His throne “from another place.”  He was enthroned at the right hand of the Father. Christ was already king. Then that day, 3,000 people were added to the church or as we would say today, 3000 people came into the kingdom. So the kingdom of Christ increased. Few weeks after that, they had exploded to even more thousands. So the kingdom of Christ had increased even more. As of this 21st century, there are over 1 billion Christians in the world, so the kingdom of Christ has continued to increase and expand. Christ had promised:  “I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”- Matthew 16:18. He has fulfilled that promise and He will continue to do so as He declared: “And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.”- Matthew 24:14. So we are seeing a pattern now. There’s an ever increasing of His government. It has become much bigger than it was 2000 years ago in terms of people brought in but it is still a work in progress that gets better and better, greater and greater.  He also has not yet set up His final millennial kingdom on earth.

Puritan theologians have called the current reign of Christ in the church age “the mediatorial kingdom.” He sits on the throne in heaven interceding for the church, which is carrying out the mission He has sent us to do. In this mediatorial reign of Christ, other governments are still operational, and they receive their commissioning from Him (Romans 13:1). However, they are under His rule- as vassals, so to speak (Psalms 82). Everything under the heavens is under His feet as He rules overall and He also doubles as the head of the church (Ephesians 1:22). But only the church acknowledges and expresses what His kingdom looks like: “righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit.”- Romans 14:17. The mediatorial kingdom is typified by the reign of David, so it is a reign through war (1 Kings 5:3; Hebrews 10:13). The millennial kingdom is typified by the reign of Solomon, so it will be a reign of peace (1 Chronicles 22:9; Isaiah 2:4). Just like the first phase of Joseph’s life while he was still with his brothers was a type of the life of Christ on earth. His “brothers” who crucified Him will recognize Him when He returns. In the meantime, the church adorns herself with the full armor of God in order to prevail in Spiritual warfare (Ephesians 6:10-18). With that, the kingdom continues to increase in strength just like David’s kingdom was, by “destroying the works of the devil”- 1 John 3:8, until finally He will return and establish His peaceful millennial kingdom. Then, we finally get to rest from war and enjoy everlasting peace. The zeal of the Lord will accomplish this.

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that you sent your Son who taught us about your righteous and peaceful government. We thank you that He is currently interceding for us and you are answering our prayers in these days of Spiritual warfare. We pray, Lord, that you open our eyes to be watchful, so that in our doctrines and in our lives, we will be brought up into the full stature of Christ, unto a perfect man. Lord, we pray that you increase our fire to expand your Kingdom. We eagerly await when our faith shall become sight, and to that end we pray: even so, Come O Lord! In Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen!

December 23rd, 2020

So also, when we were underage, we were in slavery under the elemental spiritual forces of the world. But when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law. To redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship. Galatians 4:3-5

 The passage that starts from Galatians 3:1 upto Galatians 4:11 deals with bondage/slavery versus freedom, immaturity versus maturity, tutelage versus emancipation, law versus grace, works versus faith. It talks about adoption to sonship and being heirs. While we will be looking at Galatians 4:3-5 only in our “Hail The Incarnate Deity” themed devotional for this Christmas season, it is good to keep in mind the larger context.  The Galatians 3-4 passage is a shorter version of what Paul writes in Romans chapters 4 through 8.

The Greek word for “underage” is nepioi, it means children. The word itself is neutral. It can be good or bad, depending on the context. For example, in Luke 10:22 we see “At that time Jesus, full of joy through the Holy Spirit, said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this is what you were pleased to do.” So each time we see “nepios,” it is not necessarily a bad word that means immaturity. There’s a certain childlikeness that God loves. The things that Jesus was praising the Father for at that time was a mission accomplished by the disciples that involved casting out demons. Many scholars or those who would have been considered “adults” of his day, the scribes and Pharisees, would not have been able to do that. So, “nepios” there is a good word. With that being said, in the Galatians 4:3 verse, it is a negative word. It suggests a disadvantaged, disenfranchised, retrograde, regression state. Young children are in a tender age and depending on the influence they have, they can have a good or bad experience. For their own protection, they may have to be taught certain things. Paul discusses how Jews were like such young children before Christ came and how this weakened condition affected them.

We love the stories of how Israel was redeemed from Egypt, taken from slavery into the inheritance of the promised land. But like many other Bible stories, this is figurative. Because the way Paul talks about the law here, it does not sound like an advantage. It’s like they were taken from one slavery under the Egyptians to another slavery under the law of Moses. But not just that, they were also in slavery “under the elemental spiritual forces.” Some versions say “elementary principles of the world.”  What does Paul mean by that? He certainly is not using slavery to sin or slavery to the law. He knows those terms and he uses them several times in different parts of his epistles. The Greek word used here is “stoichea” and it means “something orderly in arrangement.” For example, the ABCs of the alphabet could be considered an orderly arrangement. The closest Scripture that Paul writes with a similar meaning is Colossians 2:8 where he states: “See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ.” He follows up on this later on in that Chapter in Colossians 2:16-18 by talking about festivals like New Moon, Sabbath, acceptable and unacceptable foods—because, he says, these things were only shadows of things to come. The reality would be found in Christ. This is in line with what Paul further writes in Galatians 4:8-10. Today, we can expand the understanding to include the belief that someone can be a good Christian during the Christmas season or on Easter and a “bad” Christian throughout the rest of the year. That’s not Christianity.

Jesus spent a considerable amount of time in his teachings talking about the irrelevance of rituals. For example, in Matthew 15:11-20, we see a big argument about whether foods or even eating without washing hands can make someone unclean. Do those things make someone lose their salvation? Stand guilty and unrighteous before God? These were the big debates of the day before Christ came. While we may laugh at the trivial, comical, and the shallow nature of such debates today, these were pretty serious topics for them. There are places even today where religious rituals are still held in high esteem. This is why it was a form of bondage that only unemancipated minors could be held hostage to. Considering how Satan loves such spiritual distractions that waste people’s time, translations that use “spiritual forces” rather than “elementary principles”  are not that far off.

“But when the fullness of time came, God sent His Son, born of a woman, born under the law.”- That fullness of time coincided with the time Caesar Augustus issued a decree that everyone should be counted in a census. Joseph and Mary, who were engaged at that time, had to travel from Nazareth to Bethlehem (Luke 2:1-4) . In Google maps it is a 150 km trip, which could probably have taken 5-7 days for a late term pregnant woman to walk such a distance on foot or 3 days if they were travelling on horses. People who might be in similar circumstances today may say “this is such a bad timing.” Not for Joseph and Mary. Not for God and His beloved Son. We have to come to a realization that what often may seem to be inconvenient circumstances could actually be God’s vehicle to advance His agenda. Not only Jesus was born under the law of Moses, he was also born under the rules of Caesar. He would later teach “render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s; and render to God the things that are God’s”- Matthew 22:21. Jesus lived in obedience to the law of God and also obeyed the laws of the land, as long as they did not infringe on God’s commandments. So in the fullness of time, He was born under these laws. The coming of age of God’s people was set in God’s eternal counsel. The Word became flesh through the womb of a Jewish woman at the time the Father had decreed. The emperor’s decree just so happened to coincide with God’s schedule. Charles Wesley may write in his hymn “Late in time behold Him come,” and though that may be true relative to history, it was the right time as God is never late. In keeping with the Galatians 4 passage interpretation, this was the time appointed of the Father for the child to receive inheritance. As far as we are concerned, 2000 years after Christ came, that fullness of time is long gone, “the night is nearly over, the day is almost here.”- Romans 13:12.

“To redeem those under the law that we might receive adoption to sonship.” The purpose for which God’s Son was born into the world involves many things. He was born for government. He was born to destroy the works of the devil. He was born to redeem those under the law. His kingdom frees us from elemental traditions, religious rituals, and spiritual forces so that we may have a right relationship with God as His born again sons. Our new birth that only the birth, life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ could have made possible, makes us new creations and restores our previously lost ability to have communion with the Father. It prepares us for spiritual maturity to receive the promises for the seed of Abraham that are ours in this present age and our eternal inheritance in the age to come.  

Prayer: Father God, I thank you that in the fullness of time you sent your Son to be born of virgin Mary and lived an exemplary life obeying your law in a family that had been obeying Caesar’s decrees. Lord, I pray that you help us to render unto you what belongs to you and to render unto civil governments what belongs to those. As the night is nearly passed and our salvation is closer than when we first believed, I pray that you give us the wisdom to redeem the time so that we can live in a way that will glorify you and share this message of liberty with those who are still under bondage. In the name of Jesus, we pray. Amen !

December 24th, 2020

 But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord.” Luke 2:10-11

After Joseph and Mary arrived in Bethlehem for the census, she gave birth to Jesus. They had traveled from Nazareth because of the decree issued by Caesar Augustus. “While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born”- Luke 2:6. This was a fulfillment of the Micah 5 prophecy. It’s interesting because that Micah prophecy was used by Herod’s court to determine where exactly Jesus was supposed to be born (Matthew 2:4-8). They could not have looked the whole country. They needed to narrow down their search. This is where the Magi had travelled and where the star had stopped. Some say, the Magi could have taken a year or so to arrive, but if Joseph and Mary had left their place of residence in Nazareth to go to Bethlehem solely for the census, would they have been there for an entire year or 2 years? So, the edict issued by Caesar Augustus for the census was somehow pushing the fulfillment of that Micah prophecy.  We may go through the details of that prophecy in a future Christmas season devotional, but for now we can take note of how this otherwise inconvenient decree of Caesar actually pushed the holy family to the finish line of God’s eternal plan.

After Jesus was born, “angels from the realms of glory” appeared to shepherds who lived out in the fields. These weren’t people trained in theology of their day. They weren’t Scribes and Pharisees. They were not in a high class either, like regional merchants doing big business across the Middle East. They were just poor shepherds who were doing the regular job of watching their flocks “in fields where they laid.” We have come to associate such angelic visitations with times spent in prayer, evangelism, and missions, perhaps connecting it with what we see in the book of Acts—and to a great extent even here that’s what it is about. Because the angels were bringing “Good News,” only at that time it wasn’t widely spread and there weren’t many people who knew it. So, an angelic visitation took place in an unlikely place for those with hearts that were receptive. “God with us” does not have a specification of where we have to be to experience His presence. Shopping mall, farm, at work, at church, watching flocks, driving a car, learning Mathematics, in a senator’s office, in a head of government’s house, in an airport, bus station, inside a train, in restaurants, libraries, low-income housing, homeless shelter, hospitals—all of these places God is with us. The shepherds were among the first to experience that reality. We do not need to agonize to have God’s presence. God is with us all the time wherever we are. We may seek Him to come closer to Him and be more intimately aware of His will and presence in our lives, but He is already with us.

The angel’s message was:

“Do not be afraid, I bring you Good News that will cause great joy for all the people.”- Mary had heard about the same “do not be afraid”- Luke 1:30 from Gabriel. This is usually a message we actually see when God comes to reassure that He is with us. When an angel appeared to Gideon in the Old Testament he also said “do not be afraid.”- Judges 6:23. Gideon was initially shocked by the visitation and inquisitive: “Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but if the LORD is with us, why has all this happened to us? Where are all his wonders that our ancestors told us about.”- Judges 6:13. In Gideon’s days they had been impoverished by the Midianites who attacked from time to time and took away their possessions. They had been crying out to the Lord because of that (Judges 6:7). There are certain similarities with the time of the birth of Jesus. They were under the Roman empire, asked to pay taxes, ordered to be registered in a census, and their identity had been severely attacked in the previous 200 years that had passed. Even though the Jewish-Roman war did not take place until 66 AD, Judas of Gamala led a political resistance known as “The Fourth Philosophy” during this time of the census of Quirinius. Many devout Jews had been crying out to the Lord for deliverance and God had been revealing Himself to them (Luke 2:25-26). Some with faltering faith could have been like Gideon and asked: “If God is with us, why did all of this happen?” When God comes to visit us with Good News, He comes with assurances, peace, and joy. Considering the overwhelming pattern of this in Scripture, I would be in doubt, and even suspicious, where those 3 things are not found in a message that God is with us. On the other hand, if God leaves a people, if the glory has departed, if churches are like those we read in Revelation chapter 2-3, then people can expect the opposite.

What did Jesus bring that would cause “great joy?”  This reminds me of the time Philip went to preach in Samaria: “There was great joy in the city.”- Acts 8:8. The paralyzed had walked, the blind had seen, those who were deaf had been able to hear, and demons that tormented many people had been cast out. Thousands of people had been gloriously saved and came into the kingdom. What was there not to rejoice about? There’s great joy in heaven over one sinner who repents (Luke 15:7) and what brings heaven so much joy is bound to bring joy to man on earth. The Good News of eternal life, of not having to look at death as the end of all things, but rather a transition to even better place in glory should cause all of us great joy. The temporal life becomes more meaningful inasmuch as it is about preparing for that eternal life. That makes even the greatest sufferings on earth for 5-50 years infinitesimal compared to the infinite years of heaven’s joy and glory. The shepherds probably may not have grasped all of this that very moment, but they would eventually find out. What might have been a silent night up to that moment suddenly turned into a merry and curious night.

“Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you. He is Messiah, the Lord.” I have heard teachings that said that Jesus did not become the Christ, the Messiah, the anointed one, until John the Baptist baptized him and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in a form of a dove. Because the Holy Spirit anoints us to do something and only after baptism was Jesus ready to fulfill His mission.  They say that is the time He became Christ, the Anointed One.  I understand the intent of such teachings is to tell people the importance of the Holy Spirit; but clearly, that’s an error, since the angels are calling Jesus the Messiah immediately after birth. Just like they are calling Him the Savior before He is crucified and Lord before He is risen. The Word of God had become flesh and He had finally been laid in a manger. What a wonder He is ! 

Prayer: Father God, we thank you for this message of Good News and great joy to us. We thank you for giving us your Son, in whom we have everlasting life. We thank you Lord Jesus, for being our Teacher, our Healer, and our Baptizer in the Holy Spirit. We thank you for being our Good Lord, reigning over all our affairs in a such perfect way. This Christmas season, we pray that our eyes may be opened to your wonders anew and be captivated by this great love you have loved us. In the precious name of Jesus, we pray. Amen!

December 25th, 2020

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. John 3:16

This is perhaps the most famous Bible verse. Every Christian I know can quote this verse and everyone who is not able to do so, should try to learn that this Christmas. Even non-christians may know it because of hearing it quoted so many times when Christians are doing outreach or missions in one way or another. We will look at this verse in this final “Hail The Incarnate Deity” for this year’s Christmas season devotional.

“For God so loved the world.”  This is our Father God who loved the world. Often God’s holiness and judgments for sin can seem to make us forget God’s great love. Stories like the flood in the days of Noah, the fire and brimstone falling on Sodom and Gomorrah, Egypt wiped out at the Red Sea, Israel perishing in the wilderness with Moses unable to enter Canaan, the fall of Samaria in the Northern kingdom of Israel, the fall of Jerusalem after Nebuchadnezzar’s siege and subsequent captivity in Babylon, the list is long. God hates sin. God is angry at sin. God punishes sin. We know this pretty well. But this is not the end of the story. It is certainly something we have to keep in mind. The fall of man has made this a necessity to be continuously aware of. But we have “Good News” for a reason. The Good News is that despite all of this, God loves us. God communicated that love to us. God made a way for that love to save us from the coming wrath, His final destruction of all that is rebellious against His plan for man. God sent His son as our Savior to save us from that eternal doom. “The punishment for our sin was upon Him.”- Isaiah 53:5. Glory to God! Gloria in exelcis Deo!

For God so loved the world introduces the greatness of that love. “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”- John 15:13. What are you willing to do for your friends? What about strangers? Jesus tells of an interesting story of a friend knocking at the door at midnight when a family is sleeping (Luke 11:5-13). That friend does not want to be disturbed. Waking up at night is a little inconvenience but the price is not that costly, especially for a friend. But that man did not want to wake up until the friend became more and more importunate. It’s only after persistence and what seemed to be rude banging on the door that he wakes up to help his friend. From a human point of view, our love falls short. In the light of this, it’s amazing to see what God did for His friends. For God so loved the world, that He did not think it was inconvenient to leave His throne above and come down to the earth—not with footsteps in the cool of the night—to see if the men He had created had found out they were naked—but to be born among them like a baby—to share in their daily struggle, work as a carpenter, teach them the ways to His kingdom face to face, eat bread and fish with them, heal many who were sick, raise others from the dead, endure insult, attacks, and betrayals—and finally stretch His arms on the cross as those people he came to visit hit nails in His arms. The excruciating pain of each hammer, the blood flowing from hands to the armpits, the bitter vinegar in the mouth, the crown of thorns to mock his royal status, and finally die like a criminal in the eyes of the whole world. That is the price of love in God’s eyes. For God so loved the world that He sent Jesus to do all of this. He was like “I have indeed seen their misery”—Exodus 3:7 but this time I am no sending Moses. I am not sending Gideon. I am not sending David. I am coming down myself. 

Christmas is a beginning of a journey. The Son of God becomes the Son of Man. It starts cold, smelly, and poor—travels through preaching, healing, and fellowship—accompanied by resistance, persecution, and snares—and ends with humiliation, a kangaroo court, and execution. For God so loved the world that He gave His most precious son to endure all of this in order to save the world from itself. In order save hopeless man who could not have been able to return to God no matter how much he tried to do so. In order to give a brand new life to those who would leave their old lives behind and follow Him. In order to put an end to the tragedy of death once and for all and bring in immortality for those who would believe in His death and resurrection. This is what we celebrate on Christmas. This is the love of God that we see in Jesus as a baby, as a teacher, as a dying Savior, and as a Risen King. Hail The Incarnate Deity!

Prayer: Father God, we thank you for loving us so much that you gave us your Son Jesus to come and live on this earth and know our struggle, share our problems, and finally die for our sins on the cross. We are debtors and we would never be able to repay that kindness. We pray, Father, that you give us the strength to do as much as we can to love you back and live for your glory. In the name of Jesus, we pray. Amen !