The Critique of God ...

How scary is that?  How scary is the idea of having God Himself give your life, your work, His critique?  Keep in mind He sees all, He knows every motive, every failure, every shortcoming.  It’s not like a human version of this where some life coach tries to give you tips on how to live better.  We are talking about an impromptu critique by God Himself.  Has that ever happened?  I mean, short of our ideas about a judgment that nearly everyone places sometime in the future, has Jesus ever offered a critique on a living person’s life (well living at the time anyway)?  The short answer is yes.  And what would you imagine that critique to be, a stinging rebuke to the leadership of the church for their hypocrisy and refusal to submit themselves to the will of God?  Yes, Jesus gave a number of those, each one designed to wake up those church leaders, and stun them into the awareness of their true condition, hidden by the masks they wore, and the self-image they had constructed for themselves.  But perhaps more surprising to us, Jesus also gave out a “glowing” review as well.  Imagine that, perhaps the best review in history, handed out by the highest authority in the Universe, the one who created it.

Think about the significance of this.  An imperfect being, with imperfect doctrine, granted a glowing review by Jesus Himself.  Let’s get it straight, it was not the imperfections that were glorified.  But it was the submission in spite of imperfections that was.  Again, this is another departure for the Jewish people in the days of Christ of what they thought about the character of God.  To them, and to us, God was always some highly critical God, just waiting to point out everything we do wrong, to the point where nobody would ever be good enough to be in His company.  How well, the devil has been able to maintain this lie about the nature of our loving God, who would die Himself, rather than be separated from we who He loved so much.  The improper view of the nature of our God, was not only held in the days of Matthew, and another reason why he penned his gospel.  It is held in our own days, because what we read, we ignore.  The words of our Bibles pass our eyes, but do not penetrate our hearts.  Because like our forefathers we do not yet read them after submitting our very thoughts for Jesus to mold and reshape.

Matthew persisted nonetheless.  He begins his revelation, his uncovering, about the real nature of our God in form of Jesus, picking up in chapter eleven beginning in verse 7 saying … “And as they departed, Jesus began to say unto the multitudes concerning John, What went ye out into the wilderness to see? A reed shaken with the wind?”  The disciples of John were just leaving to relay to him the good news of everything they had seen and heard of Jesus Christ.  That would be a message to cheer his heart, affirm his faith, give him the strength to face death.  And the crowd who remained behind was clueless of all of this.  So Jesus calls their attention back to the ministry of John the Baptist.  He poses the question, what did you go to wilderness to see? 

Were you looking for someone who is shaken with the winds of popularity?  Were you looking for someone who preached what was popular in order to gain favor?  Mega churches have been built upon this approach.  But John did not follow it.  He was firm in his singular doctrine that burned within him with a roaring fire of the Spirit.  His doctrine was absent all hate; and constructed on redemptive love.  He did not rail at the people, accusing them of every sin.  Instead he shouted of repentance and the healing it alone can bring.  He was not shaken by criticism, nor by the threats of the organized church, nor even by the ruler who would imprison him.  He was firm in pointing the people to redemption beginning in repentance.

Jesus continues his critique of John in verse 8 saying … “But what went ye out for to see? A man clothed in soft raiment? behold, they that wear soft clothing are in kings' houses.”  Jesus asks the multitude again, what did they travel to the wilderness to see?  Did they expect to see a prince perhaps, someone of wealth and status, someone rewarded of God with fine things, and fine clothes?  John had enough listeners to regularly pass the collection plate for tithes and offerings.  Had he done this, his wealth would have certainly amassed.  He would have been justified in doing it, as he was certainly doing God’s work, and was certainly a minister of God.  No one, including us, would have questioned it.  But John accepted NO MONEY at all.  He did not change his eating habits (the things one can find in the desert on their own).  Nor did he change out his clothing (skins he made by himself, even for the linen robes the priests wore).  He constructed no mansion either.  If ever a minister “could” have earned a living in the ministry, it was John, and he chose to accept NONE of it.

Jesus continues once again picking up in verse 9 saying … “But what went ye out for to see? A prophet? yea, I say unto you, and more than a prophet.  [verse 10] For this is he, of whom it is written, Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee.”  Jesus asks the multitude for the third and last time what did they travel to the wilderness to see?  Perhaps they went to see the crazy man.  Often crazy men like this were prophets who heard clearly the word of the Lord.  All through history prophets were always a little outside of normal society, maybe John was just one of them.  But Jesus says “more” than a prophet.  For while John prophesied about the coming Messiah, he also had a burning conviction inspired by the Holy Spirit.  He was God’s messenger.  He had a message of repentance, the people needed to hear, and needed to respond to.  John was making straight the way of the Lord, in the hearts of the people, by speaking the words the Holy Spirit would bless.

John had a conviction beyond the prophetic.  He had a conviction for the practical.  His message was not just to excite the people about what was coming.  It was to prepare the people in their hearts to receive what was coming.  Without repentance there is no room for submission, there is no room for the Truth, they are crowded out by self, and self-interest, and self-love.  Repentance leads to an opening, a re-beginning of the journey towards God, a reconciliation between man and God.  The message of John is one of the most important ones throughout all of history.  It was not just designed to be spoken or accepted in his day, but in every day.  Had Cain repented of killing Able, instead of lying to avoid penalty, his fate might have been different.  Were I to repent of my sin, and pain it causes others, my relationship with God might enter a new level I have not even imagined as yet, my heart beginning to become in even more harmony with His heart.  That message still works.  It still has relevance and meaning and depth.

Jesus continues his critique in verse 11 saying … “Verily I say unto you, Among them that are born of women there hath not risen a greater than John the Baptist: notwithstanding he that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.”  Imagine these words spoken of you.  Among children born of women there has not risen a greater than “you”.  The decisions of John the Baptist lead him to this great compliment.  How he lived; by choice in poverty, depending upon God every day for his food, water, clothing, and shelter.  How his mother raised him as a Nazarite from birth, honoring the traditions of the faith, to commit his body to God and offer signs in his hair and flesh that he was to be offered to God, even before he had the maturity to understands what this means.  The ministry of John, both prophetic, and practical.  Everything about John had led to this compliment by the Savior of the Universe, in spite of the fact that the organized church did not care for John, and that John was sitting in prison on death row at the time.

But, says Jesus as well.  The human greatness of John, is nothing next to the least of people within the Kingdom of Heaven.  Yes, you heard that right.  Hitler, Saddam, Al Capone, pick the greatest villain you can imagine.  Have that villain submit to Jesus right before he dies and be saved in his final thoughts.  And that forgiven villain, least in the Kingdom of Heaven, is now greater than John the Baptist.  It is hard to imagine Jesus offering a critique that could potentially place Adolph Hitler or Pol Pot (the Cambodian genocidal leader) as greater than John the Baptist.  How could this be?  Because our earthly lives will never measure up, to our eternal ones.  Submission to Jesus, and the salvation that results, puts our lives on course for a greatness that simply cannot be achieved in the world in which we live, no matter how well we think we live here.  Submission is greater than sacrifice.

Then Jesus shifts from direct critique of John, to a critique of His own church, continuing in verse 12 saying …” And from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force. [verse 13] For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John.”  The fate of nearly every prophet all the way through John was a fate of suffering, and of violence.  Satan takes advantage of the long-suffering nature of God, hurling violence against the innocent, to test the patience of God, and attempt to lure Him into retaliation and violence in return.  But Satan does not understand the nature of God.  God loves the victim, as He loves the perpetrator, longing to save both from the fates Satan would devise.  The messages of the Prophets were designed to help those trapped in error to see that error and turn from it.  The Prophets were God’s way of warning those trapped in the snares of Satan, that he had doom in mind for them.  The Prophets tried to challenge evil with the message of a loving God, not content to see those He loved, suffer the fates they had chosen.  But these same Prophets were met with violence more than listening ears.

Jesus continues His critique of John picking back up in verse 14 saying … “And if ye will receive it, this is Elias, which was for to come. [verse 15] He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.”  This is where scripture is interpreted by Jesus Christ Himself.  The prophecy of the return of Elijah before the promised Messiah, is now attributed to John the Baptist and the message and ministry he has accomplished.  The prophecy interpreted in this way, means there will be no literal return of the prophet of old for them to look for, but a literal return of the message of repentance, the only way it is possible to make straight the way of the Lord, in the heart of the people.  Jesus tweaks His audience, all of whom have perfect hearing, some likely restored of His hands to be just so; to think about what He is saying.  Jesus asks them to see the wisdom of what He is saying - about both the scriptures, and the message and ministry of John.  This is not an insult to his audience.  It is a challenge for them to think differently about what they think they know about the scriptures.  To embrace a new way of looking at old scriptures.  Outside the purview of the organized church leadership, but inside the direct teachings of Jesus Christ Himself.

Are we too ready to examine our scriptures in this way?  Or do we continue in our certainty of what we know, allowing no room to be taught, even if that teaching were to come from Jesus Christ Himself?  Our will must ever be subservient to His.  Our wealth of knowledge, and understanding, must stand the shadow of a fool, compared with the wisdom of our God.  The doctrines we cling to, enforced by years of tradition, should be pillars we gladly release, when the voice of Jesus bids us … those who have ears, let them hear.  So much of how we view our Bible’s begins first with the notion of a cruel and just God, interested more in our punishment, than in our redemption.  Our preconceptions begin that redemption is hard, and sin is easy and fun.  But in truth, our sin is the source of our pain and our punishment.  Our redemption is easy, and the only way to escape the fate we have otherwise doomed ourselves to suffer.  In the light of Jesus Christ, many of our false ideas and rigid doctrines, seem to melt away.  And this is how it was meant to be.  Jesus the Messiah, was meant to rid us of the notions of men, and the burdens of traditions, and free us to love in a way we have yet to imagine.  To love as the heart of God loves.  To value others as the heart of our God truly values others, even when they are still steeped and trapped in sins they have no way to escape on their own.

The critique of Jesus Christ of John was a glowing one.  Your critique could easily be the same.  Through the lens of Jesus Christ it already is, but it could be even better.  Through the lens of full submission of who you are to Jesus Christ, your critique becomes one infinitely better than it is today.  The true meaning of life you begin to experience.  True obedience based in harmony with the heart of God, something that naturally occurs in your fingertips and feet.  All of this is available to you, if you but ask, and submit to Jesus who longs to give it to you.

And while Jesus had so many good things to say of John, His critique of His own church was not quite so glowing …

 

Doubt or Affirmation ...

Sometimes an obvious question is not as much about seeking the answer, as about hearing the answer said out loud, again and again.  A wife asks her husband, do you love me?  It is possible she has occasion to wonder, but just as likely she simply enjoys hearing him say it out loud, again and again.  Sometimes we know the answer, but conditions or circumstances give us pause, they cause to seek affirmation, to chase our doubt away.  A wife asks her husband, did you do it?  When faced with the accusation of a crime, when compounded with evidence even if only circumstantial, her faith in her husband begins to tremble.  What she looks for now is re-assurance of that faith she already holds.  She looks for his affirmation to chase away her emerging doubt.  But when conditions are overwhelming, when doubt has not only entered the building, it has taken over the building, we throw our question to the wind, desperately hoping for an answer strong enough to quell doubt, strong enough to overcome common sense, strong enough to be centered in a still small voice through which only God talks.

Imagine yourself, a minister of Christ, devout in your duties, and with great success.  You preach every day.  The power of the Holy Spirit is evident in both your words, and the response of hearts that melt in those who hear them.  With your success, the “organized” church begins to take notice, and resentment begins to build.  These are powerful men, with powerful friends.  You are a nobody; just a humble minister of Jesus.  As your ministry grows, the church in whom you should belong, begins to take steps to curtail your ministry, by having you thrown into prison on false charges.  And it works.  Now consider, you have gone from humble minister with great success, with a great number of people who listen and respond, to complete isolation in a cell with limited visitors on limited occasions.  You own nothing.  You have no family left living.  You have only a few friends left who have not yet deserted you.  Could you have been wrong?  Could your own words have been what “you” thought, perhaps not what God wanted you to speak?  Could you have been so wrong, God allowed you to come to this end, in order to stop what you were saying?

If you can imagine yourself here, you may begin to imagine the mind of John the Baptist in prison at the time of Christ.  He spent his life preaching the coming of the Messiah.  Then he announced Jesus as he came to him.  But not long after, he is cast into prison, with a grateful priesthood, and conniving powerful women bent on his quick murder.  In a religious philosophy where God rewards the faithful and punishes the wicked, which side of that equation would you imagine yourself to be on.  Your circumstances would clearly outline, you are the punished of God, not the rewarded.  It is this underlying misguided philosophy that even today forms the basis of “wealthy gospels” and “eternal hells”.  It blames God for all the evil that occurs to one of His servants.  We get cancer, it must be God’s fault, for allowing it.  We lose our homes to disaster in hurricanes, earthquakes, fires and floods; again God’s fault, we even term these events “acts of God”.  We are robbed, raped and killed; or worse our children suffer this fate.  We blame God again for allowing it to occur.  Atheists determine a loving God must not exist, because evil does.  Doubt begins to creep into our own thinking, when our circumstances do not reflect the rewards God offers, but only the punishments we hold Him responsible for.

Matthew begins to recount the question of John, and the thoughts of Christ about the ministry, message, and person of John.  Perhaps in this story, is undone the misguided philosophy we continue to cling to even in our own day.  Matthew picks up in chapter eleven beginning in verse 1 saying … “And it came to pass, when Jesus had made an end of commanding his twelve disciples, he departed thence to teach and to preach in their cities.  [verse 2] Now when John had heard in the prison the works of Christ, he sent two of his disciples,”  The gospel commission has just completed in chapter ten.  Jesus has sent His own disciples into the region of Judea to preach the gospel of the Messiah.  To perform miracles in His name.  They were to spread the gospel of salvation to the house of Israel, that the Messiah is come, to bear witness that it is Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, Jesus the Messiah, God incarnate.  And while His disciples do this, Jesus Himself remains active in the ministry.  And with predictable success.  Not many can resist the pure love of our God.

By contrast, John sits in a cell largely in isolation.  He has periodic visits from Herod, perhaps the last listener of his gospel the world will ever offer him.  John is smart enough to know that the message he speaks of repentance will not take root in the ears of Herod’s adulterous wife and daughter before they work out a way to kill him.  The priesthood will not come to the aid of John, they are not happy with him either.  And while John sits here.  The disciples of Jesus wander the countryside, performing miracles, teaching and preaching largely unimpeded, empowered by Jesus through the Holy Spirit.  Jesus Himself wanders the nation, with no agent of the Sanhedrin bold enough to kill Him in public.  Even the Romans keep their distance from Jesus, excepting the ones who seek His help, which He grants.  While the largely Nazarite John, of meek clothing and diet, sits in jail; Jesus has taken up a tax collector for Rome into His company.  A man of at least formerly lavish lifestyle, built upon the backs of his own people.  Hardly seems fair.  Hardly fits the model of a just God, one who punishes and rewards based on those who deserve it.

Matthew continues in verse 3 saying … “And said unto him, Art thou he that should come, or do we look for another?”  The question John asks two of the last disciples he will ever have, to ask our Savior is, are you the one?  Is this doubt or affirmation?  Is the answer obvious to John, or has his own circumstances particularly when contrast with other disciples of Christ grown so far apart, doubt has begun to creep in?  John is on death row, and he knows it.  Jesus is doing nothing to break him out.  Wouldn’t the leader of the Jewish nation, with the full support of the people, have the power to simply demand his release, or overrun the jail if needs be?  What kind of leader, leaves a righteous man in prison to die, while sending far from righteous men into the field to proclaim His name?  How is any of this fair?  The leadership of the organized church hate Jesus already, do they have a point?  Jesus is undoing the concept of rewards for those who deserve it.  Jesus is undoing the concept of punishing those who deserve it, instead He offers forgiveness and redemption.  This goes against long held beliefs about the nature of God, both then and now.

Jesus answers John’s disciples beginning in verse 4 saying … “Jesus answered and said unto them, Go and shew John again those things which ye do hear and see: [verse 5] The blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have the gospel preached to them. [verse 6] And blessed is he, whosoever shall not be offended in me.”  Note how Jesus responds, those in need are getting the miracles they need.  And the gospel is being preached.  But finally a blessing is offered for those who are not “offended” by who Jesus is, and what Jesus does.  To have a sinner come to repentance is a thing to be praised, not to be criticized because of how it occurred, or that I was not present when it did.  The goal is the redemption of mankind, not the pre-perfection of the messengers of that calling.  Increasing the membership of the Kingdom of Heaven, did not come with a prequalification test, it came with a simple answer, do you want this, or not.

John could have easily taken offense at what Jesus did for him, or rather, did not do for him.  John could have demanded that by his lifestyle he had earned special treatment by Jesus, and a special place at His side.  But Jesus points out, the ministry is its own reward.  What is special, is that lives are converted, souls are saved, and relationships are established with Him.  When the Holy Spirit blesses that effort, none need doubt about the results, and none need criticize the messenger who aided in it.  John had the benefit of having his doubt removed by the miracles which alone were probably up to the task.  You and I should have a similar lens in examining our own lives, where we are today, and where we were so many years ago.  There should be measurable progress there we do not understand.  There should be testimony there of victories we had no hand in, but benefited from.  Our testimony is about our own salvation, wrought by the hand of Jesus Christ Himself, our only Savior.  It is not boast, because our progress has nothing to do with us, and everything to do with Him.  That evidence should be the miracle we need, to overcome our own doubt.  None else can take it away.

John understood much of this.  Though he remained on death row, and he died a cruel death alone with an executioner.  Jesus never came to save him from jail or the axe.  Jesus never broke him out of prison, or demanded his release.  Jesus allowed the earthly life of John to end, the first martyr for the gospel, faithful to the end.  Later followers of Christ would look back to the example set by John, and echo his response.  When faced with roaring lions, and seeing their children killed; these future martyrs would continue to take up the cross of Christ instead of the swords of resistance.  They laid down their lives, and the lives of the spouses and children for the cause of Christ at the hands of wicked men.  This was not the punishment of God.  It was the ultimate destination of sin.  What seems innocuous in sin, ends in the coliseums of ancient Rome, and the axe of the executioner of John.  All roads of sin lead here.  The innocent are punished by sin itself.  This is not a condition God allows in apathy, it is a condition God permits in order to have time to save the precious life of the perpetrator.  That is not fair.  That is not justice.  It is mercy.  The same mercy that saves you and I.  The goal is the redemption of mankind, not to punish it for what it has coming.  Punishment will be finally an eternal separation from the love of God, for those who chose no other course.

The questions and life of John, disprove a misguided philosophy about the character of God, in his own day, and in ours.  But what Jesus would then say about the life of John is an even more interesting consideration …

 

Reaching Out [part three] ...

 “Who” is your savior?  We sometimes throw around that term very casually in our day.  We attribute the idea of being a savior to things far outside the realm of spiritual salvation.  The mayor of San Juan for instance could become known as “the savior of Puerto Rico” for her dogged persistence to bring the plight of our American brothers and sisters on that island to our attention.  She calls us to remember the destruction that continues to cause so many, so much misery, and motivates us to want to do something about it.  In that sense, perhaps it is fair, to call her the savior of her people.  Her actions are selfless.  And the work she does will lessen the suffering of many, most of whom she does not know.  Far less likely to be known as “the savior of Puerto Rico” will be our president Donald Trump, no matter what he does, or says.  He is simply not on the ground there.  Nor is he obsessed with the island’s recovery.  He is distracted, and perhaps his job requires it.  But our assessment of Donald, is not ever to be as favorable as our assessment of Carmen, because she is there, she is in the midst of it, and she sends us the messages of it every day, even when the rest of our country might have grown tired of hearing it.

But when power has been restored, when the water is clean, when gas is abundant, when medicines and food have been fully restocked … will the people of Puerto Rico truly be saved?  Or will they have simply returned to the point in which it is possible to have a lifestyle like the rest of America?  There are many homeless in Florida who do not sleep in comfortable beds, in air-conditioned rooms, benefiting from regular meals or good health care.  One could argue they could have all these things if they held down a job.  But lacking skills, and once having lost it all, it is hard to get back into a system that requires you have all these things first, in order to maintain them.  Are the homeless of Florida in need of a savior like the mayor of San Juan?  And even if she took up their cause, and restored them all to the lifestyle the rest of us take for granted, will the formerly homeless be considered saved?  I guess you must ask, saved from what?  Saved from a severe way of life, saved from the physical suffering natural destructions bring, or bad cyclical patterns that self-destruction brings.  But there is so much more we need to be saved from.

When we look inside of ourselves, at the elements or weaknesses of our character that cause us misery, we look for a different kind of savior.  In this sense, love can provide great motivation.  The love of a spouse, or the supporting love of family, might provide the strong willed of us, a reason to change a behavior that causes their circle of pain.  The alcoholic becomes the recovering alcoholic.  The drug addict becomes the recovering drug addict.  The criminal becomes the former criminal.  Love can prove to be a powerful means of motivation.  For the strong willed, a solid motivation to change, provides the catalyst to simply go cold-turkey and change errant behavior.  For the weak willed of us, the desire is there, but the ability is far from available.  In either case, what remains missing, is the change in desire that spawned and fostered the errant behavior in the first place.  Circumstances then only make regression easier, or harder.  But put into a circumstance where the previous bad behavior is easy to do again, and even the most ardent recovering criminal, or addict, is likely to fall back into the old patterns that give them a momentary spike in adrenaline, followed by a lifetime of regret.  In this case, love can motivate, but it cannot recreate who we are.  We need a bigger savior for that.

Our need demands a God-based salvation.  Our deformity of will, and perversion of thinking, demands a recreation that only our Creator will ever understand.  We will not find true salvation looking at our human counterparts.  Nor will we find it, even in the better angels of our family’s love.  Our need requires something greater, something divine, or regress we will until the core of who we are is cemented in the failures we are unable to detach from.  To rip the sin from the core of our hearts and minds and hands, we require the divine recreation that a divine redemptive love has to offer.  It is here, where all the false gods are segregated from the only real One.  For only Jesus offers to redeem us from the state in which we find ourselves.  No work on our part.  All the work on His part.  We do not need to accomplish some set of tasks first, or ever.  Our behavior changes only after He changes how we think, and how we love.  It is then we find the actions of our hands in harmony with the will of our God.  Not before, and never by our own strength.  Allah, Buddha, Ganesh, Odin, pick any other supposed deity and what you find are the demands of action first, followed only then by favor selectively pronounced.  With Jesus, favor is offered how we are, reformation conducted within us by Him from where we are, until what Jesus envisioned for us, is who we become.  There are no competing offers of this anywhere else, none that would work anyway, for our need demands true divinity to fix who we are.

The message of the gospel, encompasses this one fact alone.  The message of the gospel, given in the commission by Jesus to His followers contained only one thing.  It is Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, Jesus the Messiah, “who” will be our savior.  None else.  Matthew dives back into this central theme in chapter ten of his gospel picking up again in verse 32 saying … “Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven. [verse 33] But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven.”  To confess, to submit your own thinking to Jesus, to submit your own will to His, to understand how little you do, and how great He does on your behalf.  To understand your place, next to the place of your savior.  That is confession of Jesus Christ in the world in which you live, in any age, across any culture.  It is eternally relevant, for it is the singular way in which your life will ever be any different, or any better, than it is today.  There is no other way.  You will do nothing to save you.  The mayor of San Juan will do nothing to save you.  The pope will not.  Your parents or preacher will not, nor will your spouse.  All of your human community may work to lift you up.  But only Jesus can truly save you.

And likewise, in physics, there is an equal and opposite reaction.  If you choose to cut yourself off from the source of your salvation, you will end the possibility of your salvation.  When we exalt self, even within the Christian religion, by making statements such as we are in partnership with our God to save us.  Or that we must do some things first.  Or that we must obey in order to be saved.  We deny the power of Jesus Christ to save us.  Instead we exalt the power of self and our own actions to accomplish our salvation.  We choose not to relinquish control to the Savior, instead holding on to some portion of it ourselves.  Our obedience can never truly come, until our minds are brought into harmony with the will of God.  True obedience is not found only in our hands, it must be found in our hearts, minds, and motives as well.  We cannot obey until we love differently than we do today.  Those changes are not something we can will for ourselves.  They can only be wrought by the hand of our Creator, as we submit ourselves to Him for re-creation.  When we cut ourselves off from that, we wither in the conditions of sin we have long embraced.

In principle this should be an easy thing to digest and do.  But it is not.  It is at war with our “common sense”.  It is at war with our natural instincts.  And it is at war with Satan and his entire philosophy of life which he has drilled into us over a long period of time.  Man does not need a god.  But when connected to true salvation, as if by magic, the fury of your opposition will be revealed.  It is the sword that was predicted.  Matthew continues in verse 34 saying … “Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. [verse 35] For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law. [verse 36] And a man's foes shall be they of his own household.”  The family whose love you may have counted on all this time, was based on who you used to be, not upon who you are becoming when connected to Jesus.  Your changed thinking is not what your wife or husband signed up for.  Your changed priorities, and desire to sacrifice what you own for the sake of another, is not what your kids are used to, or were counting on for their own financial security. 

The true changes in you that bring you into harmony with God, as wrought by the hand of Jesus alone without your interference, make you a different creation.  And not necessarily one, your family will appreciate.  They actually prefer the old you.  And where there was no strife before, now there may be much of it.  Like Adam of old, you are faced with a dilemma of love and trust.  Matthew continues in verse 37 saying … “He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. [verse 38] And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me. [verse 39] He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it.”  Much to unpack here.  As Adam faced a choice between his love of Eve, and his trust in God, so you will face the same dilemma with family members who do not share your love and submission to Jesus Christ.  But do not fall as Adam fell, not trusting in the power of Jesus to save those who do not yet believe. 

Then there is the notion of taking up your cross.  Your beliefs in the salvation Jesus provides will have real results in who you are.  Results the world around you will not be happy with.  It is not just family that may be unappreciative it may be the world, with the force of the nation’s laws, attempting to suppress your beliefs, your speech, and your actions.  Violating the laws of the nation, in order to remain in harmony with God becomes taking up your cross.  The Roman empire put the cross upon Jesus, because they falsely believed Him a threat to themselves.  The nation in which you live, may have similar thoughts about you.  Jesus did not resist that cross.  Nor should you.  The response is not to be war, believers on one side and non-believers on the other.  The response is to be willingness to bear that cross, even to the point of death in this world.  For certainly death in this world is life in the next one.  All the while that cross was on Jesus, His only thoughts were of love for those who placed it there.  That is what harmony with God looks like.  That is what true obedience looks like.  A change of heart, and how we love.  This is what submission to the will of the Father can do within you as well.

Matthew concludes stating this is not all bad news, picking up in verse 40 … “He that receiveth you receiveth me, and he that receiveth me receiveth him that sent me. [verse 41] He that receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet shall receive a prophet's reward; and he that receiveth a righteous man in the name of a righteous man shall receive a righteous man's reward. [verse 42] And whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones a cup of cold water only in the name of a disciple, verily I say unto you, he shall in no wise lose his reward.”  The love of God burns to demonstrate itself to us.  The rewards of salvation are not only self-evident, they are reflected in the lives of those we touch.  It is as if His love were a virus that spreads quickly, does no damage, but lifts all it touches upwards.  The savior of Puerto Rico may begin a good work, but the Savior of mankind takes it to a whole other level.  While Carmen tries to turn the air-conditioning back on, Jesus frees you from who you were while you are still in the heat, hungry, thirsty, or whatever shape you find yourself in from mansion to hovel.  Jesus is concerned with insuring your life is one worth living in the here and now.  Air-conditioning does not decide this.  It may help, but it is nothing next to the love of Jesus reflected through you.

The rewards granted even to those who do something nice to one who is connected to Jesus Christ, are a demonstration of the love of God.  Even for one who calls them self His enemy, love is shown in gratitude for something nice they do for a follower of His.  Imagine a love that deep, that is demonstrated to self-described enemies, that reaches out to them.  That offers itself in gratitude to those who do not believe, just because they have done something nice for someone who does.  Following this truism, the lives of Carmen, and of Donald, may experience the gratitude of God just because something they did helped a follower of Jesus, even if their own belief system does not include Jesus for themselves.  And based on the wide number of followers they may have helped, I am not certain if they will be able to withstand the shower of love from God that is headed their way.  For the follower of Jesus, the ability to help another is its own reward.

And so concluded the first gospel commission, the first community outreach, and you and I are equally commissioned by this same chapter in the gospel of Matthew.  The singular doctrine is still relevant, it is still good news, it still works, and it is completely wrapped up in “who” our Savior truly is, and what He longs to do within us …

 

Reaching Out [part two] ...

Ideology matters; perhaps never more than today.  What you believe will drive what you are willing to sacrifice for it.  And more dangerously, what you believe may strongly influence how much you are willing to make others suffer because they do not share your beliefs.  Belief underlies it all.  And our enemy is quick to introduce fear into that equation.  Combine fear and belief, and it is easy to believe others intend to persecute you for your own beliefs.  When you believe you might be persecuted, you form a defense against this persecution.  And a good offense is always a good defense, so belief and fear combine to drive violence into our world.  Whether threats are real or perceived becomes irrelevant.  The violence that ensues is measurable.  Perhaps this is why whenever our Lord introduced the supernatural of His Kingdom to mankind he always opens the greeting with “Fear Not”.

Where your willingness to inflict violence over your beliefs, becomes more important to you than traditional bonds of friendship and family … belief transcends reasonable boundaries and becomes fanaticism.  A fanatic puts his beliefs so high in importance, that even friendship and family must take a back seat.  Friendships of many years can be dissolved in an instant over a slight change in shared beliefs.  Churches split over them.  Cain kills Able over them.  Differences in our exact interpretation of beliefs cause us to cast aside friendships, a spirit of community, and even the blood bonds of family.  And in the mind of the fanatic, all of these must be sacrificed for the sake of what is more important.  Fanatics point to the words of Jesus on this matter, stating those who love parents or children more than they love Him are not worthy of Him.  But Jesus did not offer the example of committing violence against non-believers.  Rather Jesus offered us an example of redemptive love for ALL those who do not yet believe.  Yet the fanatic ignores anything in the narrative of scripture that countermands his beliefs and violent intentions, and passionately embraces any tittle of scripture that might support them, and so builds his ‘doctrinal epoch of cause’ to inflict violence where he sees fit.

The fundamentalist is a brand that has emerged in the last 50 years.  The fundamentalist is a unique and partial picture of the fanatic.  They wish a “return” to basic doctrines and are extremely passionate about these ideas.  However, their reactions range from pity & condemnation for those who do not share their beliefs; to outright violence against the unbeliever in order to prompt him to see the error of his ways.  If the unbeliever dies in the process, that is left to the will of God.  Islamic extremists tend to fall in the fundamentalist category.  But so do many Christians who are willing to kill over their beliefs, whether to defend themselves, or to “defend the faith”.  What separates the fundamentalist from the full-on-fanatic is the boundary of family-relationships.  When the fundamentalist is willing to discard, or remove, a family member over a dispute about beliefs – they have entered the domain of the fanatic.

You can see ranges of this in your own life, if we begin by talking about politics first.  Most solid friendships can endure a difference over presidential candidates and how they are doing.  Good friends just come to a place where they agree to disagree.  Or perhaps learn to enjoy a good round of debates where no one leaves angry.  Families usually do better at this still … but only because ‘they have to’.  The bonds of blood are way too important to lose over some idiot presidential candidate.  So each family member agrees to “forgive” the one who is “mis-informed” and they either don’t talk about it at all (so as not to get angry), or they reach a maturity level that allows them open discourse without taking it personally.  It is rare where a family is willing to break apart over a disagreement in politics.  Frankly, politics is just not that worth it.

But where it comes to your salvation (in a spiritual context); people do the stupidest things, in the worst ways imaginable – and then claim what they do is the direct will of God, as if God spoke to them and dictated the series of events and actions they must go do.  But God does not.  God does not whisper in the inquisitor’s ear; that in order to change this infidel’s thinking about religion, you need to continue torturing him/her in more and more severe ways.  If there is a voice in that ear, it is NOT the voice of the Lord.  Nor does God whisper in the voice of the ear of a self-described Muslim Martyr; that murdering the innocent will somehow send a “bigger” statement to infidels about how wrong they are.  Neither act accomplishes anything, but the degradation of the perpetrator.  And to ascribe these acts to the will of God is to blaspheme the name of God; yet the crime continues on every day in assorted variations until blasphemy is common place.

Even where minds are so made up; even where opinions rarely change they only harden; the commission of the gospel lives on.  The message of the arrival of the kingdom of God, and the entry through Jesus Christ lives on, remains relevant, and is still good news.  To live a better life in the here-and-now is still an awesome concept no matter how badly I have screwed up doctrines, or how fanatically I am wrong about so so many things.  That good news dwarfs the condemnation of my fundamentalism, and has the potential to restore the relationships with family and friends my craziness has broken apart.  My entire life could be so exponentially better through Jesus Christ, and His gift is so easy to accept.  Even though our internet jungle of ever hardening circles of judgement remain, the gospel is bigger, better, and more powerful than that. 

Jesus knew the weird beliefs systems we would face.  Jesus knew how beliefs devolve into fanaticism.  Jesus knew even His own religion would fall victim to this horror.  But the gospel had to go out still.  Matthew continues the counsel of Christ resuming in chapter ten of his gospel picking up in verse 16 saying … “Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.”  No matter what the level of violence raised against the follower of Christ, violence in return, is not the response.  This text is very specific that the gospel is not spread on the point of sword.  Inflicting violence does nothing to change hearts, only love does that.  Responding to threats is not couched in excellent defensive postures and weapons of self-defense, it is couched only in love for the enemy who means us harm.  Wisdom is a better method of avoiding problems, than violence.  Being harmless makes us less of a threat than a posture of strength.  Let the Lord be our strength instead.

Matthew continues in verse 17 saying … “But beware of men: for they will deliver you up to the councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues; [verse 18] And ye shall be brought before governors and kings for my sake, for a testimony against them and the Gentiles.”  Jesus predicts the fury of organized religion against the pure message of saving grace.  He does not assure us deliverance against these heinous crimes, rather that we will surely endure them for the sake of the gospel, for the sake of the redemption of the man carrying the whip.  His own religion, that is, the religion Jesus setup with Moses in the desert will be the first to unleash the satanic fury of fanaticism against the simple saving message of Jesus as the Messiah.  But religious persecution is not the only brand His followers would suffer.  Religion would unite with the power of the State to continue and expand persecution of the followers of Jesus.  In the years to come, the corruption within the legacy Jewish religion would find its way into the Roman Catholic halls and extend the reach of persecution against groups like the Waldensians, and other smaller segments of people who believed in the saving message of Jesus Christ, not the absolute control of the organized church.  “Who” saves you has always been the ultimate question, whether singularly Jesus Christ, or some version of people claiming to be His sole church.

Jesus then provides His followers with the ultimate defense attorney for the upcoming “trials” in which they will be accused falsely, picking up in verse 19 saying … “But when they deliver you up, take no thought how or what ye shall speak: for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall speak. [verse 20] For it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you.”  We are nothing better than a conduit for the Spirit of God.  And to be that, we must get out of the way.  Preparation, is NOT required.  In fact, it should be purposely avoided.  That takes trust.  That takes confidence that we will not be making a fool of ourselves when the time comes.  But the fool in us will remain silent, while the Spirit that enters us will speak with a clarity, and emotional pull, that ONLY the Spirit of God can accomplish.  It is the well prepared of us, that provides no outlet for His Spirit.  We are too busy talking ourselves to let Him get a word in edgewise.  And while we speak our own well prepared words, it is evident we are truly fools.  For Satan can out debate us any day of the week, but against His Spirit, Satan is moot, and irrelevant.

The core of this counsel relies on a faith in Jesus Christ to save us.  To save us from ourselves.  To save us from situations well beyond our control.  And in the process, to reach out to others, and point them to the salvation of Jesus Christ.  The goal is not to be saved in a vacuum, but to spread out the witness of salvation, of what it means to be saved, in a community that is so desperate to see those effects in themselves.  And we do it so poorly.  So perhaps it is time now, to be still, to remain unprepared, and let our words become His words.  And there is no audience who we would wish to reach more intensely than the members of our own families.  Sadly, they will not always be willing to hear.  And worse we may discover fanaticism in our own ranks against the concept of Jesus Christ and his gift of salvation.

Matthew continues in verse 21 saying … “And the brother shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the child: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and cause them to be put to death. [verse 22] And ye shall be hated of all men for my name's sake: but he that endureth to the end shall be saved.”  Family will rise against family from the inside.  The blood bonds that should bind us in tolerance and love, prove brittle in the face of salvation and the name of Jesus Christ.  Our own families prefer agnosticism, they prefer methods of self-salvation, they prefer a nebulous god who can be reached through a variety of methods certainly not only through the Jesus Christ our silly scriptures describe.  Sad to think, that one sect of purported Christians, would turn in another, over doctrinal disputes of the how the remainder of scripture (outside of Jesus) is interpreted.  But that is our history, and will remain our future.  Power carries great allure, and once intoxicated with it, fanaticism is easy to achieve, even if at the death of a family member.  Keep in mind, the true followers of Jesus Christ are the victims our Lord describes … not the perpetrators.  If “Christians” turn anyone over to be killed, they blaspheme the name they carry.  Also keep in mind, our Lord does not promise us deliverance against the deaths our own families and the state and the corrupted churches would visit upon us.  Not everyone will get away, or find escape.  Some will die, perhaps many.  But to endure until the end is to keep our faith grounded in Jesus for our salvation, if not in this world, then in the far more important next one.

Matthew continues in verse 23 saying … “But when they persecute you in this city, flee ye into another: for verily I say unto you, Ye shall not have gone over the cities of Israel, till the Son of man be come.”  Our response to persecution is to flee, not to confront it violently.  But the second half of this verse always stirs up controversy in its interpretation.  On the surface, it looks as though once the gospel is spread to all the cities of Israel (in the time of Christ), that the Son of Man will return in His second coming.  But it does not say that.  It says that He will “be come”.  Keeping in the mind the timing of this commission, and the quickly spreading fame of Jesus Christ at the time.  What may have been meant, is that the Son of Man will complete His mission for our salvation, and “be come” back to the throne of His Father.  It is natural for us to read this from our own perspective, and want so bad for the words “be come” to mean “returned to take us home”.  But the facts on the ground obviously dispute that, and we know Jesus is not a liar.  Therefore our understanding must be off, and another meaning must have been intended.

Matthew continues in verse 24 saying … “The disciple is not above his master, nor the servant above his lord. [verse 25] It is enough for the disciple that he be as his master, and the servant as his lord. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebub, how much more shall they call them of his household?”  Look at the history of reformation within the church, any church.  When Jesus entered the house and religion of Israel, they called our God, Satan.  When Luther stood up in the Catholic church, his reputation was the first thing to suffer.  When the youth of our own churches rise, to embrace the homeless, or meet their peers where they are with the things they may be used to.  We, the organized body, the elders, the established and traditional members of the church, ALWAYS shun what is new, or what is different, of what looks “unholy” to us.  Just as the Pharisees of old did to Jesus.  Just as the Catholic leadership did to Luther.  Just as you and I do to our youth, fearing they bring the world into the church.  Odd that the results of the Spirit of God are always condemned as the workings of Satan, by those who profess to follow Jesus, but seem to have no real idea who Jesus is.

But conspiracy is no match for the Holy Spirit.  Matthew continues in verse 26 saying … “Fear them not therefore: for there is nothing covered, that shall not be revealed; and hid, that shall not be known. [verse 27] What I tell you in darkness, that speak ye in light: and what ye hear in the ear, that preach ye upon the housetops.”  The quiet conspiracies to put Jesus to death are now revealed as part of our scriptures for all to see.  The quiet betrayal of Judas revealed to everyone.  The denials of Peter reprinted in the light of day.  The hypocrisies of the Catholic church over the centuries, obsessed more with the power of popes, than the saving power of Jesus Christ.  And in our day, the quiet conspiracies that take place in government halls, or church board meetings, where the interests of power or financial gains are the number one priority; they will again be revealed for all to see, in the failures that are sure to accompany them.  Jesus is not interested in maintaining our earthly wealth, and even less in granting us power.  Jesus is interested in developing our sense of humble service, and our hearts to be willing to part with everything we own, for the sake of another’s benefit.  The former only distracts from the latter, and so it will be revealed for the folly it is.

Matthew continues in verse 28 saying … “And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. [verse 29] Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. [verse 30] But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. [verse 31] Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows.”  The message of the gospel is at war with the natural inclinations of the human heart.  Our embrace of sin made this so, and continues to make this so.  It is the power of Jesus, that can override what we would naturally want, and what we would naturally do.  That is the power of salvation.  What our opposition is prepared to do, the level of fundamentalism they will claim as justification for what violence they wish to inflict, is not a matter for us to fear.  The tragedy that fanaticism is willing to impose is not a matter for us to fear.  For our Lord sees all.  He knows us so intimately that He knows how many hairs sit upon our heads (even when that number is in constant decline 😊).  Our salvation rests in His hands not our own.  It is that message that Satan wishes to cover up.  He does not want the name of Jesus Christ spread he wants it silenced.  Killing a messenger does not accomplish that.  But altering a follower’s philosophy to be one of self does do the trick.

Satan has no need to silence a follower of Jesus who has no personal testimony to share.  Satan has no need to torture a “Christian” who is already very busy attempting to drive the sin from themselves, and from their desires.  They are already torturing themselves with their own failure.  And one day, they will reach of point of repeated failures until they give up, and advise others to do the same.  Satan could care less about the body, it is the permanence of the soul he is after.  Directing us away from Jesus Christ gives him a chance at getting that ultimate prize.  This is how the soul is destroyed.  It is not the ultimate fires that will do the work of destruction.  The destruction will happen long before, at the tips of our own fingers as we refuse to give Jesus our salvation, and hold on to it instead ourselves.  It was always the introduction of self into Christianity that Satan has long sought.  Do some amount of good deeds.  Give away some amount of money.  In effect, buy your salvation by the strength of your own hands and intentions.  He sold the lie to Cain, and continues to sell it to us.  And too many, who do not know Jesus personally yet, are avid consumers of this lie, to the destruction of their own souls.  That is worth fearing.

But even then Jesus says we need not fear, for our salvation is based in Jesus Christ, and not ourselves.  And the counsel for outreach was not concluded yet …