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Showing posts with label Isaiah. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Isaiah. Show all posts

Friday, August 26, 2022

Never Forgotten - Purity 820


Never Forgotten - Purity 820

Purity 820 08/26/2022  Purity 820 Podcast

Good morning,

Today’s photo of a slowly setting sun and sand dunes comes to us from an anonymous friend who shared this scene on social media back in March.  I would imagine this beach is somewhere in Florida but could be mistaken as any memory of the photographer or the location that I may have had has been lost. But the good news is that their photo wasn’t lost and it can be used today to welcome us to the last day of the work week and cause us to remember the Lord who created the heavens and the earth and who will never forget about us.   

Well, Thank God for that, and Thank God it is Friday! Although I this Friday doesn’t have that anticipation of finishing another work week because today is the last day of my “stay-cation”, it still has the excitement that comes from knowing that I will be reunited with my wife later today. 

Although it was a vacation, I decided to utilize my time off to prepare for the ministry work I will be doing after Labor Day, and although I haven’t accomplished as much as I would have liked, I am satisfied that I got a lot of my ducks in a row and made a good start on my ambitious effort to do something new. 

I am currently preparing power point presentations for a “course”  or “book study” of Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s book, The Cost of Discipleship” that I always wanted to do and although creating lesson 1 was akin to the visit to the dentist office, it dusted off my “mad” power point skills and creating lesson 2 has been a little less painful. 

Remember when people used “mad” like that? Like it was cool.  It was more my younger brother’s generation that talked like that, I think, and I always thought it was a little stupid, like “He was mad angry!” but it was probably in that general cultural time frame or when “mad” was dwindling if not totally dead,( it is dead, right?), when I was getting my Associates degree in Telecommunications, Class of 2013?, maybe? That I last had to use power point.  So it has been a trip down memory lane as I try to create something for people to look at, as I will fumble and fawn over Bonhoeffer’s words and encourage people to love the Lord our God and to follow Jesus like one of the first apostles, who literally dropped everything to answer His call to discipleship and who dedicated their lives to telling others of the new life they could have in Christ.

As I went through the growing pains of reorienting myself with power point, I would get tempted to quit and just give the idea of doing this new thing and just stick with the comfy confines of the Freedom in Christ courses that I facilitate but I have persisted for a few reasons. 

I really believe that our life in Christ encourages us to do something new, to do something more for God’s kingdom.  Whether it is gaining victory over another part of our own lives that is worldly, or choosing to edify ourselves by learning something new, or if it is choosing to serve our local churches in some way or if it is deciding to step out in our local communities to go good works, I believe that God wants us to stretch ourselves to discover new capacities in ourselves and to discover our purpose in Him.  

While we have to be careful not to “burn out”, I think we should also not grow complacent in our faith and in the things that would demonstrate we have some.   Although I would also recommend that we examine our hearts and minds as we decide to walk in faith.  

In addition to creating power points for my new venture, I have also immersed myself in some Christian teaching by Crossexamined.org, Dr. Frank Turek. Turek is an apologist, and his teachings are rich and effective for challenging the current culture of atheism and moral relativity. Turek reveals how the common beliefs in our society go against reason, natural law, and the Bible. His work is first rate and I have learned a lot from his teachings, and I believe that being equipped through them was just as important as doing the work on my new class. 

Because I know the grace of the Lord , I know I don’t need to work to be approved by Him, but when I stretch myself and grow I benefit from the process. I believe that the Lord wants us to learn and grow to be better equipped to encourage others and to stand strong in our own walk with Him.

But sometimes the work can be daunting and you, because you know the Lord’s grace, might be tempted to just “rest”, to kick your feet up and do nothing, secure in the Lord’s love.  But then you realize that the peace you have in Christ is unknown to so many people out there and that it wouldn’t be loving to not at least try to introduce people to the life of love, joy, and peace that you have come to know.  

So I have been working this week and have been a bit tired in the process and in my struggle to create something new-”ish”, I was tempted to quit but reminded myself that I wanted to do it and that it didn’t have to be perfect and that it could benefit somebody else, so I’d press on.  

And yesterday I was blessed with some positive feedback.  Someone reached out to me to tell my that yesterday’s blog post was “great” and I received an email thanking me for the work I have done with my discipleship classes saying that I have personally impacted their life and that they are sharing what they have learned with others in their local church. 

And when those encouragements come, I know that this is what the Lord would have me do: to keep going, to keep growing, to keep speaking, and to keep encouraging others to follow Him.  

The Lord doesn’t forget us and He doesn’t want us to forget that there is more to this world than meets the eye and that the work we do to grow closer to Him and to promote His kingdom is worthwhile.  

So keep on chugging along, I think you can, and I know God is for you and can empower you to do the things He has prepared for you.  So keep walking and talking with Him to discover all that He has for you.  

 

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Today’s Bible verse comes to us from “The NLT Bible Promise Book for Men”.

This morning’s meditation verse is:

Isaiah 44:24 (NLT2)
24  This is what the LORD says— your Redeemer and Creator: “I am the LORD, who made all things. I alone stretched out the heavens. Who was with me when I made the earth?

Today’s verse reminds us that our Lord is our Redeemer and Our Creator and that He alone stands over and above all things.  

The question of the Lord in today’s verse of : “Who was with me when I made the earth?”  is either easily answered or a little complicated as the mystery of the trinity could give us pause.  

The simple answer to the Lord’s somewhat rhetorical question is “Nobody.”  And that points to a fundamental truth that really reminds us of who is in charge.  In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.  Nobody else was there.  Just God. Before time and space were created, God was there to make it.  Wow. 

No one created God. He is self-existent.  The “unmoved mover” is not an “effect” that had a cause.  The “Great I am”, just was and always will be.  God started the universe and He will determine it’s course.  

God also made man and even though we went the way of Satan and rebelled against Him by sinning, God loved us enough to make away to make peace with Him, to redeem the lives of all who put their faith in Christ, to save the lives of those who rightly would go to hell by His grace alone.  

So we should recognize God’s power and sovereignty. But we should also rejoice because through Jesus, God also redeems us and will call us to live with Him forever and ever

God started “alone” but in the end of this universe He won’t end that way.  When He wills it, He will create a new heaven and a new earth and He will call the redeemed to live there with Him for ever and ever. Amen!

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As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk.

Today we continue sharing from Clinton E. Arnold’s “Powers of Darkness”

As always, I share this information for educational purposes and encourage all to purchase Clinton Arnold’s books for your own private study and to support his work.  This resource is available on many websites for less than $20.00.

The Powers Assail the Purity of the Church

This past decade has witnessed perhaps one of the greatest discreditings of the church in its history. Evangelical ministers have succumbed to temptations of sensual lust, pride and wealth in unparalleled proportions. This fact is so well known it needs no documentation or quantification. In the West the purity of the church has been disgraced.

Ostensibly falling victim to the temptations of the “flesh,” numerous evangelicals have also been victimized by intense demonic attack. In the apostle Paul’s way of thinking, it is really unnecessary to separate the cravings of the inner impulse from the simultaneous activity of Satan who exploits these desires. Just as Satan attacked Jesus in the desert at the outset of Jesus’ earthly ministry to thwart him from his redemptive mission, so too Satan assaults the church—the body of Christ—to deter it from fulfilling its mission. Satan entices people at the points of their greatest vulnerability to act in ways displeasing to God, whether it be through engaging in a sexual tryst or by using unethical means to acquire wealth. The results of sin are never isolated to the individual; an entire congregation, a denomination or the churches of an entire region feel the implications.

Not only overt acts of sin, but also idolatry hinders the growth and ministry of the church. The early Christians faced the great temptation of combining their worship of Christ with devotion to other gods and goddesses. This was the spirit of the times (commonly known as syncretism). Paul was thoroughly convinced that worshiping other gods was tantamount to worshiping demons. From his perspective the powers of darkness were deeply involved in the non-Christian religions. This tendency to syncretize continues to be a serious temptation faced by Christians in polytheistic, non-Western cultures. It takes a major step of faith to destroy the household gods and give one’s entire devotion to Christ alone.

An inadequate Christology is behind the desire to syncretize. Jesus has been exalted high above the other gods and all other angels, spirits and demons. Christ seeks wholehearted devotion from his people, and he deserves nothing less.

Paul also had a broader view of idolatry that extended to an undue devotion to material possessions. He warned one group of Christians to “put to death … greed, which is idolatry” (Col 3:5). Paul was keenly aware of how the desire to accumulate could so grip a person’s devotion and attention that it is comparable to worshiping an idol. Many evangelical thinkers have pointed to the culpability of the West in this regard—and rightly so. As our culture continues to become so consumption-fixated, the attitude permeates the church. While this mindset is something that comes from within (the flesh), it is a disposition that Satan exploits and uses to his advantage to blunt the work of the church and its devotion to Christ.[1]

---------------------------more tomorrow------------------------

Join our “Victory over the Darkness”, “The Bondage Breaker”, "Freedom in Christ" series of Discipleship Classes via the mt4christ247 podcast!

at https://mt4christ247.podbean.com, You can also find it on Apple podcasts

(https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mt4christ247s-podcast/id1551615154). The mt4christ247 podcast is also available on Google Podcasts, Amazon Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartradio, and Audible.com. 

These teachings are also available on the MT4Christ247 You Tube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTxjSNstREpuGWuL0bF3U7w/featured

Email me at mt4christ247@gmail.com to receive the class materials, share your progress, and to be encouraged.

My wife, TammyLyn, also offers Christian encouragement via her Facebook Group: Ask, Seek, Knock (https://www.facebook.com/groups/529047851449098 ) and her podcast Ask, Seek, and Knock on Podbean (https://feed.podbean.com/tammalyn78/feed.xml)

Encouragement for the Path of Christian Discipleship


[1] Clinton E. Arnold, Powers of Darkness: Principalities & Powers in Paul’s Letters (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic: An Imprint of InterVarsity Press, 1992), 191–192.

Wednesday, August 17, 2022

Not Having to Fake It – The Cost of Discipleship - Purity 812

Not Having to Fake It – The Cost of Discipleship  - Purity 812

Purity 812 08/17/2022  Purity 812 Podcast

Good morning,

Today’s photo of a sunset on the horizon to the right of a mountainous cloud formation comes to from a friend who captured this scene at Wabasso Beach, Florida and shared it on social media back on August 1st.  

Well, It’s Wednesday again and I thought my friend’s photo was good to share today because it is a beautiful sight and that peaked cloud formation on the left could adequately visually represent arriving at the “hump” of the work week.   

Not only have we arrived at the midpoint of our work week but we have also officially made it past the midpoint of the month and although it is not as epic as that saying from Game of Thrones, I will say it: “Autumn is Coming…”.  I know, I know “let’s let summer be summer” but apparently I amnot the  only one who is always looking forward.  I sa Halloween Candy at Walmart past weekend! Halloween! In August! Even I don’t look that far ahead… but in truth I guess I do. And that’s a good thing, be prepared, right?

Currently, I am in the early stages of getting prepared for this Fall’s Men’s Freedom in Christ Discipleship course that I facilitate on Tuesday for Freedom in Christ Ministries but I have also felt lead to do solo project for my audio podcast, and YouTube Channel. It has been on my heart to do a class or a book study on Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s “The Cost of Discipleship” and I have decided to pull the trigger and finally do it on Thursdays this Fall.  

For someone who encourages others to experience their freedom in Christ by “walking on the path of Christian Discipleship”, I have always felt that “The Cost of Discipleship” is THE TEXT on Discipleship and it should be taught to anyone who comes to faith in Christ. Bonhoeffer’s exposition of the Sermon on the Mount unapologetically spells out what it means to follow Christ and exposes “cheap grace” in our “church cultures”.  For someone who was seeking to be an authentic Christian after a lifetime of worldly living, The Cost of Discipleship provided me with the education and motivation to progressively surrender to the Lordship of Christ.  

Bonhoeffer’s book is so good that I will have difficulty in choosing what not to share. Currently my early efforts at creating “lessons” from his book has resulted in me merely creating headings to spell out the content of his text and creating bullet points from it.  I taught classes in the past from Dr. Neil Anderson’s books in which I have sad 90% of the content of the class is straight from Anderson’s work and that percentage may be even higher with Bonhoeffer as his writing is just “gold.”

So the new Bonhoeffer class will be a labor of love, but it will very humbling as I will just try to get out of the way and let Bonhoeffer posthumously speak for himself.

I believe that “Discipleship”, whose original German title is simply Nachfolge (literally: "following" or: "the act of following") which was originally published in 1937, stands the test of time because it is based on the word of God and is timeless because it answers the question “what does it really mean to be a Christian?”. And in our current age of Christianity with its vast spectrum of denominations, non-denominations, and differing doctrines and practices, I believe that Bonhoeffer’s work is more relevant today than when he originally wrote it. 

Bonhoeffer wrote to address the hypocrisy of “cheap grace” and nominal Christianity in an age where the vast majority of the society he lived in proclaimed to be Christian, where Christian denominational institutions were a key part of the fabric of society. Could you imagine what the Christian martyr would say today in light of today’s multiplicity of “Christian choices” and the diversity of faith systems to confuse the cause of Christ?  

I honestly don’t know if Bonhoeffer would be shocked or not, but I believe that he would undoubtedly give the same advice: to follow Jesus.

While I know that is a simple instruction, I understand the difficulty and confusion that can be involved in following it. 

I don’t seek to “whip anyone into shape” because I know that is not how our faith works.  It’s a walk not a forced march.  It’s an invitation to follow, not a order that can not be refused. It’s a relationship, not religion. 

I understand that we have to learn to crawl before we can walk, and we have to walk before we can “run the race”. But the word of God, and books like the Cost of Discipleship, encourage us that we really can be the people God calls us to be. We really can be authentic Christians.  

Yesterday, as I was reviewing the reasons that some of the men gave for wanting to take the freedom in Christ course this fall, I thought of a line of dialog from the Oliver Stone, film Platoon. 

Somewhere early in the film, the new Army private, Chris Taylor, played by Charlie Sheen contemplates being put in the jungles of Viet Nam and his narrator’s voice over says: 

“Maybe I finally found it, way down here in the mud. Maybe from down here I can start up again. Be something I can be proud of without having to fake it, be a fake human being.” (https://www.moviequotes.com/s-movie/platoon/)

One of the biggest problem people have with Christianity is the “fake Christians”.

But I am here to tell you, from someone who came from way down in the mud and the darkness of his past, that with Christ, you can start again.   You can be something you can be proud of , without having to fake it. 

Jesus Christ really is the Son of God, and the God the Son. And because of your in faith Him, you can live. And if you decide follow Him, you don’t have to fake it. You can really be a Christian.   

Bonhoeffer knew it. And know it and I am encouraging all who read or hear this message to follow Jesus Christ with how you live your life, and you can know it too.  

If you found Jesus as your Savior, you found what you needed but that was just the beginning of all that the Lord has for you.  So keep walking and talking with God. 

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Today’s Bible verse comes to us from “The NLT Bible Promise Book for Men”.

This morning’s meditation verse is:

Isaiah 40:31 (NLT2)
31  But those who trust in the LORD will find new strength. They will soar high on wings like eagles. They will run and not grow weary. They will walk and not faint.

Today’s verse speaks of the strength that one will find when they trust in the Lord.  

Hey, this might surprise you but you do know that when you come to faith in Jesus Christ that you enter into a “supernatural” realm? I mean, we do make peace with God and are welcomed into His kingdom as His adopted children after all.  

Now while spiritual gifts and spiritual experiences of the manifest presence of God or the outpouring, or infilling, of the Holy Spirit will vary,  one of “supernatural” benefits that we will know is the Lord’s strength working in us and through us, to accomplish amazing things and to endure amazingly difficult situations.   

Now, the power to overcome or to endure, may not be super flashy, and could be easily doubted or even imitated and counterfeited by those with no faith in God, a common testimony of the power of the Christian faith is of the receiving of a “strength that was not my own.”

While many could claim that “God’s strength” is just “hard work” or “perseverance” that anyone could choose to do, the evidence of God’s presence in someone’s life goes beyond “just doing it” or “not quitting”.  Beyond strength that could be commanded by the force of one’s individual will, the difference God makes in someone’s life is shown by the growth of the fruit of the Spirit and the counter intuitive practices of the Christian faith.  

The Christian will endeavor to be morally upstanding and will be known by the fruit of the Spirit as someone who demonstrates love, joy, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, kindness, patience, and self-control.

The Christian would also give all the glory to God and specifically name Christ as their Lord and Savior. 

The strength that the Christian receive is an outflow of God’s grace and that stuff pours into much more that endurance.  So trust in the Lord and find the strength to endure, to overcome, and to be transformed to faithfully represent His kingdom.  

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As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk.

Today we continue sharing from Clinton E. Arnold’s “Powers of Darkness”

As always, I share this information for educational purposes and encourage all to purchase Clinton Arnold’s books for your own private study and to support his work.  This resource is available on many websites for less than $20.00.

Biblical Scholarship and the Problem of Myth

In the religious academic community the eminent Marburg theologian Rudolf Bultmann has significantly influenced the present generation of scholars. Nurtured in an academic environment that spurned the belief in devils and demons as antiquated and useless for moderns, Bultmann too regarded them as part of the mythical language of the New Testament. For Bultmann, however, myth has an essential role to play in early Christianity because it explained the other world (the divine and spiritual) in terms of this world. Nevertheless, Bultmann considered this prescientific view of the world as obsolete. He notes, “Now that the forces and the laws of nature have been discovered, we can no longer believe in spirits, whether good or evil.”

Bultmann and many other scholars since him relegated the references to principalities and powers in the New Testament to the mythology of Jewish apocalyptic, that is, Jewish accounts of a cataclysmic end of time. Such interpreters regarded Jewish apocalyptic as an eschatological (endtime) myth that influenced Paul in a profound way. While it is true that Paul shares many ideas with Jewish apocalyptic, including the notion of evil spirits wreaking evil throughout the earth, Jewish apocalyptic was not the only view of the world during Paul’s time that attributed evil to the work of hostile spirits. As already shown, the Gentiles to whom Paul preached also believed in personal evil forces who influenced humanity on many levels. While some of the terms Paul used for evil spirits are found in Jewish apocalyptic, the same terms and others are also used in magical writings and other pagan literature for supernatural spirits. Regardless of the particular world view (with regard to cosmogony—that is, origins or eschatology), both Jews and Gentiles could understand what Paul had to say on the topic of evil spirits. The concept of evil spirits was something agreed upon by all in the first century.

In addition it is significant to note that Paul only spoke once of the role of the powers in connection with the endtime triumph of God (1 Cor 15:24). The majority of Paul’s references to the powers appear in ethical contexts or in terms of the work of Christ on the cross. One therefore cannot dismiss the Pauline references to “principalities and powers” as Paul’s dependence on mythical imagery merely because Jewish writers in the apocalyptic literature used the same terms.

Many moderns are content merely to discard either the whole New Testament or the statements in the New Testament that allegedly reflect the outmoded mythical view of the world. Bultmann, however, wanted to take the message of the New Testament seriously and sought to find contemporary meaning in the references to the powers. Consequently, Bultmann suggested a program of “demythologizing” Scripture, that is, stripping off the elements of its outmoded world view as a means of hearing what it has to say for the present day. In his view myth does not give us an objective picture of the world, but an expression of one’s understanding of self in the world. Bultmann understood the Holy Spirit, for instance, not as a personal being distinct from the Christian, but the possibility of a new life that can be lived on the basis of an individual’s personal and deliberate resolve. Bultmann’s overall approach is “existentialist.” He repeatedly emphasized the need to escape the constraints of the New Testament world view by discovering the meaning of the existence that stands behind it. He found this meaning in the heart of Christian preaching, which he interpreted as finding personal meaning in the context of one’s concrete life decisions.

Many of the followers of Bultmann have tried to demythologize the powers by interpreting them as structures of our existence. Some interpreters suggest that we should understand the powers more in the sense of other Pauline categories such as sin, the law, flesh and death. Others argue that the powers should be seen as social structures, political ideologies and the like. This kind of interpretation has been particularly prominent among liberation theologians. Still, the bottom-line issue is the motive for demythologizing the powers—a denial of the real existence of evil spirits.

Some scholars point to the political dimensions of Jewish apocalyptic as a warrant for demythologizing the New Testament references to the powers by interpreting them as political structures. They correctly point to the fact that political events in the history of Israel influenced and partly motivated the writing of the apocalyptic literature—Israel had lost its struggle for autonomy in the two centuries before Christ. In his interpretation of Jesus’ parable of the strong man (Mk 3:20–30), for example, Ched Myers recounts how the Jewish religious leaders accused Jesus of casting out demons by the ruler of demons. Myers then contends that since this terminology echoes the principalities-and-powers language found throughout the New Testament, “the semantic field is obviously that of apocalyptic, and the discourse is therefore specifically political.” For Myers, Jesus’ attacks on demons through exorcism really represent an attack on the scribal establishment that Jesus intends to overthrow. The language of demons and unclean spirits becomes for Myers the code words to refer to the prevailing social and political structures. Myers sees Jesus’ example of “binding the strong man” as therefore a relevant example for his followers today. It is a call to challenge the American government by “unmasking and resisting the institutionalized lies and hidden crimes of imperial domination and violence.”

Such a political reading falls short of an accurate interpretation of the terminology used for evil spirits in the New Testament. Simply because the terminology for evil spirits appears in the apocalyptic writings does not mean that all parts of the apocalyptic drama need to be interpreted as political events. It is also a fallacy to assume that since the word demon or ruler occurs in a piece of writing that was prompted by a political situation, the word must have a political interpretation. There is no doubt that Jews living in the first century believed that real angelic functionaries would carry out the events recorded in their apocalyptic writings. For Myers, as well as for many other interpreters, the root issue centers on a presupposition that the language of demons, evil spirits, and principalities and powers is mythical and needs to be interpreted.

---------------------------more tomorrow------------------------

Join our “Victory over the Darkness”, “The Bondage Breaker”, "Freedom in Christ" series of Discipleship Classes via the mt4christ247 podcast!

at https://mt4christ247.podbean.com, You can also find it on Apple podcasts

(https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mt4christ247s-podcast/id1551615154). The mt4christ247 podcast is also available on Google Podcasts, Amazon Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartradio, and Audible.com. 

These teachings are also available on the MT4Christ247 You Tube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTxjSNstREpuGWuL0bF3U7w/featured

Email me at mt4christ247@gmail.com to receive the class materials, share your progress, and to be encouraged.

My wife, TammyLyn, also offers Christian encouragement via her Facebook Group: Ask, Seek, Knock (https://www.facebook.com/groups/529047851449098 ) and her podcast Ask, Seek, and Knock on Podbean (https://feed.podbean.com/tammalyn78/feed.xml)

Encouragement for the Path of Christian Discipleship



 

Thursday, May 5, 2022

The National Day of Prayer and Cinco De Mayo: A Small Victory that Inspired a Nation - Purity 723


 The National Day of Prayer and Cinco De Mayo: A Small Victory that Inspired a Nation - Purity 723

Purity 723 05/05/2022 

Good morning,

Today’s photo of an snow and ice covered road running alongside an icicle covered outcropping of rock and ice glazed forest underneath a blazing sun and a clear blue sky comes to us from a friend who captured this scene from an undisclosed location in upstate NY back on March 31st. If you are the photographer, and care to enlighten us of of this photo’s location  and your identity, we are curious to know both, as our short investigation of the “usual suspects” proved fruitless in revealing it’s origins. 

Well, It’s Thursday, America’s National Day of Prayer, and Cinco De Mayo.   

I am sharing links regarding both the National Day of Prayer (https://www.nationaldayofprayer.org )   and Cinco De Mayo (https://www.history.com/topics/holidays/cinco-de-mayo)  on the blog today for anyone curious to find out what those things are about in detail, but in brief both these things happening today can encourage us while we keep on walking and talking with God on the path of Christian Discipleship.   

According to History.com, Cinco De Mayo while a relatively minor holiday in Mexico has “evolved into a commemoration of Mexican culture and heritage, particularly in areas with large Mexican-American populations.

In my observations, it also seems to be a day where people with no Mexican heritage “celebrate the Mexican culture” by eating Mexican food and drinking Mexican alcoholic beverages, like Margaritas and Corona Beer. From where I am sitting the 5th of May resembles a Mexican “St. Patrick’s Day”, where the holiday’s meaning may be overshadowed by the excess of the celebration itself.

Anyway, the holiday – Cinco De Mayo, while not “Mexico’s Independence Day”, like many people wrongly assume, is a celebration of single Mexican victory, of the Battle of Puebla, that happened on May 5th, 1862 where a severely outnumbered Mexican militia dealt an invading French force a surprise loss.  Although not a major strategic win in the overall war against the French, the success at the Battle of Puebla on May 5 represented a great symbolic victory for the Mexican government and bolstered the resistance movement.  But it wasn’t until 1867, and thanks in part to support from the United States, that France finally withdrew from Mexico. 

So what does this have to do with Christian Discipleship?  Not much but it can inspire us.  That small victory on May the 5th, inspired a nation to fight for their independence against what may have seemed like impossible odds, and in our daily war against sin and the ways of the world, we may feel that there is no point in trying to defeat a besetting sin or to overcome worldly habits that separate us from a close relationship with the Lord.  

One of the biggest lies the enemy, the flesh, and world tries to tell Christians is that somethings are just impossible, or that they are just impossible for us personally.  While some people can overcome sinful or unhealthy lifestyle choices, this oppressive force of the world the flesh, and the devil will try to convince us that for us, it just is impossible. 

That’s a lie. Our faith in Christ has freed us from sin and death and has given us the power to overcome.   But we have to make the daily decision to follow the Lord and resist the dark influences that would keep us, or drag us back into, bondage.

Just like a military force will have to train and be disciplined to be victorious, Christians need to be trained in the things of the Lord and be disciplined in our spiritual practices to achieve victory over our former worldly ways and to maintain our freedom in Christ.    

Which brings us to The National Day of Prayer.

“The National Day of Prayer is an annual observance held on the first Thursday of May, inviting people to pray for the nation. It was created in 1952 by a joint resolution of the United States Congress, and signed into law by President Harry S. Truman. Our Task Force is a privately funded organization whose purpose is to encourage participation on the National Day of Prayer. It exists to communicate with every individual the need for personal repentance and prayer, to create appropriate materials, and to mobilize the Christian community to intercede for America’s leaders and its families. The Task Force represents a Judeo-Christian expression of the national observance, based on our understanding that this country was birthed in prayer and in reverence for the God of the Bible.” (https://www.nationaldayofprayer.org/about)

This observance was obviously created by men and women who had deep faith that God hears prayer and will bless them.  

My purpose here on the blog and podcast is similar to that the National Day of Prayer, in that I too try “communicate with every individual the need for personal repentance and prayer” but it is my conviction that repentance and prayer form the foundation for a lifestyle of Christian Discipleship that is lived out, not just one day, but all days of the year as I have learned and experienced the fact that the fruit of the Spirit that are mentioned in Galatians 5:22-23: that of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and self-control, grow in our lives when we “walk in the Spirit”.  

I applaud the efforts of the National Day of Prayer to inspire people to intercede for America’s leaders and families and pray that our prayers this year will cause more people in our society to turn to God, make Jesus their Lord and Savior, and make the decision to be authentic in their Christian faith by choosing to adopt the mentality of a disciple, to make the daily decision to practice the disciplines of our faith and to apply the wisdom of God’s word to all the areas of their lives.   

So pray for the leaders and the families in our nation today but also choose to fight the good fight of faith against what may seem like impossible odds by choosing to resist the world, the flesh in the devil on a daily campaign that starts with setting the intention to keep walking and talking with God, leads to successive victories and increasing freedom in Christ, and ends in glory for One who created the world and who invites us to be with Him forever.

______________________________________________________________

Today’s Bible verse comes to us from “The NLT Bible Promise Book for Men”.

This morning’s meditation verse is:

Isaiah 29:19 (NLT2)
19  The humble will be filled with fresh joy from the LORD. The poor will rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.

Today’s Bible verse points to our relationship with God and how our humbleness is rewarded with joy that comes regardless of our earthly resources or circumstances.

A parallel verse to this sentiment can be seen in;

Matthew 5:3 (NKJV)
3  "Blessed are the poor in spirit, For theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

How can the poorbe  blessed or rejoice?  I mean the poor or the poor in spirit are bummin’.  They got nothing.  Shouldn’t they take Job’s wife’s advice and:

Job 2:9 (NKJV)
9  … Curse God and die!"

No, and why?  Because what we see here on earth is not all there is. While we could look at this world as a hostile environment and if we are poor we could decide to curse the God who made it when we fail to have the abundance that some of our neighbors enjoy.  That would be really unwise.  If we think the suffering of this bad, the weeping and gnashing of teeth that comes to those who choose to be separated from the Lord is a whole lot worse because the

Matthew 25:41 (NKJV)
41  .. the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels:

and those who reject the free gift of life through faith in Jesus Christ, never goes out. 

That’s why those who may be poor, but who humble themselves and make Jesus the Lord of their lives, can have joy from the Lord and Rejoice in the Holy One of Israel because they know that the Lord is with them always and that the kingdom of heaven is theirs.  

With that knowledge, and a close personal relationship with God, our circumstances, no matter how meager they may be, can not keep us from experiencing the joy that the Lord has for those who walk in the Spirit and who will one day experience the ultimate glory of heaven itself when they see God face to face.  

Through faith in Christ, we are rich in mercy and in grace and with those commodities we can afford what we need here on earth and store our treasures to be fully realized in heaven, 

As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk. 

Today we continue sharing from John Piper’s “Don’t Waste Your Life”.  

As always, I share this information for educational purposes and encourage all to purchase John Pipers’ books for your own private study and to support his work.  This resource is available on many websites for less than $5.00.

“If They Persecuted Me, They Will Also Persecute You”

Lest we think that this risk-taking life was unique to Paul, he made it a point to tell young Christians that they would meet unspecified troubles. After establishing new churches on his first missionary journey, he returned some months later “strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying that through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God” (Acts 14:22). When he wrote to the young Thessalonian church, he expressed concern that they might have been shaken by their afflictions and said to them, “You yourselves know that we have been destined for this [that is, for these afflictions]” (1 Thessalonians 3:3). In other words, the Christian life is a call to risk.

Jesus had made this clear. He said, for example, in Luke 21:16, “You will be delivered up even by parents and brothers and relatives and friends, and some of you they will put to death.” The key word here is some. “Some of you they will put to death.” This word puts the earthly life of the disciples in great uncertainty. Not all will die for the cause of Christ. But not all will live either. Some will die. And some will live. This is what I mean by risk. It is the will of God that we be uncertain about how life on this earth will turn out for us. And therefore it is the will of the Lord that we take risks for the cause of God.

Life was hard for Jesus, and he said it would be hard for his followers. “Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you” (John 15:20). So Peter warned the churches of Asia that mistreatment would be normal. “Beloved, do not be surprised at the fiery trial when it comes upon you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed. If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you” (1 Peter 4:12–14).

To Become a Christian Was to Risk Your Life

The first three centuries of the Christian church set the pattern of growth under threat. Stephen Neill, in his History of Christian Missions, wrote, “Undoubtedly, Christians under the Roman Empire had no legal right to existence, and were liable to the utmost stringency of the law.… Every Christian knew that sooner or later he might have to testify to his faith at the cost of his life.” Might. There’s the risk. It was always there. Maybe we will be killed for being Christians. Maybe we won’t. It is a risk. That was normal. And to become a Christian under those circumstances was right.

In fact, it was the Christ-exalting love that the Christians showed in spite of risk that stunned the pagan world. The Roman Emperor Julian (a.d. 332–363) wanted to breathe new life into the ancient pagan religion but saw more and more people drawn to Christianity. He wrote with frustration against these “atheists” (who did not believe in the Roman gods, but in Christ):

Atheism [i.e., Christian faith] has been specially advanced through the loving service rendered to strangers, and through their care for the burial of the dead. It is a scandal there is not a single Jew who is a beggar, and that the godless Galileans care not only for their own poor but for ours as well; while those who belong to us look in vain for the help that we should render them.

It is costly to follow Christ. There is risk everywhere. But, as we saw in Chapter 3, this very risk is the means by which the value of Christ shines more brightly.

How to Waste Forty Years and Thousands of Lives

But what happens when the people of God do not escape from the beguiling enchantment of security? What happens if they try to live their lives in the mirage of safety? The answer is wasted lives. Do you remember the time it happened?

It had been less than three years since the people of Israel came out of Egypt by the power of God. Now they were on the borders of the Promised Land. The Lord said to Moses, “Send men to spy out the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the people of Israel” (Numbers 13:2). So Moses sent Caleb, Joshua, and ten other men. After forty days they returned with a huge cluster of grapes hung on a pole between two men. Caleb issued the hope-filled call to his people: “Let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it” (Numbers 13:30). But the others said, “We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we are” (v. 31).

Caleb was unable to explode the myth of safety. The people were gripped by the beguiling enchantment of security—the notion that there is a sheltered way of life apart from the path of God-exalting obedience. They murmured against Moses and Aaron and decided to go back to Egypt—the great mirage of safety.

Joshua tried to free them from their stupor.

The land, which we passed through to spy it out, is an exceedingly good land. If the Lord delights in us, he will bring us into this land and give it to us, a land that flows with milk and honey. Only do not rebel against the Lord. And do not fear the people of the land, for they are bread for us. Their protection is removed from them, and the Lord is with us; do not fear them. (Numbers 14:7–9)

But not even Joshua could explode the myth of safety. The people were drunk in a dreamworld of security. And they tried to stone Caleb and Joshua. The result was thousands of wasted lives and wasted years. It was clearly wrong not to take the risk of battling the giants in the land of Canaan. Oh, how much is wasted when we do not risk for the cause of God!

What About You?

Risk is right. And the reason is not because God promises success to all our ventures in his cause. There is no promise that every effort for the cause of God will succeed, at least not in the short run. John the Baptist risked calling King Herod an adulterer when he divorced his own wife in order to take his brother’s wife. For this John got his head chopped off. And he had done right to risk his life for the cause of God and truth. Jesus had no criticism for him, only the highest praise (Matthew 11:11).

Paul risked going up to Jerusalem to complete his ministry to the poor. He was beaten and thrown in prison for two years and then shipped off to Rome and executed there two years later. And he did right to risk his life for the cause of Christ. How many graves are there in Africa and Asia because thousands of young missionaries were freed by the power of the Holy Spirit from the enchantment of security and then risked their lives to make much of Christ among the unreached peoples of the world!

And now what about you? Are you caught in the enchantment of security, paralyzed from taking any risks for the cause of God? Or have you been freed by the power of the Holy Spirit from the mirage of Egyptian safety and comfort? Do you men ever say with Joab, “For the sake of the name, I’ll try it! And may the Lord do what seems good to him”? Do you women ever say with Esther, “For the sake of Christ, I’ll try it! And if I perish, I perish”?[1]

---------------------------more tomorrow------------------------

Join our “Victory over the Darkness”, “The Bondage Breaker”, "Freedom in Christ" series of Discipleship Classes via the mt4christ247 podcast!

at https://mt4christ247.podbean.com, You can also find it on Apple podcasts

(https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mt4christ247s-podcast/id1551615154). The mt4christ247 podcast is also available on Google Podcasts, Amazon Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartradio, and Audible.com. 

These teachings are also available on the MT4Christ247 You Tube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTxjSNstREpuGWuL0bF3U7w/featured

Email me at mt4christ247@gmail.com to receive the class materials, share your progress, and to be encouraged.

My wife, TammyLyn, also offers Christian encouragement via her Facebook Group: Ask, Seek, Knock (https://www.facebook.com/groups/529047851449098 ) and her podcast Ask, Seek, and Knock on Podbean (https://feed.podbean.com/tammalyn78/feed.xml)

Encouragement for the Path of Christian Discipleship



[1] John Piper, Don’t Waste Your Life (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2003), 86–90.

Saturday, April 30, 2022

Let’s Get Together, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah! – Organizations, Denominations, and Congregations, Oh My! - Purity 719


Let’s Get Together, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah! – Organizations, Denominations, and Congregations, Oh My!  - Purity 719

Purity 719 04/30/2022     Purity 719 Podcast

Good morning,

Today’s photo of, what I believe to be, an early morning sunrise over a farm somewhere along the way on my wife’s morning commute to work comes to us from my phone’s photo archives as I saved it back April 12th, and as of this morning its origin is still in question as I have absolutely no degree of certainty that a. it was taken and shared by my wife or comes from some other friend or b. it is a photo of a sunrise or a sunset! 

No, I think that’s a sunset, right? Yeah. Whatever. Whether it’s a sunrise or a sunset, I share it because of it’s natural beauty and I love how the clouds are above the sun forming a triangular heavenly “teepee” that encapsulates the sky and has the sun as a base fire.  

This heavenly tabernacle, or tent of meeting, reminds me of two things. 

Because I am currently at my countryside home enjoying the company of my beloved wedded wife, it reminds me of the ideal Christian marriage, where husband and wife are gathered together with God as their focal point of worship, purpose, and direction, as the Lord is the One who establishes the standards of their marriage covenant. 

When a husband and wife are equally seeking the Lord and His will for their individual lives and agree to obey the commandments that the Lord puts forth in His word for husbands and wives, they naturally will draw closer together and have peace and harmony, as each party will seek to love and serve the other as an expression of, not only their love for one another, but as an expression of their love and obedience to the Lord, and as a confirmation of their individual identity in Christ.

Did you know being a good husband or wife was a spiritual practice? It is, and if you are married, your role as a husband and wife isn’t just a duty it’s part of your identity and purpose in Christ. 

The second thing that today’s photo, and what I see to be a heavenly tabernacle,  reminds me of is the church, that body of Christ, that often meets in buildings with steeples that literally point to the heavens and usually have a cross at the top to remind people of Christ’s sacrifice and to encourage people to put their faith in Him. 

This morning I have a whole mash up melody of musical theatre and theatrical moments in my mind as the consideration of today’s photo, marriage, and the church have bounced around my mind as I reflect on my faith walk, things happening in my life right now, and the mystery of how the “church” and individual “come together” has my thoughts spinning as I consider the paradoxes and expectations of a life of Christian discipleship.   

In considering, the individual and the “church” a whole cavalcade of questions and concerns regarding the various aspects at play in that dynamic came to the fore front of my mind.  

In regards to the church, different types of buildings, forms of worship, traditions, and denominations are all out there for us to choose from.  What the “church” means to one person can be completely different to someone else. Just a few options for your church include:  

·       Steeple or no steeple,

·       conservative or liberal,

·       Bible only or Bible and church tradition,

·       Liturgical verses Non-liturgical,

·       Pipe organ, choirs, or contemporary worship music,

·       Women preachers or no women preachers,

·       Denomination or non-denominational

·       Gifts of the Spirit or not so much

Just these options alone can make your head spin and are a perfect reason for the unbelieving masses to question the Christian faith.

But I would challenge those who would say that agreeing to become a Christian means a loss of freedom, because obviously with all the possible combinations of these variables, there is actually great freedom in how one decides to worship as a Christian that can accommodate your personal convictions and preferences.

And that is what it comes down to right? It comes down to your personal relationship with the Lord and how you choose to worship the Lord.

As individuals endowed with the freedom to choose what we believe and what we do, as much as we may like to rely on “the church” to determine our life of faith, it really is our decision and how we will express our life of faith that will determine the relationship we have with the Lord.  

As I considered the idea of coming together as a body of believers I thought of the old Hayley Mills Song “Let’s Get Together” from Disney’s the Parent Trap that says:

‘Let's get together, yeah yeah yeah
Think of all that we could sha-are
Let's get together everyday
Every way and everywhere
And though we haven't got a lot
We could be sharin' all we've got
Together 

Let’s get together, as the body of Christ, as a body of believers, think of all that we could sha-are, right?  Coming together to support one another in our faith with common traditions and forms of worship is a good thing but I have to be honest when I say that sometimes our expectations of what we will receive from membership with a church can be challenged as our interactions may be less than ideal, or loving as we hoped for, as people will invariably disappoint one another from time to time and if we aren’t growing in our practice of forgiveness and cultivating the fruit of patience, we could easily become offended or disillusioned at some of the things that can happen in a church.  

When I thought of that Hayley Mills song, for the life of me, I thought the lyrics said somewhere “Let’s get together, yeah, yeah, yeah, we could have lots of fun.” But they don’t,  and just like how I could be wrong about how I thought I had a perfect old pop culture reference from my memories to poke fun at our gatherings as a church, our expectation for a perfect church family where we can be completely fulfilled and satisfied in our walk of faith could also misguided and incorrect.  

Expecting others to bless us or to give us what we need in terms of our relationship with God is a tall order for anyone to fulfill and reveals a misunderstanding of our faith. Expecting another person, a member of clergy, a pastor, elder, or friend – or a whole collection of others, that corporate body of believers, gathered together in unity, to provide you with satisfaction and purpose reflects a fundamental misunderstanding of what our faith is: a personal relationship with God.  

So yes, we should follow a spiritual leader for regular sessions of worship, and we should join a corporate body of believers to support and encourage one another in our faith,  but we can’t expect that leader or our brothers and sisters in Christ to establish and maintain our personal relationship with the Lord.  

So yes, there are many options of how we can worship the Lord in a corporate setting, and it may be a little scary to contemplate:  Organizations, denominations, and congregations, OH MY! But we should humble ourselves and choose one, where the word of God is preached, and where we can worship and serve the Lord faithfully.  

But we shouldn’t expect our membership in that church to completely fulfill our relationship with God. To be honest, we can’t have a true personal relationship with God through these means. Sure we can worship and serve the Lord there but think about your relationship with God like it was a relationship with your spouse. 

Expecting your relationship with God to be complete through your local church alone, is like deciding to have a relationship with your wife through her father.   

I love my wife TammyLyn and I want a personal relationship with her.  Now her father, Cliff, has known TammyLyn all of her life. He loves her and knows a lot about her.  I could go to Cliff and learn many things about TammyLyn and together we could give thanks and praise her at Cliff’s house.  We could even agree to get together once a week to remember the things TammyLyn has said and done in her life and to declare our love for her.  Through this process, I could learn about TammyLyn and grow in my love for TammyLyn. I could even ask Cliff to tell his daughter that I love her for me.

But would this process, of loving my wife though her father, at his house, be the best way to be in a personal relationship with TammyLyn?   Wouldn’t it be better for me to establish and maintain a relationship with TammyLyn by myself, without an outside party to bring us together, without a formal structure, that takes place once a week, to show her my love?  Shouldn’t I talk to TammyLyn directly?

Of course, I should.

And likewise, our relationship with God was never intended to operate solely through a service of an ordained minister or even through the corporate gathering of a like minded body of believers. Our relationship with God can include these things but to really receive His love and express our love for Him, we need to go to Him directly. 

So start today or keep walking and talking with God. The mystery of our faith and our purpose in Christ can be unraveled as long as we seek God’s presence in our lives and ask Him to guide us to where we should go, continually.  

Although  I may have felt nervous and uncomfortable in my initial attempts to talk to TammyLyn, and believe me I was, it was easier with time, as we got to know one another, and we understood that we loved one another.   

Just so you know, God loves you. He sent Jesus to earth to show us how much He wanted to be with you. He revealed the truth of the gospel to forgive you, to heal you, and to live with you forever.   So no matter how uncomfortable or nervous you may be about “talking to God” or “in prayer”, remember that the Lord has already accepted you and He wants your love for Him to increase and for your personal relationship to grow. 

So let the Lord know that you appreciate what He has done and that you don’t want just to see Him once a week at church. Tell Him you aren’t really sure how this works but that you want to know Him more and to be with Him every day.

______________________________________________________________

Today’s Bible verse comes to us from “The NLT Bible Promise Book for Men”.

This morning’s meditation verse is:

Isaiah 57:15 (NLT2)
15  The high and lofty one who lives in eternity, the Holy One, says this: “I live in the high and holy place with those whose spirits are contrite and humble. I restore the crushed spirit of the humble and revive the courage of those with repentant hearts.

Today’s Bible verse reminds us of the exalted status of the Lord Almighty but also shows that He is love because He restores the broken when they are humbly come to Him in repentance.   

The Lord is high and lifted up! The heavenly realm is “who knows where”.  I have actually seen  Christian teachings that utilized astronomy and scripture to show how the positioning of various stars coupled with certain Bible verses lead the presenter to believe that heaven was somewhere in the “north of the universe”.  Apparently others were more specific and theorized that heaven is located in the star cluster Pleiades!

I will just let that go because I don’t know and it doesn’t really matter where heaven might be located because no matter where it is I am assured that those who put their faith in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior and who die before His return to earth are guaranteed to find it someday.  

As good as it is to know that Christians will never really die because to be absent with the body is to be present with the Lord, it is also very good to know that God is present with us in the here in now through the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit and through the utilization of the wisdom of the word of God.  God is with us!

And as today’s verse indicates although He is “in the high and holy place with those whose spirits are contrite and humble”, He is also willing to “restore the crushed spirit of the humble and revive the courage of those” who come to Him  “with repentant hearts”.   

God will restore us and will give us courage when we turn from our sins and choose to live according to His wisdom and ways.   

Our relationship with the Lord God Almighty who is high and lifted up, is happening here on earth and we get to experience the joy of being restored, strengthened, and empowered when we choose to follow His will and His purpose for our lives.  

 

As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.org where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk. 

Today we continue sharing from John Piper’s “Don’t Waste Your Life”.  

As always, I share this information for educational purposes and encourage all to purchase John Pipers’ books for your own private study and to support his work.  This resource is available on many websites for less than $5.00.

 

I Live for Your Progress and Joy in Faith

To see this we need a definition of faith. Ordinarily faith would mean trust or confidence you put in someone who has given good evidence of his reliability and willingness and ability to provide what you need. But when Jesus Christ is the object of faith there is a twist. He himself is what we need. If we only trust Christ to give us gifts and not himself as the all-satisfying gift, then we do not trust him in a way that honors him as our treasure. We simply honor the gifts. They are what we really want, not him. So biblical faith in Jesus must mean that we trust him to give us what we need most—namely, himself. That means that faith itself must include at its essence a treasuring of Christ above all things.

Now we are in a position to see why Paul’s two aims for his life are in fact one. According to verse 20, his aim is to magnify Christ in life; and according to verse 25, his aim is to promote the progress and joy in the Philippians’ faith. That is why he believes God might let him live. This would be his life: to labor for their “progress and joy in the faith.”

But now we have seen that faith is essentially treasuring Christ. The word “joy” in verse 25 (“for your … joy in the faith”) signals that this treasuring is a joyful treasuring. And if Christ is joyfully treasured, he is magnified. That is the single, all-embracing passion of Paul’s life. In other words, Paul is saying, “My life is devoted to producing in you that one great experience of the heart by which Christ is magnified—namely, being satisfied in him, joyfully treasuring him above all else. That’s what I mean when I say, ‘For me to live is Christ.’ That is, for me to live is your Christ-magnifying faith.”

The Christian Life Is Many Deaths

It would be a great mistake at this point if we separated the way death honors Christ from the way life honors Christ. The reason this would be a mistake is that the life of a Christian includes many deaths. Paul said, “I die every day!” (1 Corinthians 15:31). Jesus said, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me” (Luke 9:23). Daily Christian living is daily Christian dying. The dying I have in mind is the dying of comfort and security and reputation and health and family and friends and wealth and homeland. These may be taken from us at any time in the path of Christ-exalting obedience. To die daily the way Paul did, and to take up our cross daily the way Jesus commanded, is to embrace this life of loss for Christ’s sake and count it gain.

In other words, the way we honor Christ in death is to treasure Jesus above the gift of life, and the way we honor Christ in life is to treasure Jesus above life’s gifts. This is why Paul used the same word “gain” in relation to Christ at death and in relation to Christ in life. Not only did he say, “To die is gain,” but he also said, “Whatever gain I had [in life!], I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ” (Philippians 3:7–8).

Pain and Pleasure as Ways to Make Much of Christ

All of life for the Christian is meant to magnify Christ. This can happen through pleasure, and it can happen through pain. We are focusing here on the pain. The reason for this is not that a thousand pleasant things don’t come our way as Christians. Nor is it that we should not enjoy them as gifts of God and glorify him with thanksgiving. We should. That is what the Bible teaches. “Everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, for it is made holy by the word of God and prayer” (1 Timothy 4:4–5). And it is true that “The one who offers thanksgiving as his sacrifice glorifies me” (Psalm 50:23).

The reason I don’t stress this is that we are spring-loaded to see the pleasant side of truth. We are fallen, comfort-loving creatures. We are always on the lookout for ways to justify our self-protecting, self-securing, self-pleasing ways of life. I know this about myself. And I am glad that this is not all bad. God “richly supplies us with everything to enjoy” (1 Timothy 6:17).

How We Handle Loss Shows Who Our Treasure Is

But what I know even more surely is that the greatest joy in God comes from giving his gifts away, not in hoarding them for ourselves. It is good to work and have. It is better to work and have in order to give. God’s glory shines more brightly when he satisfies us in times of loss than when he provides for us in times of plenty. The health, wealth, and prosperity “gospel” swallows up the beauty of Christ in the beauty of his gifts and turns the gifts into idols. The world is not impressed when Christians get rich and say thanks to God. They are impressed when God is so satisfying that we give our riches away for Christ’s sake and count it gain.

No one ever said that they learned their deepest lessons of life, or had their sweetest encounters with God, on the sunny days. People go deep with God when the drought comes. That is the way God designed it. Christ aims to be magnified in life most clearly by the way we experience him in our losses. Paul is our example: “We were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead” (2 Corinthians 1:8–9). The design of Paul’s suffering was to make radically clear for his own soul, and for ours, that God and God alone is the only treasure who lasts. When everything in life is stripped away except God, and we trust him more because of it, this is gain, and he is glorified.[1]

---------------------------more tomorrow------------------------

Join our “Victory over the Darkness”, “The Bondage Breaker”, "Freedom in Christ" series of Discipleship Classes via the mt4christ247 podcast!

at https://mt4christ247.podbean.com, You can also find it on Apple podcasts

(https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-mt4christ247s-podcast/id1551615154). The mt4christ247 podcast is also available on Google Podcasts, Amazon Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartradio, and Audible.com. 

These teachings are also available on the MT4Christ247 You Tube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTxjSNstREpuGWuL0bF3U7w/featured

Email me at mt4christ247@gmail.com to receive the class materials, share your progress, and to be encouraged.

My wife, TammyLyn, also offers Christian encouragement via her Facebook Group: Ask, Seek, Knock (https://www.facebook.com/groups/529047851449098 ) and her podcast Ask, Seek, and Knock on Podbean (https://feed.podbean.com/tammalyn78/feed.xml)

Encouragement for the Path of Christian Discipleship


[1] John Piper, Don’t Waste Your Life (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2003), 70–73.