Make Jesus Your Own

Jesus met a sinful woman at a well and he changed her life. Then she told her neighbors and  “Many of the Samaritans…believed in Him because of the woman’s testimony” (John 4:39). But they didn’t just take her word for who He was. They spent two days listening to Jesus, and they came to personal knowledge and a personal relationship with Him. “We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world” (v. 42). (Read John 4:1-42)

Too many of us have settled for a second-hand relationship with God. We go to church every Sunday and listen to the words that are preached. We may go to Sunday School and hear the lesson brought by the teacher from the material of a writer who doesn’t know us. We may even go so far as to attend a Bible study class and listen to the leader, and read the lesson. But we often fail to make it our own. We settle for what someone else tells us about God, and we wonder why He is so distant. But God created you so that you might have a deeply intimate and personal relationship with Him. Jesus came to interact personally with people. He sends His Holy Spirit to live in us – you can’t get more intimate than that. God knows your heart and your needs, and He has a Word just for you. He has a purpose just for you. You won’t find it anywhere else but at His feet.

I will teach the Bible for as long as He gives me breath. There is so much to learn, and so much to share, the Word of the Lord never gets stale or boring. But my ultimate goal is to teach myself out of a job – to stir in you a hunger and passion for the Word, and the God who wrote it. I pray that you make His Word your own and that you never settle for a second-hand relationship with the One who created you, loves you, and died for you. Beloved, I pray that you will be able to say, with Job, “My ears had heard of you – but now – my eyes have seen you” (Job 42:5).

Come to the Word of God

When I speak of the Bible I often say it is “light and life to me and nourishment to my soul.” Those are all from the Scriptures – and they are very special to me.

I come from a family of crafters. My mom was an extraordinary seamstress and my grandmother created beautiful embroidered designs with a needle and thread. When I was about 10 years old, Mom decided it was time for me to take up the family tradition, starting with learning handwork. She bought me a simple embroidery kit and taught me the backstitch, the daisy stitch, and how to fill a piece of fabric with color. The picture had an old-fashioned oil lamp, an opened Bible – with a real velvet bookmark – and the words of Psalm 119:105. As I stitched the letters, the words were “sewn” into my heart: “Thy Word is a Lamp unto my feet and a Light unto my path.” The piece has long been lost but I can close my eyes and see every detail. And I will never forget that verse.

Just before Moses died he gave the Israelites his blessing and the Lord’s instructions. Among his words was an admonition to “Take to heart all the words [of the Lord],” saying “they are not just idle words for you—they are your life” (Deut 32:46, 47). Through the prophet Isaiah, God implored the people to come and satisfy their hunger and thirst saying, “Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good, and your soul will delight in the richest of fare. Give ear and come to me; hear me, that your soul may live” (Is 55:2,3).

Light. Life. Nourishment for the soul.

Granted, I’ve lost my way a few times in my life and found myself in dark scary places. But I would trace those words on my heart and look for the light. I’ve tried to satisfy my spiritual body with worldly junk food and found my life wasting away, but my cravings always sent me back to the nourishing truth of the Scriptures. The Word of God is Light and Life to me. It is stitched on my heart. It is nourishment to my soul. It fills me as nothing else can. Beloved the Bible will show you the path to life and give you strength for the journey. Come and see. Come and hear. Come and taste. These are good words from a good God.

The Chasm

As this year comes to a close, I find myself wondering how much longer the human race can survive. With wars and violence and hatred and abuse all across the globe, and the rise of sexual perversion taking firm root in the culture. It seems we’ve turned right and wrong upside-down. But if you study the Bible you are not completely shocked. Isaiah prophesied a day when evil will be called good and good evil (Is 5:20).  Unless you’re living under a rock, you know we’re there – even in the church. Paul warned “The time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear” (2 Tim 4:3). We’ve seen this sad reality as every kind of sin has been welcomed and celebrated by the “church” in recent years. But where the line between “right and wrong” has been so blurred, it must become more clearly defined. The fence is getting to hot to sit on much longer.

Scripture tells us that the chasm between the people of God and the people of wickedness will get wider as the day draws near. And how does a chasm grow? Quakes and tremors deep in the earth. The same is true for the church. We are experiencing the “birth pains” of that chasm growing as faithful Christians are separating themselves from those on the side of wickedness. Again, if you know the Scriptures, you are not surprised. Daniel 12:10 says – “Many will be purified, made spotless and refined, but the wicked will continue to be wicked.” And Jesus said, “Let him who does wrong continue to do wrong; let him who is vile continue to be vile; let him who does right continue to do right and let him who is holy continue to be holy.” (Rev. 22:11).

So what does that mean for you and me? We are the church. We are the Body of Christ. We must make a stand for what is right and true – but it must come from the conviction of our own hearts. It’s not enough to rant about the sin in the church or the world if we’re not ready to confess the sin in our lives.  Beloved, you and I must separate ourselves from sin and wickedness. The quakes and tremors have to start here. May we be a generation of faithful, holy people.

Come Glorify the Lord

The news shows and magazines are all doing their year-end reviews, looking over the storylines and headlines of the past 12 months.  While there are a few bright spots in the year, there was mostly tragedy, sadness, suffering, and sorrow.  We just celebrated the angel’s announcement “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill toward men” (Luke 2:14).   But where is the “peace on earth?”  What happened to all the “goodwill?” What went wrong?

I believe the answer to these questions, in fact, the answer to all our questions about the state of the world can be satisfied in the first words of this verse:  “Glory to God in the highest.” The Westminster Catechism, created by the church in the 17^th century declares that “Man’s chief end is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever.” When we fail to give God the glory He deserves, it diminishes our ability to enjoy Him and the life He has given us. Paul said that this is the sin of mankind: to know the truth of God but refuse to glorify Him (Rom 1:21). That arrogance sends us spiraling into the abyss of darkness and depravity.

 But if we glorify God, we can see and receive the Light of Life. Our hearts know the truth and we are set free to enjoy God as He intended. And that affects everything else.  It changes us and our human relationships. We think and act on the presence of God within us. We are kind and gracious. We are peaceful and loving. We are humble and compassionate. And the world takes notice.

David gave us both a pattern of worship and reasons for worship in 1 Chronicles 16: 7-36. We worship God when we give Him thanks, remember His goodness, seek Him, tell His story, hold Him in high esteem, sing to Him, and praise and worship Him. We glorify God because He is God and there is none like Him. He is faithful. He cares about us and for us. He is great and worthy of praise. He is splendid and majestic and mighty. He created all things – including you and me – and holds all things together. He is our Savor and Redeemer. He is eternal. And if all that wasn’t enough, He is good and His love endures forever.

Do you want to see peace on earth? Or maybe just peace in your life? Start by giving God the glory He deserves. Beloved nothing else will change your heart and your world more.

You Can Say It Now, or Say It Later: Jesus Is Lord

“I know who you are – the Holy One of God!” Mark 1:24

Do you know (without looking it up) who spoke those words? No, it wasn’t Peter or John. Not the wise and righteous spiritual leaders of Israel. It wasn’t even one of the angels. Those words were spoken by a man possessed by an evil spirit, a demon of hell. Someone who certainly had no affection for Jesus, but recognized His divine nature as God in human flesh.

The world is filled with people who refuse to acknowledge Jesus for who He is. They may regard Him as nothing more than a great teacher or prophet. Many consider Him an extraordinary humanitarian. And more than a few claim He is a charlatan who has deceived people for more than two thousand years. Some dismiss Him altogether as a man-made hoax designed to ‘fleece the sheep.”

In my undergrad studies, I had to interview several non-believers and I asked them to just speak three words: “Jesus is Lord” and every one of them refused. One said he “couldn’t” say it, the words wouldn’t form in his mouth. How can two people know of Jesus and one believe and one not? Because “the message they heard was of no value to them, because those who heard did not combine it with faith” (Heb 4:2). Demons don’t have faith and neither do people who hear the gospel and walk away from it. But one day they will see what they refused to see in this life.

Paul declared in Philippians 2:10-11 that “at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” The evil spirit in our key verse is proof of Paul’s words. The day will come – very soon I believe – when every human from Adam to the last man standing will kneel and profess Jesus as Lord – the Son of God – the Holy One. It will be an involuntary response to His holiness and majesty. Just as the demon declared it, the words will fall from every person’s lips as all of mankind acknowledges Him. For those who believe today, it will be a shout of celebration. But for those who spurned the Son of God during their lifetime, that confession will be made with deep anguish and terror as they realize that in rejecting Jesus Christ they rejected their only hope for salvation.

You and I have a choice to make today that will determine how we respond in that glorious moment. We can reject Jesus now and make that confession by force, or bow our knees and our hearts and acknowledge Jesus as Lord today, so that great confession will be spoken with Joy. Don’t wait to proclaim the Name of Jesus, Beloved – He is Lord!

Hebrews: Outside the Camp

“We’re New Testament Christians, why are we studying the Old Testament? This stuff doesn’t apply to us anymore.” “One reason,” I answered “is because the New Testament writers used it quite a bit in their books and letters.  If we want to understand what they were saying, we need to understand their references.” That’s what we’re going to do in today’s passage.

“The high priest carried the blood of animals into the Most Holy Place as a sin offering, but the bodies are burned outside the camp” (Heb 13:11). It was Yom Kippur, the most holy day of the Jewish year. The day when the sins of the nation were atoned for. It was a day for fasting and prayer and confession. It was the day that the slate was wiped clean and the people were declared righteous – at least until they sinned again.  The high priest took the blood of the slaughtered animal into the Holy of Holies in the Tabernacle/Temple as a sin offering and sprinkled it on the mercy seat of the Lord. The carcass of the animal would be carried outside of the camp/city to be burned because it represented the sin of the people. Sin must not be allowed to remain among God’s holy nation.

The writer makes the new covenant connection in verse 12: “And so Jesus also suffered outside the city gate to make the people holy through His own blood.” Jesus was the sacrificial animal. Jesus’ blood was sprinkled on the mercy seat of the Lord. And Jesus was crucified and buried outside of the city of Jerusalem because He bore the sin of all humanity. And by His blood, those who believe and receive His atonement are made holy.

An interesting aside here is that the Jewish leaders rejected Jesus and had Him crucified at Golgotha because of His radical message. But by putting Him outside of the city proper they were unknowingly confirming that He was indeed the sacrifice for the sins of the people. Because his original audience was believing Jews, the writer urged them to “go to Him outside the camp, bearing the disgrace He bore,” symbolically rejecting the old ways of Judaism (v. 13).

As believers in Christ, you and I will often have to “go outside the camp” of popular opinion and cultural relevance, even within the church, to live in holiness. But we’re in good company. We’re out there with Jesus. Remember what He said: “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first” (John 15:18).

Oh, and there’s one more reason why we need to study the Old Testament, even as New Testament Christians – because Jesus is all over it and all in it. It’s worth digging into the early texts to know Him better. All of history, including the entire Bible, is His story. It’s the greatest story ever told.

Seeking Jesus

“Why are you here?” I asked my class asked one Sunday morning. After a minute someone said, “Because it’s Sunday morning and I’ve gone to church every Sunday for my whole life.” Another answered, “I am here for the fellowship of my church family.” Others chimed in: “I’m here because the Bible said ‘Forsake not the assembling of your selves together.’” “I am here to be fed in my spirit.”

I recalled this conversation while reading John 6. Jesus confronted the crowd that followed Him after He had fed more than five thousand people the day before (John 6:1-13). When they came looking for Him Jesus said, “I tell you the truth, you are looking for me not because you saw miraculous signs but because you ate the loaves and had your fill” (v. 26).

Now verse 2 said that the people “saw” the miraculous signs He had performed.” So what did Jesus mean? Here’s where the Spirit stirred up the word nerd in me and said, “Saw?” The word used in verse 2 is to see as a spectator, to view with the eyes. But the word that John used in verse 26 means to discern clearly, to behold – to experience. It’s like the difference between watching a football game from the stands and playing it on the field. You can be a fan, but until you put the pads on and take the hits and cross the goalline with the ball in your hand you haven’t experienced the game. The crowd has seen with their eyes the miracles of Jesus – healing the sick and feeding the multitudes – but they did not understand what the signs were pointing to because they did not see them with their hearts. They were fans, but they hadn’t experienced Jesus.

The Lord said they were back because He fed their bellies and they expected more of the same, but if they had looked with faith – if they had experienced Him – they would know Him. They would follow Him because He is the very Son of God and the only means to eternal life.

You and I need to seek Christ for who He is, not just for what he can do for us – to know Him for the Joy of His presence, and not only for His presents. I can find nowhere in Scripture that God says, “I want You to know all I can do for you.” But I lost count after 200 times that I read “That you may know Me…” In knowing God, we discover what He can do, but if we are only seeking Him for what we can gain we have missed the whole point of the relationship.

Beloved, why are you seeking Jesus?

For the Name of Jesus

She looked at me with disgust, “Keep that stuff to yourself” she snarled. “God bless you!” I called out to her as she stormed away. I was young in my faith and bold – maybe brazen is the better word. I was sitting in the food court of the local mall with a friend who was giving witness to God’s work in her family. I raised my hands and shouted, “Wooo! Praise God!” That’s when the woman at the next table picked up her bags and launched her bomb at me. I wasn’t fazed. In fact, I wore it as a badge of honor. I counted it as “religious persecution,” and for the time and the culture, I suppose it was.

But what I called persecution was not even a slap on the wrist compared to believers in China, India, Sri Lanka, Egypt, Nigeria, Cuba, and dozen more. There the threats are not merely verbal but physical, economic, and relational, and often end in violence and death. I dare say their faith has been forged in the fire. Just as the apostles’ was.

Even after being ordered to stop preaching and teaching in the name of Jesus, His followers didn’t quit. The religious leaders were filled with jealousy and ordered them to be arrested (Acts 5:17-18). They responded by escaping jail with the help of an angel who said, “Go, stand in the temple courts and tell the people the full message of this new life” (v. 20). After being brought again before the Sanhedrin – the ruling council of the Jews – they declared, “We must obey God rather than men!” (v. 29). In return they were flogged and the Bible says they “left the Sanhedrin rejoicing because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name” (v. 41).

In our modern, western culture, religion is regarded as a personal preference, not a life-giving entity.  It is kept private and should not be allowed to spill over onto others.  In schools, workplaces, among our peers, and even in the food court at the mall we are told to keep our religion to ourselves, or “save that stuff for church.”  And we do because we don’t want to rock the boat.  But true Christianity – the kind that changes the world – is all-or-nothing. Beloved, it’s time for you and me to not only rock the boat but get out of it and walk on the water.

Christ in You

It’s in the music on Christian radio. It’s in the studies on the shelves of Christian books stores. It’s in the podcasts and messages by Christian speakers. What is it? Me, me, me. I recently discovered a 90’s channel on my favorite Christian radio station. I’m a sucker for nostalgia so I listened to the music of my early days in the faith and quickly noticed a huge difference in the songs. The older music was much more Christ-centric. It was true worship music – who Jesus is and what He has done in His power and holiness. I flipped back to the current channel and the theme of the music was who Jesus is – to me, and what He has done – for me, and how He makes me feel. The studies that Christian publishers produce follow the same format. It’s all designed to invoke feelings, but it falls short of truth. Now I’m not a fuddy-duddy here to complain about the younger generation. I am a Bible teacher and I’m here to turn your focus from self to the Savior.

Charles Spurgeon said, “My faith rests not upon what I am or shall be or feel or know, but in what Christ is, in what He has done. Hallelujah!” So should ours. In his letter to the Colossian church, Paul said the most glorious mystery man can ever know is “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Col 1:27). Think about that. Christ. In you.

Christ in you means that “your spirit is alive because of righteousness” (Rom 8:10). The very same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead now lives in you (v. 11). Christ in you means that you can live by faith and walk in God’s love (Gal 2:20). Christ in you means that His power is at work within you, strengthening you in your inner being (Eph 3:16). Christ in you means that God’s glory is yours. Jesus said, “I have given them the glory that You gave me, that they may be one as we are one. I in them and You in me” (John 17:22-23).

Christ in you means that have “the mind of Christ” (I Cor 2:16). Whoa! And Christ did not think about Himself. Listen to Paul again: “Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made Himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself . . . “ (Phil 2:5-8). And so must we. Sing about Christ. Study Christ. Hear the words of Christ. Christ is in you, Beloved. Now that’s something to sing about!

Mirror Image

I’ve been a Bible student for at least thirty years, a Bible teacher for more than twenty, and a Bible writer for ten. I’ve taught, studied, or written about every book in the Bible. I have a bachelor’s degree in Theology and Biblical Studies and have almost completed my master’s. But I’ve barely scratched the surface of biblical truth. I have only a minuscule glimpse of God. There’s far more to discover than my finite middle-aged, deep-southern mind can grasp. Still, I will keep digging until I draw my last breath. And then I will know more.

Paul said that in this life, “we know in part . . .” (1 Cor 13:9). We know fragments of truth, and that makes it hard to believe because there is so much we don’t know. The world thinks of us as fools for trusting in what we cannot see and cannot fully comprehend. Yet. One of the most important things God has been teaching me is to keep an eternal mindset. That’s not a Pollyanna “it’ll all turn out okay in the end” attitude. An eternal mindset isn’t focused on the circumstances, it’s focused on the sovereign King of the universe. The Lord God Almighty. The Creator of all that is.

Here is what I believe is at the heart of an eternal mindset. You and I – and every human that was, is, or is to come – is made in the Imago Dei – the image of God. Before He scooped up the dust of the earth God said, “Let us make man in our own image” (Gen 1:26). And that is what He did. We are walking, talking, breathing expressions of our Creator. But sin separated us from our Creator and marred the perfect image we were meant to bear. It’s what Paul meant in verse 12: Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror . . .” We look at our spiritual reflection, knowing we’re supposed to see God, but we see only ourselves – our sinful human selves.

But one day, because of Jesus, we will see that perfect image. No, we won’t be looking into a divine mirror, we will be looking at the Divine Himself. Paul says, “then we shall see face to face.” We will see God. Face to face. I can’t even imagine. But I long for it. It’s my heart’s highest desire. I hope it’s yours too, Beloved.