Love One Another

There are a lot of angry voices in the world. In the news, in politics, social media - you hear them everywhere. Many of these voices claim to be followers of Jesus. It can be so confusing. Fortunately, Jesus told us how we can spot a real follower of his. This is what Jesus said: “I give you a new command: Love one another. Just as I have loved you, you are also to love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” John 13:34-35 (CSB) The idea here is: love is something one does - it can be seen. These loving actions are a true marker of a follower of Jesus.

 

In the letter that James, the brother of Jesus, wrote in the New Testament, he says explicitly that this is so. James wrote: “What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save them? Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. But someone will say, “You have faith; I have deeds.” Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds. You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that —and shudder. You foolish person, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless? Was not our father Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did.” (James 2:14-22 NIV)

 

The apostle John agrees with James when he wrote: “We know that we have come to know him if we keep his commands. Whoever says, “I know him,” but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in that person. But if anyone obeys his word, love for God is truly made complete in them. This is how we know we are in him: Whoever claims to live in him must live as Jesus did.” (1 John 2:3-6 NIV)

 

What then did Jesus command? How did Jesus live? The apostle John in his gospel gives us the answers to these questions. John wrote that Jesus said, “If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you.” (John 15:10-12 NIV) You can spot a true Christian if they are a loving person who follows Jesus – who is learning to love like Jesus loved. This is how Jesus lived.

 

Love grows in a Christian like a fruit. It may start small, but it certainly grows. I encourage all Christians to obey Jesus’ command to love one another, growing this fruit. And I encourage all those who are seeking the real and living God to look for Christians who love like Jesus commanded. They can help you know the Truth.

Faith or Presumption?

There is a real difference between faith and presumption. But if it was really easy to tell the difference, a lot fewer people would make the common mistake of thinking that they are acting by faith when instead they are acting in presumption.

When Jesus was tempted by Satan to throw himself off the temple, the devil used scripture to make his point. It was certainly true that if Jesus fell off that pinnacle, the angels of God would lift him up so he wouldn’t have been hurt. But Jesus’ response was that scripture says that we are not to tempt the Lord,  even by our use of scripture. What did Jesus mean by this?

 

Just because God promised protection doesn’t give us the right to go and recklessly put ourselves in harm’s way, forcing God to back up his promise. What kind of relationship with God would that be? One of us loving God? Or one of arrogance, trying to force God’s hand?

 

There is a verse at the end of Mark that reads, Mark 16:17-18 (ESV) “And these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.” I want to focus in on the part that reads “they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them”.

 

There have been groups of Christians, because of these verses, who have had poisonous snakes and poison in their worship services. They say something like, the Bible says it, I believe it, and it’s so. Yes, it’s so, but like Satan’s temptation of Jesus, just because it is scripture doesn’t give us the freedom to try to bully God. That would be acting presumptuously. The intent of that verse is fulfilled in situations like the one Paul found himself in in Acts 28:2-6. There Paul was putting some wood on a fire and a poisonous viper bit him on the hand. The locals thought he would die, but nothing happened. So they wondered, who could Paul be? Thus Paul was able to preach the gospel to them.

 

These promises of protection - like Psalms 91:3 (ESV) “For he will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the deadly pestilence” - are there to encourage us in times like today. But to act presumptuously would be unwise. For the scripture also says, ”The prudent sees danger and hides himself, but the simple go on and suffer for it.” Proverbs 22:3 (ESV) Proverbs 27:12 says the same thing.

 

So let’s act in faith, trusting God for our safety and deliverance, not being fearful or panicky. This honors God. So does acting prudently in the face of danger, danger like the COVID-19 virus.

Christlikeness

When my wife and I began to have children my wife was always looking at our kids and trying to determine who in our families they looked like. This child had my forehead, and that child had her mother’s lips. I couldn’t see it at first like my wife could, but as the children grew older, I began to see what my wife was seeing. It was our family look, our family identity. Years later anyone could tell that we were a family because we looked and did things like each other.

 At the very beginning of the Bible God says, “Let us make man in our image, according to our likeness. They will rule the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, the livestock, the whole earth, and the creatures that crawl on the earth.” The next verse reads, “So God created man in his own image; he created him in the image of God; he created them male and female.” (Genesis 1:26-27 CSB) One of God’s desires in creating humanity was to have us look like him.

 

Jesus is God’s son. The apostle Paul tells us explicitly that Jesus is “the image of the invisible God”. (Colossians 1:15) Jesus himself said “The one who has seen me has seen the Father.” (John 14:9) God’s purpose in creating humanity was fulfilled by Jesus. Jesus did everything that God had ever wanted in humanity. Now, the question is, how do we come to look like Jesus? What would be our family resemblance?

 

One defining characteristic of God is that “God is love.” (1 John 4:8) So those who love look like God. Love is a defining characteristic for those in God’s family. Like with all family characteristics, they are received from the parents. In this case the parent is God himself. Like the Apostle John wrote, that to all who received Jesus by believing in him, God gave the right for them to be children of God. (John 1:12-13) By receiving Jesus as God’s Son and endeavoring to do what Jesus taught, a person begins to live a life of love.

 

Learning how to love is a life-long journey. It is made much easier by doing to others what Jesus has done to you. The more you know of God’s love for you, the more you are able to love others. The Apostle John wrote that we love because God first loved us. (1 John 4:19) 

 

Jesus once told a parable that relates to this about a guy who was going to go an a journey and gave his servants different amounts of money to invest. When he got back he was going to reward them based on how well they invested what they were given. Everyone did real well except for the person who received the least amount. That person was afraid to lose the money and had hid it in the ground – he did not receive a reward. Jesus’ point was this: invest into others what God has invested in you. Has God forgiven you? Forgive others. Has God been patient with you? Be patient with others. Has God helped you? Help others. Do this and you will grow in love, the family resemblance.

A Change of Heart

 A story is told of a mother who brought her son into church one Sunday. The boy stood on the pew and the mother asked the little boy to sit down. “Please sit down,” she asked. “No,” answered the boy. More firmly the Mom said, “Please – sit – down.” “No!” said the boy. Exasperated, the Mom pushed the boy down into a sitting position with a loud “SIT DOWN!” The boy looked angrily at his Mom and said, “I may be sitting down on the outside, but I’m standing up on the inside!” 

We don’t want to be like that little boy, looking like an obedient child, sitting so nicely, but in his heart he is actually completely different. What can change our hearts? True repentance.

 

Jesus once told a series of three parables, recorded in Luke chapter 15, about repentance. Seems that there were certain folks who took exception to Jesus’ continued relationship with people who were known to be of a low moral character. They did not see that these people had repented. Jesus explained the situation to his accusers in these parables. They apparently did not know what repentance really was.

 

Jesus spoke of a shepherd who had 100 sheep when one wandered away and became lost. The shepherd found the lost sheep and brought it home. In the parable, Jesus equates the shepherd finding the lost sheep as the moment of repentance. What did the sheep do to repent? Nothing.

 

Then Jesus tells another similar parable of a woman who had 10 coins and lost one of them. She searched and searched until she found it. Jesus again equated the finding of the coin with true repentance. What did the coin do to repent? Nothing.

 

Knowing that this could be confusing, Jesus tells a third parable to clarify his point. It is often called the parable of prodigal son. In this tale, the younger son insults his father, demands his inheritance before the father dies, and goes off and spends it all on wild living. After he has spent it all, he can’t make enough money to even feed himself. He decides then to ask his Dad if he could just be an employee, no longer worthy to be his son.

 

His Dad sees the boy coming from a long way away and runs to him, hugging and kissing him, calling him his son. At this point the boy stopped, and, realizing that he father really did love him, asked for forgiveness. Nothing was said about becoming an employee. Here was the point of repentance: the boy believed his father and accepted his father’s love. This is repentance. What did the boy do? Nothing, really. He just came and asked for forgiveness. The relationship between a father and wayward son was restored. The father initiated, and the son accepted, his father’s restoring love.

 

The associates of Jesus had reestablished their relationship with Father God by believing in Jesus. They were “sitting down on the inside”. They had repented by receiving Jesus, by accepting God’s love. Like the sheep and the coin, the boy was lost and then found. We too can be found by God when we receive Jesus and His love. This is the heart of true repentance: a change of heart about Jesus. This is how we become a child of God.

Alpha and Omega

 Many of us have heard the term “Alpha and Omega” applied to God. It usually means that God is in the beginning and the end of all things – that God himself is the Beginning and the End. While I do believe that this is true, I once had an experience that placed this divine designation in a different light.

 My mother usually came from Michigan to visit me and my family in Oregon every summer. We would all go together to the beach in Lincoln City for a week. Each year we looked forward to this time with great anticipation. We were in the process of making plans again for our special time, when my mother informed me that she would not be able to come this summer. She was seriously ill from cancer and could not make the trip.

 

We were devastated from this news. I knew I had to go back to Michigan to see my mother before she died. I thought to myself, “If my Mom can’t come to the beach, I’ll bring the beach to her.” She loved the beach, the sand and water. “I’ll go to the beach and dig up some sand and bring back a bottle of the sea water for her.”

 

When I arrived at the beach to collect my gift, it was storming; wind and rain drenched me. I went over to some rocks and filled up my water bottle. As I was getting a little teary eyed, thinking of how much my mother loved the ocean, I turned to look at the sand. The sand is ALL blackened from a recent oil spill. I’m soaked, emotional, and really needing to quickly find some clean sand.

 

I notice a patch of sand near the beach grass. It has an odd orange spot within it. I wonder, what is that? Walking over to the clear bit of sand, the orange spot begins to come into focus through my water spattered glasses. I get on my knees and the orange spot resolves into a toy shovel, probably left behind by some child. I use it to conveniently fill my bag with sand. It occurs to me that God has provided a tool for me so I can put the sand into the bag without having to use my hands. How kind!

 

But then my heart breaks. “Why is it,” I pray out loud, “I can see you in the small things, like this shovel, but it is so hard for me to see you in the big things, like my mother dying of cancer?”

 

A thought, right then, came to me: “If I am in the little things, I am also in the big. I’m the Alpha and Omega.” This concept instantly brought me peace. I could trust that God had not abandoned my mother in her time of need. The picture was bigger than I could see from where I stood.

 

Yes, my mother died of cancer a short while later. We buried the sand and water with her. Jesus is the Alpha and Omega -- the Beginning and the End -- who is in the Small and in the Big.

Fruit In Old Age

I have always wondered about that part of scripture where Jesus curses the fig tree for not having fruit, even though it was not the season for bearing fruit. Here is that passage of scripture:

Mark 11:12-14, 20-21 (NIV) The next day as they were leaving Bethany, Jesus was hungry. Seeing in the distance a fig tree in leaf, he went to find out if it had any fruit. When he reached it, he found nothing but leaves, because it was not the season for figs. Then he said to the tree, "May no one ever eat fruit from you again." And his disciples heard him say it. In the morning, as they went along, they saw the fig tree withered from the roots. Peter remembered and said to Jesus, "Rabbi, look! The fig tree you cursed has withered!"

Why did Jesus curse this fig tree? Maybe it was just a setup to show the power of believing? Since every time in the Gospels when this incident is recorded Jesus uses it to teach the power of faith, this could make sense. Except that it still doesn’t answer my question, why did Jesus do this? Why was it right for him to expect fruit on a tree in the off season?

Psalm 92:12-15 gives us a clue. “The righteous will flourish like a palm tree, they will grow like a cedar of Lebanon; planted in the house of the Lord, they will flourish in the courts of our God. They will still bear fruit in old age, they will stay fresh and green, proclaiming, "The Lord is upright; he is my Rock, and there is no wickedness in him."”

In this passage the righteous old folks will still bear fruit and be fresh and green. Yet old age is not the normal time to bear fruit. Having children is for the young. Older folks begin to wither since God has bound all things over to decay. How then do they do have fruit at the wrong time? By proclaiming that the Lord is upright and that there is no wickedness in him.

How do they know this? They have lived a full life. They have seen good and evil. How did they prevent their hearts from bitterness from seeing all the evil that happens to people and that may even have happened to them? They knew God as their Rock. They have come to trust Him and His word. The confessed the truth about God in worship and praise. They have seen and declared that there is no wickedness in the Lord their God.

Their fruit is a supernatural fruit that does not depend on the anything natural. Jesus was looking for supernatural fruit. This is why, I think, that Jesus had a right to expect fruit. He wasn’t looking for naturally generated figs, but supernaturally generated figs. The fruit God is looking for from us is not the kind we can produce on our own, but the fruit of the Holy Spirit in us. 

Anger

 If you watch the news, listen to your friends (or former friends!), wander around Facebook, or any social media, something is bound to give you an opportunity to be angry. Seems as if our entire social environment is purposely feeding people’s anger, flaming it into a bonfire of rage. It doesn’t matter whether you are Indigenous or non-native, democrat, independent, or republican, white or black, there’s plenty of real things happening to get the heat to rise.

 

So, what do we do with all this anger? Years ago I had severe lower back pain. The doctors could find no physical cause that would produce the level of pain I experienced. After a while, I discovered I was very angry, yet I wouldn’t admit this to myself. Why? Because I was angry with God. How could I, as a Christian, justify my being angry with God? I couldn’t, so I sublimated my anger. I hid it from myself, yet the physical effects still happened. My lower back tightened, causing real pain. Eventually I found, by admitting to myself that I was angry with God, that my pain went away. It wasn’t the anger in itself that caused my pain, it was the denial of my anger that did that deed.

 

The Bible has a lot to say about anger. Two verses come immediately to mind. One is Ephesians 4:26-27 (NIV) - “In your anger do not sin”: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold. Another is James 1:19-20 (NIV) - My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires.

 

Additionally, the Psalms often are concerned with anger, and much of it is about God’s anger. In the Psalms, God’s anger with evil and wicked people is explored in depth. Yet with God, anger is not about being offended or wanting to retaliate, but about justice. When God acts on his anger, justice is carried out.

 

Our anger does not make God nervous. Nor does it surprise him or cause him to reject us. We don’t need to hide our anger from God. God’s way of dealing with His anger was the cross. Jesus, God incarnate, took upon himself on the cross all the evil humanity has done. Jesus gave his life to forgive all those who angered him. So when we pray, expressing our anger to God, God has the opportunity to help us see things the way he does.

 

When the writers of the Psalms are angry, they turn to God for justice. To leave God out of the equation when we are angry is to experience anger with no hope for justice. This kind of anger progresses to bitterness, hopelessness, and violence. When you are angry, communicate to God about it in prayer. Then wait for God to help you see how to respond out of concern for the people who angered you, instead of getting revenge.

Playing the Music

 Playing the Music

 

I was asked a difficult question this week by a man who was seeking understanding. He asked me, “What is the biggest problem the church has in communicating its message to our society?” I was stunned for a moment trying to think of my answer. I then remembered something I had read recently (I don’t know where), which was an excellent summary of this issue.

 

My answer went something like this: Bach was a great composer. His music was some of the best that was ever written. Yet when someone who is not yet skilled tries to play a Bach cello sonata, it doesn’t sound very good. If your only exposure to Bach’s music was through people who couldn’t yet play it very well, you might conclude that Bach wasn’t a very good composer. The problem wasn’t the music, but how it was being played. So too the church’s problem in communicating its message to our society is not a problem with the message, but how it is played.

 

The church’s message, its music if you will, is the greatest and most beautiful ever written. But it is also, like many of Bach’s compositions, very difficult to play well. Our music has lines like “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) Or “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” (John 13:34-35) The church’s ability to communicate this first line has to do with how well they play the second.

 

Like all music, to play it well takes practice. One has to put in the effort to master the material. It is not enough to just know which note follows which, although that is very important. To play music well, it has to become part of you. Your focus is on the music itself, not the mechanics of playing.

 

When Christians learn to love well, our message can then be heard. We won’t obscure it with a mechanical rendition, or by faking what we have not yet mastered. There needs to be examples from those who play the message well, so the rest of us can know how it should sound.

 

Fortunately, such examples exist. Jesus Himself is the message, and an example of how the message is to be played or communicated. The apostle Paul encouraged us Christians to “Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God.” (Romans 15:7) When we do this, Jesus, and Jesus’ message, is heard clearly. The music is being played well.

 

So to those who are not Christians, I want you to remember that the music of Christ’s message is much deeper and more beautiful than anyone of us can ever play it. Hopefully, from time to time, you see glimpses of the grandeur of the music God wrote through Jesus. I invite you to come and learn, and become a person who truly loves God and people.