Sunday, February 26, 2017
“True Life, Faithful Life”
Scripture: Romans 8:1-17
Today, we appropriately complete our series on living a life in Jesus, as Wednesday begins our Lenten season. Lent will be a period of preparation to joyfully celebrate Easter in its entirety - from the crucifixion of our Lord Jesus on Calvary, to his glorious resurrection from the tomb of death.
So what kind of life should we already be living as we approach Lent? Over the past few weeks,
We’ve considered the need to place our entire life in the word of God, to let it guide us, and to let it instruct us.
We’ve considered the conflict that exists between the Law of Moses and the Law of God, that while Moses and those who followed him certainly had good intentions, their concept of honoring the Lord fell far short of what the Almighty truly wanted from them (and us!)
We discovered that it isn’t enough to simply receive God’s love and mercy for our sinful ways, but that we are also to show that same kind of love to others.
And last week, we considered the concept that true divine authority can only come through surrender to the servant heart.
But is this enough? Is living a Godly life sufficient to overcome the condemnation that comes to us because of our sin?
Read Romans 8:1-8
There is no longer any condemnation against those who are in Christ Jesus. That is the good news, but the question for today is, what is that “condemnation”, and how is it overturned by being “in Christ Jesus”?
This condemnation is that which will occur at the Final Judgment, and is pronounced because we have sinned against the Law of God. By our own means, there is no escaping the sentence – we are sinful, and how can the sinful ever atone (make good) for the sins that we commit? But God has set a plan in motion that will provide us with a way out – one that isn’t by our means, but by his. Paul tells us that we have been freed from the law of sin and death, which is the penalty for sin, through the coming of Jesus into this world. He came, not as God, but as a sinless Man, and by his offering at Calvary, his sacrifice in death would be sufficient to destroy the death that all of us so richly deserve.
After all, someone had to die for the sentence of sin, and Father God would accept Christ’s sacrifice on behalf of the world. And simply by our accepting this sacrifice in blood, our penalty for sin is exchanged for eternal life.
Now I have no doubt that at least a few of you are wondering “How does that happen? How can that work?” To tell you the truth, I have no idea, and doubt that anyone else knows for certain! But I do know that the Lord has said that it is true, and that is good enough for me. Accepting Christ’s sacrifice, though, is the tough part. It is more than just believing in Jesus as Lord – it means that we are to begin living a life that reflects him, even while we live in this world.
That doesn’t mean, though, that we will ever discover how to live a sinless life – we are still flesh and blood mortals. But by faith in Christ, and by rejecting the ways that the world would have us live and believe, and making the honest commitment to live our life in his way, Christ’s gift of eternal life will be ours.
The problem is that the ways of earth, those ways that we are most familiar with and, quite honestly, most comfortable with, are not God’s ways. Paul tells us that the ways of earth, the ways of sin, can only lead to death, but when we live in the ways of the Spirit of God, we will have eternal life. And we get to choose – will we surrender to the ways of the sinful nature, the ways that earth proclaims, and be caught up in the self-imposed sentence of death – or will we surrender to the ways of Almighty God, and know his living mercy?
Will it be freedom in Christ, or condemnation in the world?
We are told that a “life in the flesh” will never please God – that a life given to freedom in Christ and his way will be the only source of joy for the Lord. This gift of freedom is the Lord’s promise, and without it we can only lose out on the greatest gift of all time.
This is the truth, for if it wasn’t, Jesus’ death on the Cross would be useless and a waste, and God is never wasteful.
Read Romans 9-11
It’s a matter of control, isn’t it – not a forced control, but one that we readily accept. It is by our choice, our free will, as to whether we live under the control of sin, or under the control of the Holy Spirit. Some may wonder why we need to be controlled at all? In Mark 14:38, we find Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, warning his disciples to stay awake and pray, that they might not fall into temptation – he tells them that “The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.”
The human nature is, without exception, a weak and waffling characteristic. Our tendency is to submit to the sinful life – without some other influence for our lives, we will always allow sin to control our actions and thoughts. But if our desire is to live within the Spirit of God, we can no longer depend on our own strength and commitment to remain on course. We are in desperate need of God’s Spirit to fill us and to lead us – to provide a sense of control for our life.
Paul tells us that the presence of the Spirit within us is the evidence that we are living a life in Christ – that they are mutually inclusive, and can be no other way. If there is one in our life, there is the other. So what is the evidence of the Spirit’s residence?
It comes when we give up the old ways, and follow the teaching of Jesus. The gospels are full of examples of people giving up their unrighteous living, and beginning to follow the Lord’s ways, as well as those who refuse to change. In Acts 5:1-11, we read of Ananias and his wife Sapphira who sold some property, presumably to help the needy. But they kept a portion of the proceeds for themselves, and when they gave the remainder to the apostles to distribute, the truth came out. Instead of being praised for the gift, they both would be struck dead for the lie they were living.
We need to remember that sin is nothing more than a lie that is being told against God, and the judgment of death is on that lie. But if the Spirit is alive and well within us, the resurrection that lifted Jesus up will also lift us up with him.
Read Romans 8:12-17
Paul begins this section with the words “we have an obligation”. Some translations use the word “debt”, which might be a little clearer. Our debt, our obligation, is to the Lord’s sacrifice on our behalf. Our obligation is to live as the Lord would have us live, and to reject the life that comes from our sinful nature. Paul uses this thought to make two points.
The first is that we are to turn the death that sin brings to us back upon sin itself. When we live in the Spirit, we receive the power to turn death away from our own lives, and to cause sin itself to die within us. As Galatians 2:20 tells us, “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.” Paul says that our sinful nature must die on the same cross that received Jesus – in other words, it is by faith in Christ’s sacrifice, that by the blood that he gave up on Calvary, that our sin can be defeated. For it is when the sinful self dies, that the Christ can take his place and live within us.
Paul’s second point is that we can either be heirs to the world and all that it can give and all that it will receive (which, incidentally, is nothing but condemnation!) or, by faith in Jesus Christ, we can be heirs of God with him and receive all that the Lord has to give to his own. And the only criteria that will be used at the Judgment is whether we have fully accepted Christ as Lord and Savior and Master of our lives.
Gaining eternal life is truly as simple as that – surrender the world’s death and gain God’s Glory. Which would you prefer? Which will you choose?
Sunday, February 19, 2017
“Accepting Christ’s Authority”
Scripture: John 5:19-30
What images does the word “authority” conjure up in your mind? I suppose that it depends on the position that you are in as to how it may affect us. Are you a parent? An employee in business? A student? A person driving a car who just noticed flashing red lights in the rear view mirror? A police officer? A lawyer? A Judge? A defendant?
In secular terms, it depends on whether we are in a position to exercise it, or submit to it. But as a Christian, what does the word “authority” mean for your life? How might it be different than authority in the world’s view? Today, as we continue to consider the various aspects of living a life in Jesus Christ, we will examine how Christ’s authority influences our life.
Robert Fulghum, an author who wrote All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten, says that he placed alongside the mirror in his bathroom a picture of a woman who is not his wife. Every morning as he stood there shaving, he looked at the picture of that woman.
She is a small humped-over woman wearing sandals and a blue eastern robe and head- dress (sari). She is surrounded by important-looking people in tuxedos, evening gowns and the regalia of royalty. It is the picture of Mother Teresa, receiving the Nobel Peace Prize.
Fulghum said he keeps that picture there to remind him that, more than a resident of any nation, more than any pope, more than any chief executive officer of a major corporation, that woman has authority because she is a servant.
- Homiletics Online
As a Christian, we follow the example and authority of Jesus, who is, first and foremost, a servant, and as the ultimate servant, became the Ultimate Authority.
Read John 5:19-23
In the previous passage (John 5:1-18), Jesus had healed a lame man on the Sabbath, and the Pharisees were livid! And in the last few verses of that passage, Jesus refers to God as his “Father”, which sets the learned men of Israel off even further! We are told that because of this, the persecution would now begin in earnest, and the price on Jesus’ head had just gone up!
That is one of the problems with Divine authority – if the Lord uses it within his principles, people complain that he didn’t use it to suit their purpose, and if he doesn’t use it at all, the same folks will grumble that he didn’t because he couldn’t!
So, in our text for today, Jesus offers a primer on the how’s and why’s of Divine Authority.
First, he compounds the Father-Son issue even further by saying that the Son can only so what the Father does. He is affirming and clarifying the relationship that exists between him and Father God. It isn’t a relationship that he has established, or even accepted on his own – it is one that has been since before time began.
And he knows what the Father does, and desires him to do, because of an incredible love that exists between them. What can that love accomplish? It means that the dead can be raised to new life; it means that the sick and infirm can be made well; it means that the truth of God can, and will, be given to all who listen; it means that judgment is no longer based on what we do, but on what our faith believes that Jesus did! And what does this bring? It brings honor to the Son, as well as to the Father, if there is faith involved. And what if there is no faith? There can be no honor to either one.
It seems that the authority of God isn’t one of Judgment – it is simply one of an infinite love that exists within a relationship defined by the Father. And that is the problem that the Pharisees of Jesus’ day had, and it is one that continues to plague the world through the concepts advanced by both the legalists and the progressives of today – they want to define this relationship and its authority by their own terms, and desire little more than to leave God completely out of the arrangement.
The Son and the Father not only do the same work, they will never have the ability to do it differently! And today, we can also claim that the Holy Spirit is also included in that loving and intimate relationship, and is also incapable of doing or saying or counseling in any contradictory way.
The human aspect of Jesus became a servant, so that the love inherent in the Divine could be freed to do the work of the Father – more specifically, that of salvation. And what can that relationship do for those who profess faith in the Son? It means that we also must become a servant, so that the Divine can be freed to work within our lives! And if we don’t?
“He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him.”
And that is not a good condition to find yourself in!
Read John 5:24-27
And Jesus cuts right to the chase – if we believe the word that He speaks, and accept the truth that the Father offers, condemnation will be overturned. The unspoken concept here is usually missed – that we already stand condemned by the very lives that we live. No matter how good, no matter how justly, no matter how lovingly we offer our selves to the people of earth, it isn’t anywhere near to being sufficient to reverse the sentence of death. For without the words that Jesus spoke, and without the truth of God in our lives, we are lost.
Life is created by Almighty God, and rebirth into new life is also exclusively his to grant. Jesus calls each of us to surrender our limited understanding, our worldly desires, our plans, our “goodness”, our life, and to accept the life that He holds out for each of us. Nicodemus had trouble with this one, too, (John 3:1-21) but eventually, he would discover the point that Jesus was making – that by our means and purpose, this life is all that we will ever have. But that by renouncing the honors and glory and ways that we seek here, and by accepting the life that he wants us to live, a new and eternal life can come to us, simply by faith and trust in Him.
Read John 5:28-30
Hear, and accept, and receive life, or turn away, and refuse, and remain condemned. Those are the only two options – there is no other! And the issue of judgment comes up once more.
We typically base our understanding of judgment on our own court system. Both sides of an issue are presented to either a judge or a jury, and they, using their intellect and, unfortunately, their own prejudices and agendas, decide which side wins, based on the information presented. If we really think about it, the possibility for error in this form of judgment is phenomenal! A decision is made based strictly on what was said and allowed to be heard during the trial. Then human reasoning and assessment take over – the most imperfect way to reach a life and death decision that I have ever heard of. And yet, it is most likely the fairest one that we have at our human disposal!
But in the Final Judgment, there is only one side to be presented – and that is the Truth. In Zechariah 3:1-5 (NKJV), we discover that God’s judgment presents no defense (there is, obviously, no defense for defying the will of God!) and even the prosecution (Satan) is silenced, for what could Satan say, truthfully or deceitfully, that God doesn’t already know! The judgment is based solely on what the Judge knows about the person standing before him, the one that is referred to as “the brand plucked from the fire”.
Nothing will be hidden, nothing will be excused, nothing will have anything to say – not good nor bad, for us or against us, except whether we hear and believe the words that came from the Son, and whether we have accepted the absolute truth of the Father.
Whether we live in Christ or in the world is completely up to us – it is our decision to make. Will we follow the example of Christ that exists in servanthood to the Father’s will? Will we allow the will of God to prevail in our lives? Will we allow divine mercy to free us by faith and trust in Jesus?
Or will we decide to do it all on our own? The authority of Christ hangs in the balance – will it be allowed to work within and through us, or will we surrender to the completely ineffective and false authority that we find in the world?
The Lord has left that choice up to each and every person who will ever live on earth. May we all choose wisely.
Sunday, February 12, 2017
“Mercy”
Scripture: Luke 10:25-37
While many may believe that Jesus’ main purpose in this world was to overthrow the old ways of Israel, and to set up a series of “new commandments”, this attitude is far from the truth that Jesus lived. Certainly, there were various aspects of the Law of Moses that were not of God, and Jesus spoke strongly against them, but the Lord was solidly behind the Law of God. In Matthew 5:17-20, he pointedly tells the crowd on the hillside that abolition of the law was the last thing he intended to do – that he had come to “fulfill” the law, not to do away with it. In other words, his life would be given so that the law could be complete.
He was constantly butting heads with the Pharisees, Sadducees, and other Jewish leaders over the importance of the law in faith. In our text for today, Jesus, once again, is approached by the “wise men” of Israel, in an attempt to trap him into denying the law.
Read Luke 10:25-28
“What must I do to inherit eternal life?” Scripture tells us that this isn’t your routine question from the crowd – it is a test, a trial to see if Jesus really understood scripture and the law as well as he implied that he did. Interestingly, the question poised here is different than that recorded in Matthew 22:34-40, which is worded “which is the greatest commandment?”
Luke’s version focuses on the issue of Israel’s covenant, their inheritance from God, which was generally seen as 1) that they would become a great people, 2) that they would be blessed, and 3) that they would receive a land that was promised to them years before. (Genesis 12:1-3) But as the covenant had yet to be fulfilled in total, it had come to be seen as a promise that would be completed in eternity. The lawyer, therefore, was focused on the human-style inheritance he would receive in heaven. This mistake is no different than the expectation of many today - what is there about faith that will benefit them! “What’s in it for me?” And they want the answer to be in terms that they can understand and appreciate.
I expect that the lawyer was waiting for Jesus to offer some new commandment – one that the lawyer had never heard before and would never accept. But Jesus turns the tables on him, and asks him what the present law has to say about it! The original question was intended to test Jesus, and was, essentially, meant as an insult, but the Lord turns it back onto the questioner, placing the test firmly on him! “What have you read in the law?”
He answers correctly – that we are to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul and strength (and adds “mind” which isn’t included in the Shema (Deuteronomy 6:4-5), and adds that we are also to love our neighbor as our self (Leviticus 19:18). And Jesus compliments him on his knowledge of the word. The point that is made here is that without love for both God and others, we can never show love to either.
“What must I do to inherit eternal life?” This is one of the very few times in Jesus’ teaching when we are told that we have something to do, other than have faith in him! Love God and love others is what we must do, and if we truly examine the extent and depth that this love must take on, it will no longer seem to be a simple and informal requirement, for it is about putting our faith into practice.
Love God - trust God, obey God, have faith in God, give your all to God, without reservation, without hesitation, and without holding anything back!
Love your neighbor - help them, care for them, give them whatever they need, make them first in your life, regardless of who they are or what they may have done to you or others!
“Do this and you will live.”
Read Luke 10:29-35
“And who is my neighbor?” Another test? The Pharisee knew who he saw as his neighbor, but he wanted to see who Jesus saw as a neighbor. How far must the social and religious boundaries extend?
And Jesus tells one of his most recognized parables. It is about an undefined, unidentified, unnamed man, who had fallen into hard times. So who was he? Jesus left that up to the imagination of whoever was hearing the story, because for him, it didn’t matter – it only mattered that someone, anyone, was in desperate need of help, and that someone, anyone, must come to his aid.
Suddenly, someone does comes along and sees the man who is in need. For the beaten man, there is, at last, hope that he might be saved. It was a priest! Priests helped people, didn’t they? “Sir, I’m hurt very badly - will you help me?” But the priest crosses the road to keep from getting too close, and he continues on his way. No reason is given for the priest’s callous demeanor, and “hope” continues down the road.
But then, another man comes along – a Levite by his dress. The man thinks maybe this righteous man will help me. Weakly he cries out - “Sir, I’m hurt badly and I’m dying – please help me!” The Levite also sees the injured man, and also makes the conscious decision to avoid him at all costs, and help becomes a fleeting hope once again.
But then, through blurred eyes, he feels that someone else is approaching. He is so weak he can barely make a noise, and expects that this “hope” will also pass him by. But this traveler actually stops! It’s an ordinary person, a Samaritan.
At this point in Jesus’ story, the Pharisee must have been surprised by the choice of a Samaritan to be the one who shows “pity”. After all, those people were unclean, they were the offspring of marriages between Jews and Gentiles, they were worse than Gentiles – they were sinners beyond all reason - and they had been ostracized from Jewish society.
By depicting a Samaritan as the hero, as the true man of faith, Jesus has crossed the boundary of Jewish propriety. He is teaching that social barriers, racial barriers, religious barriers, regional and national barriers mean nothing when it comes to showing love to God and to others. So do you think the injured man cares who helps him? Is anyone in need going to turn down assistance regardless of where it comes from?
And the man experiences “hope” once again.
If the story ended here, we would all be severely challenged to be that kind of “neighbor”. But there is more, and that will stretch us beyond all reason!
The Samaritan cleaned and bandaged the injured man’s wounds; he interrupted his own journey and took the man to a place where additional help could be obtained. And the story still doesn’t end - he didn’t leave – he stayed all night, watching and caring for the man, and the next day, when the man was doing a little better and he was able to leave to complete his trip, he not only paid for the previous night, but gave the innkeeper money to continue the care for as long as it was needed, pledging that if even more money was needed, he would pay it the next time he traveled through the area.
The Samaritan, despised throughout Jewish society, is shown to not only have far more compassion that the two religious leaders did, but is also far more faithful to those two great commandments – the ones that lead to eternal life.
Are we even close to being that kind of neighbor? Are we ready to drop whatever we may be doing, and interrupt wherever we may be going, to help others in distress? And if we do, how far will we go to give them the help that they need?
Christians are all called to shatter the boundaries that are created by stereotypical prejudice. We are to tear down the barriers that separate social classes. We are the ones who Micah wrote his admonition for – Micah 6:8 – “He has shown you, O man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.”
Just as the Samaritan was, we are to not only talk about justice for the oppressed - we are to act justly in all that we do. We aren’t simply to be merciful - we are to love offering mercy to all who are struggling. We aren’t to simply do God’s work in this life, we are to do it humbly, without thought of reward or recognition or appreciation.
When Jesus turned the question of who our neighbor is back on the learned man, the Pharisee couldn’t, he wouldn’t, name the “neighbor” for who he was – he could only proclaim that the neighbor was the one who showed mercy.
May we, too, be that kind of unnamed, undefined, unappreciated neighbor to the people of this world.
Sunday, February 5, 2017
“True Purity”
Scripture: Matthew 15:1-20
So what does it really mean to live in Jesus? Since the days of the Pharisees, many believe that it means that we live within the law – that we are focused on “being and doing good”. But many others take an entirely different approach, and look to Galatians 5:18 in a literal but disjointed and non-contextual way - that “.. if you are led by the Spirit, you are not subject to the law.” And they believe that the life they lead, regardless of what they do, falls under this thought. The truth that both approaches to life seem to miss, though, is that 1) when we follow the Spirit of God, we will be living within divine law, and conversely, if we truly live within the Lord’s law, it is only because we follow the Spirit. The truth of the matter is found in Matthew 5:17-20, in which Jesus tells us that the law (the Law of God, and not necessarily that of Moses and the Pharisees!), will never pass away, and if it is held solely within itself, being incomplete and ineffective, it will also require fulfillment and understanding through him.
This passage takes us back to James 2:26 – “As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead.” So while God’s commandments for our lives are still absolute and required, we also must have faith in Christ – faith in all that he taught, faith in all he did, and faith in all that he accomplished on our behalf. Both are absolute necessities.
But what do we do about the discrepancy between the law of Moses and the Law of God? How do we know which is what, especially when there is overlap? The solution is that when we are in doubt, we need to ask ourselves “So what did Jesus teach?” And that is always the best starting point.
Read Matthew 15:1-9
The problem with the law is that it is neither sufficient nor effective, in and of itself. No matter how extensive a law is, there will almost always be a loophole so large that you can drive that proverbial “Mack truck” through it. And people spend hours of their time looking for those gaping holes in both the law of our legal system and in the commandments of God, instead of looking for the truth and heart of it all, and following that!
So what was the big deal regarding washing your hands before you ate?
A story.
A young couple moved into a new neighborhood. The next morning while they were eating breakfast, the young woman saw her neighbor hanging the wash outside. "That laundry is not very clean," she said. "She doesn't know how to wash correctly. Perhaps she needs better laundry soap." Her husband looked on, but remained silent.
Every time her neighbor would hang her wash to dry, the young woman would make the same comments. About one month later, the woman was surprised one morning to see a nice clean wash on the line and said to her husband, "Look, she has learned how to wash correctly. I wonder, who taught her this?"
The husband said, "I got up early this morning and cleaned our windows."
(From Homiletics Online)
Yes, guys, first our mothers, and later our wives, have taught us that we must always wash our hands before coming to the supper table, but the Pharisees weren’t talking about issues surrounding personal hygiene. The “washing” that they were talking about was a tradition that the Pharisees had set in place. It wasn’t a law for the people, and it wasn’t even about the elimination of germs – it was a requirement that the Pharisees developed, presumably to mimic the law regarding priestly preparation to be ritually clean before serving in the temple. (Leviticus 21:24 – 22:3) If it was good enough for the priests, then it must be good enough for the Pharisees, and if they had to do it, then everyone should be doing it!
Washing your hands before eating had nothing to do with health or faith – it was all about one class of people imposing an unreasonable demand upon the others. No wonder that Jesus was upset with them!
And Jesus also calls them on an unrelated issue – that of setting themselves above the 5th Commandment – “Honor your father and mother.” They had created a loophole, again with their tradition, which they could use, and presumably did, to avoid addressing the needs of their own family. After all, they could look better by giving to the temple where others would see them, than to their own parents where it would have been in a much more private setting!
And humanity’s attempts to justify their “false worship” continues unabated, even to today.
Read Matthew 15:10-14
The Pharisees had been using the word and concept of being “unclean” as a synonym for “sinfulness”. So now, the Lord uses this interchange as a teaching moment to show the crowd (no longer just the Pharisees and scribes) what true sinfulness is all about.
Sin isn’t the condemnation of some issue that the world and the people of earth have determined to be wrong - it is any act that goes against the will of Almighty God. Sin, therefore, is defined not by human or worldly context, but by God, and Jesus begins to teach the truth.
So no matter what your mother told you, it is not a sin to eat with dirty hands. It may not be a wise thing to do, it may not be a healthy thing to do, but the Lord has not put it into a commandment. Now note that Jesus never says that we shouldn’t wash our hands – he simply says that it isn’t sinful to not do so.
And in verse 12, Jesus’ focus changes again – this time from the crowd that has been following him, to his own disciples. And their concern? That the Pharisees may have become angry over Jesus rebuke of their “law”. Have you ever noticed that the Jewish hierarchy were so set in their ways, and so hardened against all that Jesus teaches, that the word of God no longer means anything to them?
For the most part, I truly believe that they thought that they were bringing honor to the Lord God of Israel, when the reality was that Satan had hardened their hearts and had turned them against the truth of the Lord. This is the point of the story we heard a few minutes ago regarding the woman who was judging her neighbor falsely because of the filth on her own dirty windows.
So let’s think about our own “dirty windows” for a moment. How does our sin effect the way we see and treat others? After all, that’s what prejudice is all about, isn’t it - (“My way is right and your way is wrong!”) - and that does go against Jesus words – “As I have loved you, so you must love one another.” (John 13:34-35) The Lord never withheld anything from the crowds, and quite honestly, he never withheld anything from the Pharisees, either – it’s just that they wouldn’t accept the love of Christ that was right there, waiting for them, all the time.
Of course, loving others as Jesus loved us is a pretty daunting task, to say the least! Remember that when Jesus went to Calvary, it wasn’t just for those who loved him and honored him – his passion and salvation were being offered for every man, woman and child, everyone who would ever live, throughout the entire world, regardless of who we are or what we have done! It required tremendous sacrifice on his part, and as he hung on that cross, he took the penalty for our sin (Luke 23:32-34) – all of it – all that the world would commit, with no caveats whatsoever, and all we have to do is accept it through faith in him.
And the third commandment in the Great Commission is to teach one another to obey all that the Lord has taught us. (Matthew 28:18-20) We have a long way to go before we finally get there, don’t we!
Read Matthew 15:15-20
Isn’t it interesting that Christ seems to connect evil thought with murder, sexual sin with theft, false testimony with slander. And rightly so. Evil ideas have a way of destroying, of ripping the life out, of our relationship with Almighty God; an immoral sex act steals the relationship that we should rightly have with our spouse, and deposits it firmly in the lap of an undeserving person; both false testimony and slander are lies that we tell against another person. And when we commit each one of these, we nullify the love that we are supposed to be showing to the very people who come into our lives.
And Jesus uses the analogy of digestion as a means to describe what should happen to the “dirt” of the world – that it must be allowed to become waste so that the “body”, our soul, can expel it from our lives. But when it doesn’t pass out, when we nurture it instead of wasting it, the analogy tells us that it settles in our heart, and that is where sin will fester and grow.
The point, of course, is that it is the things of God that should be growing and thriving within our lives, and not the sickness and disease that the world tries to feed us. But the problem is that the “false testimony and slander” of earth clouds our judgment, making it impossible to separate the dirt of earth from the goodness of God. We need to be constantly on guard against Satan’s deceit, and prepared to use our knowledge of the will of God to defeat his hateful ways, to allow them to become waste, and to pass out of our lives.
Are the “windows into our soul” clean and clear? If not, then we need to take our spiritual Windex, that which we know as “faith in Jesus Christ”, and let him clean up our vision.
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