Monday, April 23, 2012

Truth Truimphy Over Fear Factor.

"God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control.” (2 Timothy 1:7)

The reality TV show Fear Factor features people who are willing to face their worst fears for notoriety and financial gain. In fact, my discomfort with watching for any length of time probably has something to do with reminding me of things and events that I fear or at least find uncomfortable.

There is no doubt that fear is no friend of our effectiveness for Christ. We are often fearful about witnessing, giving our money away, saying no to our friends, forgiving a cruel offense, saying yes to a short-term missionary assignment, or risking being misunderstood if we speak up for biblical values at the water-cooler. If Satan can get us stymied by fear, he doesn’t have to do much else to shut down our spiritual progress and usefulness.

Saturday, April 21, 2012

Beware of the Least Likely Temptation

If you had known . . . in this your day, the things that make for your peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes —Luke 19:42

Jesus entered Jerusalem triumphantly and the city was stirred to its very foundations, but a strange god was there-the pride of the Pharisees. It was a god that seemed religious and upright, but Jesus compared it to “whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness” (Matthew 23:27).
What is it that blinds you to the peace of God “in this your day”? Do you have a strange god-not a disgusting monster but perhaps an unholy nature that controls your life? More than once God has brought me face to face with a strange god in my life, and I knew that I should have given it up, but I didn’t do it. I got through the crisis “by the skin of my teeth,” only to find myself still under the control of that strange god. I am blind to the very things that make for my own peace. It is a shocking thing that we can be in the exact place where the Spirit of God should be having His completely unhindered way with us, and yet we only make matters worse, increasing our blame in God’s eyes.
“If you had known . . . .” God’s words here cut directly to the heart, with the tears of Jesus behind them. These words imply responsibility for our own faults. God holds us accountable for what we refuse to see or are unable to see because of our sin. And “now they are hidden from your eyes” because you have never completely yielded your nature to Him. Oh, the deep, unending sadness for what might have been! God never again opens the doors that have been closed. He opens other doors, but He reminds us that there are doors which we have shut-doors which had no need to be shut. Never be afraid when God brings back your past. Let your memory have its way with you. It is a minister of God bringing its rebuke and sorrow to you. God will turn what might have been into a wonderful lesson of growth for the future.

Readiness

God called to him . . . . And he said, ’Here I am’ —Exodus 3:4

When God speaks, many of us are like people in a fog, and we give no answer. Moses’ reply to God revealed that he knew where he was and that he was ready. Readiness means having a right relationship to God and having the knowledge of where we are. We are so busy telling God where we would like to go. Yet the man or woman who is ready for God and His work is the one who receives the prize when the summons comes. We wait with the idea that some great opportunity or something sensational will be coming our way, and when it does come we are quick to cry out, “Here I am.” Whenever we sense that Jesus Christ is rising up to take authority over some great task, we are there, but we are not ready for some obscure duty.
Readiness for God means that we are prepared to do the smallest thing or the largest thing— it makes no difference. It means we have no choice in what we want to do, but that whatever God’s plans may be, we are there and ready. Whenever any duty presents itself, we hear God’s voice as our Lord heard His Father’s voice, and we are ready for it with the total readiness of our love for Him. Jesus Christ expects to do with us just as His Father did with Him. He can put us wherever He wants, in pleasant duties or in menial ones, because our union with Him is the same as His union with the Father. “. . . that they may be one just as We are one . . .” (John 17:22).
Be ready for the sudden surprise visits of God. A ready person never needs to get ready— he is ready. Think of the time we waste trying to get ready once God has called! The burning bush is a symbol of everything that surrounds the person who is ready, and it is on fire with the presence of God Himself.

Establishing Personal Relationship With God

WHAT DO WE NEED TO KNOW ABOUT GOD?

GOD LOVES US AND WANTS US TO HAVE A PERSONAL RELATIONSHIP WITH HIM

God loves us even if we haven’t loved him.
“In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us.” (1 John 4:10)
God wants us to know him.
The Bible says God is at work in everyone’s life. “So that they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us.” (Acts 17:27)

WHAT IS WRONG WITH US?

OUR RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD HAS BEEN BROKEN BY SIN

We have all made choices showing we are inclined to be:
Passively indifferent to God
“All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned, every one, to his own way; and the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.” (Isaiah 53:6)
Or actively opposed to God
“And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed.” (John 3:19-20)
The result of our choices to resist or ignore God results in spiritual death (separation from God).
“We are dead in trespasses and sins.” (Ephesians 2:1)
“And thus death spread to all men, because all sinned.” (Romans 5:12)

WHAT DID GOD DO FOR US?

GOD HAD PROVIDED A SOLUTION FOR OUR LOST RELATIONSHIP

Jesus Christ came to do what we could not do for ourselves.
“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” (John 3:16)
He came into the world to bring us to his Father.
“Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.’ ” (John 14:6)
He died in our place to pay the penalty for our sin.
“For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit.” (1 Peter 3:18)
He rose from the dead to show that his claims were true.
“For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures, and that He was seen by Cephas, then by the twelve. After that He was seen by over five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain to the present, but some have fallen asleep.” (1 Corinthians 15:3-6)

WHAT DO WE NEED TO DO?

WE MUST EACH PERSONALLY TRUST JESUS CHRIST AS OUR LORD AND SAVIOR

Our own efforts to earn God’s acceptance are inadequate.
“Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit.” (Titus 3:5)
We must admit our need for forgiveness.
“For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” (Romans 3:23)
“And the tax collector, standing afar off, would not so much as lift his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me a sinner!’ ” (Luke 18:13)
We must receive Christ and his offer of salvation as a gift.
“But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name.” (John 1:12)
“For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.” (Ephesians 2:8-9)

WHERE DO WE BEGIN?

A PERSONAL RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD BEGINS TODAY

You can begin your personal relationship with God by putting your faith in Jesus Christ as your Savior and Lord. You may find it helpful to express your new faith in words similar to these:
Dear God, I know that my sin has separated me from You. Thank You for sending Your Son to die in my place. I now trust Jesus to forgive my sins. I invite Him into my life as my Savior and Lord. Thank You for receiving me into Your eternal family. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.

WHAT’S NEXT?

YOUR TRUST IN JESUS CHRIST BEGINS AN EVERLASTING PERSONAL RELATIONSHIP WITH GOD

God’s commitment to you:
God assures you that if you have trusted Jesus as your Savior, He has given you eternal life. “These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life, and that you may continue to believe in the name of the Son of God.” (1 John 5:13)
God promises to never leave you. ” I will never leave you nor forsake you.” (Hebrews 13:5)
God has forgiven all of your sins, past, present, and future. “And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.” (Colossians 2:13-14)
God has given you His Spirit to enable you to live in a way that pleases Him. “If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.” (Galatians 5:25)

Helpful or Heartless Toward Others?

It is Christ who also makes intercession for us. . the Spirit makes intercession for the saints.-Romans 8:34, 27

Do we need any more arguments than these to become intercessors-that Christ “always lives to make intercession” (Hebrews 7:25), and that the Holy Spirit “makes intercession for the saints”? Are we living in such a relationship with others that we do the work of intercession as a result of being the children of God who are taught by His Spirit? We should take a look at our current circumstances. Do crises which affect us or others in our home, business, country, or elsewhere, seem to be crushing in on us? Are we being pushed out of the presence of God and left with no time for worship? If so, we must put a stop to such distractions and get into such a living relationship with God that our relationship with others is maintained through the work of intercession, where God works His miracles.
Beware of getting ahead of God by your very desire to do His will. We run ahead of Him in a thousand and one activities, becoming so burdened with people and problems that we don’t worship God, and we fail to intercede. If a burden and its resulting pressure come upon us while we are not in an attitude of worship, it will only produce a hardness toward God and despair in our own souls. God continually introduces us to people in whom we have no interest, and unless we are worshiping God the natural tendency is to be heartless toward them. We give them a quick verse of Scripture, like jabbing them with a spear, or leave them with a hurried, uncaring word of counsel before we go. A heartless Christian must be a terrible grief to our Lord.
Are our lives in the proper place so that we may participate in the intercession of our Lord and the Holy Spirit?