Fellowship

*Edited October 9, 2015.*

When you think of the word “fellowship,” what comes to mind?  Do you think of church events, or relationship with one another?  Fellowship is about sincere relationship with one another.  Fellowship is not about church picnics, potlucks, or conducting small talk in the “fellowship hall” before and after church while snacking on some doughnuts and sipping on orange juice.  These can be used for fellowship, but it goes beyond that.  Fellowship is about real people — real Christians — meeting each other’s real needs and coming together to fulfil the Church mission.  Our key passage to understand Christian fellowship is Acts 2:42-47:

And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.  And we came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles.  And all who believed were together and had all things in common.  And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need.  And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favour with all people.  And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.

Let’s get a little context here (context is everything!).  On the day of Pentecost, St. Peter stood up and proclaimed in the presence of thousands of people that God had risen Jesus Christ from the dead, the same Jesus that they had demanded to be crucified under Pontius Pilate.  On that day, 3,000+ people repented of their sins, and this was the beginning of the first church.  These 3,000 people are who “they” are in the above passage.  St. Luke, the author of Acts, writes that they had devoted themselves to fellowship.  I will be identifying what fellowship is in a moment, but let’s first identify what the mission of the church is.

Jesus gave us the Great Commission, commanding the apostles and all Christians to, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.  And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:18-20).  That is our duty as Christians.  People often complain that we are “pushing” Christianity onto them.  The truth is, they don’t feel forced at all; they just don’t want to hear what we have to say because it opposes their way of living, hence what Jesus says in John 7:7, “The world cannot hate you, but it hates Me because I testify about it that its works are evil.”  The truth is that we’re simply doing what we were commissioned to do over five millennia ago; not sharing the new of Jesus Christ and teaching what He has commanded us to do is doing the opposite of what He has commissioned every one of us to do.  Jesus said to Peter and Andrew, “Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men” (Matthew 4:19).  This language He used with Peter and Andrew was significant because they were fishermen.  But what did He mean by this?  I understand this to be a metaphor of the Christian duty.  Jesus commanded and taught the apostles to teach people everything they need to know about Him and the will of His Father, our God.  Therefore,  it is our duty to cast out the bait of the Good News of Jesus Christ and pull people in.  So really, unbelievers aren’t being “pushed” upon by our beliefs, for the action of pushing forces you away.  Rather, we are attempting to reel them in — attempting to pull them in, which is to draw someone near.  Like a very large fish on the hook (bloated with arrogance), they fight really hard to escape from the reality of Jesus Christ.

Now, what is true fellowship?  The early Christian Church is often viewed as the highpoint of Christianity, and it’s because of the intense devotion to fellowship they had — devotion to one another.  Going back to Acts, it says that they were devoted  to the apostles’ teaching, the breaking of bread, and the prayers.  These early Christians were devoted to the teaching of the apostles — there were no divisions, no disagreements on doctrine because they “had all things in common” (v. 44).  When we Lutherans confess in the Nicene Creed that “we believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church,” we are declaring that we follow the apostles’ teachings, which sadly not many American churches do today.  (Also, “catholic” in the true sense of the word means all Christians worldwide at all times — past, present, and future.)  Although divisions did not come a little later,  nowadays there is even a wider division and there is a lot of enmity among Christians when it comes to doctrinal details.  The early Christians also practised the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper regularly.  Nowadays, the majority of denominations don’t practise it on a regular basis and most are even misinformed of what the sacrament is.  We Lutherans are blessed to realise the vitality of practising the sacrament on a regular basis.  Some Christians believe it is only a sign.  It is more than that, however.  It is for the forgiveness of sins as well, which is exactly what Jesus meant when He said, “For this is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins” (Matthew 26:28).

The early Christians were also devoted to the prayers, meaning that they had a prayerful life.  It was just a regular part of their daily life.  Because of their prayerful life, it is highly likely that they were praying for one another frequently, which I honestly don’t see a lot of today.  People often say to me, “I’ll pray for you,” and I wonder:  Do they really?  I’m sure many of you can relate.  How often have you told someone that you’ll pray for them, but never followed through because you “forgot”?  If you tell someone you’ll pray for them, keep that promise!  I must admit that I’m guilty of forgetting to pray for someone when I said I would.  This is why I’ve developed the method of having a prayer journal where I write down the person’s name and what I’m supposed to pray for, that way I don’t forget.  (And as a future pastor, this is a great practise!)  If I don’t have it on me, I have a smartphone so I use that easy technology to use the Notes app to jot it down.

The early Christians were also diligent in giving to the poor.  They loved doing that so much that they sold their very possessions and belongings and distributed the proceeds to the poor, each according to their needs.  How often do you give money to a homeless person?  Or even something simpler like buying them a meal, or a cup of coffee if you don’t have any cash on you?  How often do you get rid of your things that you no longer need to the poor — like excess sweatshirts, old clothes, etc.?  Too many people, even Christians, use the excuse, “Well, I don’t know what they’re going to use it for.  I don’t know if they’re going to use it for drugs or alcohol.”  There’s a difference between an explanation and an excuse; that is an excuse.  Did Jesus tell us to only give to the poor when we best determine how they’re going to use it?  Did He tell us to only give to the best intentioned poor person?  No, He did not.  We can never claim to know a person’s mind, especially one we don’t know at all.  It is foolish to assume we know how a homeless person will use the money we’ll give them.  All we can do is hope and pray.  We all know the story of the rich young man — that particular young man who claimed to have done many things for Christ (and don’t’ we all make similar claims?), including having kept the Ten Commandments, and he asked Jesus how he can inherit eternal life.  Jesus replied, “You lack one thing:  go, sell all that you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me” (Mark 10:21).  Selling everything you have is a bit extreme, and because of the times we live in He doesn’t call us to do that today.

Still, however, He doesn’t distinguish whom to give to.  He simply said to give to the poor.  It’s not up to us to distinguish who deserves what.  In fact, none of us deserve anything, not even the redemption of our sins.  Yet Christ still chose to die for the whole world (hence John 3:16), not a select few  whom He felt deserved it.  So how dare we have the audacity to decide which homeless person doesn’t “deserve” our giving.  Likewise, St. Paul writes, “Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver” (2 Corinthians 9:7).  Not knowing what they’ll use the money for is a poor excuse.  You’re not omniscient; God is, so why worry about it?  Decide in your heart how much you’ll give, and give that amount.  They’re always grateful even for a little.  Do this not in reluctance or compulsion, but out of love and joy.  It doesn’t happen very often at all, but if God does make it irrevocably clear that He’s calling you to sell everything and follow Him elsewhere, then do so.  If you keep looking for reasons to show someone mercy, you’ll never show them mercy because there will never be a reason.  Mercy doesn’t need a reason to be established.  Just look at god’s infinite mercy on us; we deserve nothing from Him, yet He gives anyway.  We  do not deserve salvation from our sins, yet in His mercy God saved us.  He had no reason to save us other than that He had mercy on us in His love.  So if you keep trying to determine what a homeless person will use the money for, you’ll always be reluctant to do a kind thing and if you do give in reluctance, you do so under compulsion instead of love, joy, and mercy, and not with a cheerful heart.

The early Christians were in so much fellowship with one another that they went to church every day, eating together.  Granted, we’re in much different times now and can’t really afford to go to church every single day because of what our jobs and other responsibilities demand of us.  But even so, we can still put aside time to visit one another and eat together, not only at annual pot locks and a small breakfast  in the fellowship hall before service begins.  Due to their intense fellowship, God “added  to their number day by day those who were being saved” (v. 47).  Their fellowship and immense love for one another caused more and more people to be added to the Church!  That’s pretty amazing.  I have never seen a church so in love with God with so much love for one another with an abundance of fellowship that resulted  in more and more people being added to the church.  I have yet to witness such an amazing account.

Hebrews 10:24-25 says, “And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting  to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.”  This is exactly what fellowship is, and also why God requires we go to church.  Fellowship is to cause one another to love people and to do good works as a response to our gifted faith, never neglecting to meet together.  This passage also disputes the argument, “I don’t need to go to church to be a Christian.  I can just do a personal devotion in my home.”  False, God requires it.  As the passage says, we must not neglect meeting together, “as is the habit of some,” which are those who claim they don’t need to go to church.  As God is the Creator, He set order to specific things, one of which is His people meeting together as a Church.  He requires this so that we may encourage and inspire one another in love and do His good works together in order to speak to the world, doing so more and more as we “see the Day drawing near.”  What day is that?  The Last day, which is the day our Lord Jesus Christ returns.

Individualism is widely preached, exhorted, and celebrated in western culture.  Through the influence of the media, music industry, and film industry, we are told that self-sufficiency and independence leads to a prosperous life.  Unfortunately, many Christians have developed this individualistic mindset in their faith (which is indicative of those Christians who think they don’t need to go to church).  We want to keep God all to ourselves; we don’t want to share Him with others, Christian or non-Christian.  We forget that it is God who establishes our prosperity (Psalm 1:1-3); it is not dependent on self-sufficiency, and if it happens to be borne by one’s own works, it never lasts and just leads to misery.  We don’t want to be told how to spend our time or money or what we should think.  I don’t know about you, but before I was Christian I was only concerned about myself.  I only wanted to do what was best for me; I had no concern for others.  As far as I was concerned, I didn’t need God in my life to know what I must and mustn’t do or to give me direction.  You could’ve built a monument to my narcissism.  It wasn’t until the Holy Spirit converted me that I began to think of others more than myself.  And now, I recognise that I need God in my life to know what I must and mustn’t do and that I need Him to give me direction.

The world can’t make up its mind what it wants to do.  God’s way is certain.  Like St. Paul points out, I wouldn’t know what it means to covet if the law had not said, “You shall not covet” (Romans 7:7).  In other words, we wouldn’t know what it means to sin had the Law not revealed it to us, and we wouldn’t know about forgiveness and freedom from sin had the Gospel not revealed it to us in Jesus Christ.  When you become Christian, it’s not longer about you.  It’s all about the Holy Trinity, and it’s about serving those around you in lovingkindness and doing so through fellowship.

The Metamorphosis of Christianity, Part 3 Finale

By consuming all these fruits of the Spirit, we show people the work of Christ as He simultaneously works in us in this Christian metamorphosis of being made new. Consuming these fruits is how we are in Christ and made new (2 Corinthians 5:17). This isn't an option we are given as Christians; it is our duty. Jesus said, "You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people's feet. You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven" (Matthew 5:13-16). We are the salt of the earth. To understand what this means, let's examine what it is that salt does. It has three functions. Salt enhances the taste of our food, it stings and heals wounds, and it preserves food from spoiling. This is how we are supposed to be spiritually, never losing that flavour.

Jesus is using emphatic language here. You are the salt of the earth; you are the light of the world. This isn't something that you try to do. You either are or you aren't. Be salty Christians by adding flavour to the fruits of the Spirit — that is, by practising these fruits and instilling them in the lives of others. You add flavour by actually doing them, hence James 2:17, which I covered on the fruit of goodness. By practising these fruits and by impacting the lives of others with these fruits, you enhance their lives. You also sting them with the Law (the diagnosis of sin), but then it is necessary to heal them with the Gospel (the remedy of sin). After that is done, you continue interacting with them and guiding them and loving them in order to preserve their spirituality from spoiling. As the light of the world, influence others. When we're driving on the highway at night and see a city off in the distance, the entire city is lit up and it looks very attractive. The sight of this city attracts us and makes us eager to come towards it, and we do because we don't spend our entire lives on the highway. Likewise, we have the light of Christ within us. Shine that light with the fruits of the Spirit, and people will be attracted to that light and will want to experience it. You either are the salt of the earth and the light of the world, or you're not. If you stop salting the fruits of the Spirit and lose your flavour, how can it be restored other than doing those things again? Jesus says that it becomes worthless and is thrown out into the streets and trampled under people's feet. In biblical times, when salt became worthless, they just threw it out into the street and people would inevitably trample over it. That's why Jesus uses this imagery. In the same way, if you lose your flavour as a Christian — if you have no good works in response to your faith (as we discussed with James 2:17 on the fruit of goodness), then your faith is worthless; it is dead and you might as well have no faith at all. It's harsh, but true, and the truth is harsh at times.

Ephesians 5:6-11, "Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience. Therefore do not become partners with them; for at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light (for the fruit of light in all that is good and right and true), and try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord. Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them." The "sons of disobedience" are people who choose to be independent of God — to disobey Him, for they have been deceived by the words of the world ("empty words"). Paul points out that this is no longer to be our lifestyle because we were in darkness, and now that we're in Christ, we are the light of Christ. The fruit of light is that of the fruit of the Spirit. Since the fruit of light consists of the light of Christ, and God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit are One, then the fruit consisting of Jesus's light is therefore that of the Holy Spirit. As God's children, we walk in this way, for all would agree that the fruits of the Spirit are indeed good, right, and true. The works of darkness are what Paul listed before the fruits of the Spirit: "Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God" (Galatians 5:19-21). Those attributes, and others like them, are the works of darkness, and all would agree that they are unfruitful. We are to expose the unfruitfulness of this darkness by eliminating them with the light of the fruits of the Spirit that are in Christ our Lord.

Verse ten, "and try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord," might come across as confusing to some people. How do we discern God's will? Exactly as Paul tells us in Romans 12:2, "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect." To be conformed to this world is to put its ways, beliefs, and practises over what God's Word says. For a simple example, God's Word prohibits a myriad of sins, and it is the world that condones sins such as premarital sex, homosexuality, stealing (particularly music and movies), and many other things. God's Word explicitly says that all those things and many more are sinful, but by being conformed to the world, one will accept sin as something right and true. This verse may also bring up some confusion: "How do our minds become transformed and renewed?" It's simple: by abiding in God's Word. The word abide means "accepting or acting in accordance with." Accept God's Word as the truth and act in accordance with what He says, and you will begin to experience the transformation of your heart and the renewing of your mind. It doesn't happen over night for many of us. It can happen, but it's extremely rare. It usually takes months or years.

I'll explain this. For me personally, it's been taking me years. Since the moment I accepted Christ into my life, that is when I first began to be transformed and renewed, which the same thing happens to everybody. I have found that transformation is a longer process than renewal. Transformation is that of the heart — growing the ability to love yourself and love others as you love Christ. For the longest time, I dealt with self-loathing and hatred for others, and it took me many years, even after accepting Christ, to conquer that anchor in my heart to begin loving myself and other people. After learning to love myself, I then grew to love others. It's a long work in progress, but as you grow, it starts to become natural. You notice the change in you that Christ started and continues to work in you. By being able to finally love myself and love others, my heart is transformed. Renewal is that of the mind — always contemplating on the ways of the Lord. The more time you spend in God's Word and the more you meditate on it, the more you will know His Word and knowing His Word is knowing what His will is. This was a much shorter process for me, and a process that I'm still growing in. Since I've come to know Christ, I've been spending a lot of time in the Word by reading it and not only that, but also living it. What's the point in reading God's Word if you don't live it? The more I read and the more I do my best to live it out, the more and more I know God's Word and ultimately what His will is because again, God's Word is His will. It took only a year, approximately, to get to the point where no matter what situation I'm in I always think, "What does God's Word say about this?" Of course, being human, there are times when I fail; but it is God's Word that reminds me that I did fail and causes me to repent. God's thoughts start to become your thoughts, and God's morals start to become your moral. You know God is speaking to you when there are Godly thoughts in your head that are in line with God's Word, and you will know this by either memorisation or by looking it up. (You can work at memorisation or memorise verses by chance. For me personally, I've accidentally memorised a few verses simply because of how much I read my Bible. The objective is not to have verses memorised and say, "Hey look at me!" but to become familiar with God's Word.) When you hear that small voice in your head telling you that something is or is not in line with God's Word, that's when you know God is speaking to you and what God's will is. By God's Word being in my mind constantly in every situation, my mind is renewed. This transformation and this renewal enables you to discern what God's will is, which is what He finds good, acceptable, and perfect, "for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure" (Philippians 2:13).

Colossians 4:6, "Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person." I only have a few words to say about this. Be kind in your speech; be meek, be compassionate, and be sympathetic by being seasoned with the salt of God's fruits. Do not criticise, condemn, or complain. Rather, speak love, truth, and genuineness into people's lives.


The final stage of our metamorphosis is salvation! As we consume each fruit of the Spirit, the goal of their digestion is our faith, which is salvation. First Peter 1:8-9, "Though you have not seen Him, you love Him. Though you do not now see Him, you believe in Him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls." I don't know how to expand on Peter's words here, honestly. He said it perfectly. Loving Jesus and believing in Him despite the fact that we've never seen Him is exactly what faith is, as is defined for us in Hebrews 11:1, 3; and it is through that faith in Christ by which we obtain its goal — its outcome, and that is salvation.

Acts 4:12, " 'And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under Heaven given among men by which we must be saved.' " Need I say anything more? Salvation is given by no one but Christ, whom we obtain faith from and whom we have faith in. "For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with Him" (1 Thessalonians 5:9-10).

Romans 1:16-17, "For I am not ashamed of the Gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, 'The righteous shall live by faith.' " God's power enables salvation for those who believe — believe what? In whom Christ was, is, and is to come — the Messiah, Redeemer of our sins. God reveals His righteousness and gifts salvation to us from His gifted faith for the purpose of faith itself. God is amazing! A voice from Heaven will say, " 'Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of His Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God" (Revelation 12:10). Salvation is coming!

The Law vs. Grace, and Relationship with God

*Edited October 16, 2015.*

The Law vs. Grace

The Decalogue (Ten Commandments) and the Law were given to us as a mirror to reveal our sin — how filthy our lives get when we reject God and live independently of Him.  There are many who believe they are made righteous by keeping the Law (even when they don’t recognise it as such), which is legalism — overemphasising the Law and disregarding the Gospel.  Can you clean your face with the same mirror that shows you how dirty you are?  As St. James puts it, “For if anyone is a hearer of the Word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was” (1:23-24).  We often look at the Law and immediately forget how sinful we are and don’t repent.  Just like a mirror, God’s Word has the ability to reveal to us the truth about our sinful condition.  In James’ example, the man looks into the mirror and then walks away without doing anything.  This illustration he gives represents the way most Christians today study the Bible.  They read Scripture, see the truth that demands transformation, and then walk away as if nothing ever happened (just think of Christians who support gay marriage).  Indeed, heretics do this as well.  If we hear the Word of God but don’t do what it says, we are merely deceiving ourselves.

James continued in saying that religion without practical action is worthless (vv. 26-27).  The Bible does not teach us to follow rules; it is a picture of Jesus.  It is God revealing to us whom He is and what He does and has done for us.  While words may tell us of God’s character and what He may want from us, we cannot do any of it by our strength alone.  Life is in Him and in no one else, not even ourselves.  You might think that living by rules and principles are easier than living in relationship with people and God.  It is true that relationships can be messier than rules, but rules will never give you answers to your deepest questions and they will never love you, they will never have mercy, they will never have compassion, and they will never forgive.  The Law condemns, ostensibly revealing to the human race that we are incapable of fulfilling the Law, which is why it was necessary for Christ to fulfil it (more on that in a little bit).  When you read the Bible, don’t look for rules and principles (even though they exist); rather, look for relationship — a way you can grow closer to God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit that proceeds from the Father.  The “rules” and “principles” listed in Scripture are the ways that God has made it possible for us to be in relationship with Him.

There is no mercy or grace in rules, not even for one mistake.  A rule or law (or the Law) tells you that if you commit this sin/wrongful act (e.g. lying), you are condemned and if you omit this particular action (e.g. loving your neighbour as yourself), you are condemned.  That’s why Jesus fulfilled the Law for us — so that it no longer has jurisdiction over us.  For we are no longer under law, but grace (Romans 6:14).  But that doesn’t mean the Law no longer applies to the Christian life; believing otherwise is known as antinomianism.  The Law still reveals our sin and condemns us.  However, the Law that once contained impossible demands now becomes a promise that the Triune God fulfils for us in Christ Jesus (Matthew 5:17).  Keep in mind that if you live your life apart from God, the promise is empty.  Jesus laid the demand of the Law to rest — He fulfilled it; it no longer has any power to condemn the Christian, unless you live apart from God.  Jesus is both the promise and its fulfillment.  Trying to keep the Law is declaring your independence from God — a way of keeping control; and it is a failure of trusting God in your salvation.  There is no salvation in the Law; salvation is in Christ alone.  We like the Law so much that we see others, even wrongful Christians being guilty of this, preaching the Law in condemnation in order to have control; but it’s much worse than that.  It gives us the power to judge others and feel superior to them.  We believe we are living to a more righteous standard than those we judge.  Enforcing rules, especially in its more subtle expressions like responsibility and expectation, is a vain attempt to create certainty out of uncertainty.  Rules cannot bring freedom; they only have the power to judge and to condemn.

God prefers verbs over nouns.  Buckminster Fuller once said, “God is a Verb.”  To Moses, God said, “I am who I am” (Exodus 3:14).  God is whom He will be.  He is alive, He is active, and He is moving.  As His very essence is a very, everything we know about God is what He does.  We know who He is (the verb for current state of action) because of what He does (the verb for continual action).  He is related to verbs such as confessing, repenting, living, loving, responding, growing, dancing, singing, and so on.  Humans, on the other hand, have a tendency to take a verb that is alive and full of grace and turn it into a dead noun or law that consists entirely of rules.  Nouns exist because there is a created universe and physical reality, but if the universe is only a mass of nouns, it is dead.  Unless God is, there are no verbs, and verbs are what make the universe alive.  What this means is this:  For something to move from death to life (or non-existence to existence), you must introduce something active to something living and present tense, which is to move from law to grace.  And who has the power to do this?  God alone.  Only can create something out of nothing, and therefore only He can move law to grace.

For example, let’s look at the noun responsibility.  Before our words became nouns, they were first God’s words (verbs) — nouns with movement — the ability to respond.  God’s words are alive and active — they’re full of life; our words are dead and full of law, fear, and judgement.  This is why we don’t find the word responsibility in Scripture.  God gives us the ability to respond and our response is to be free to love and serve in every situation, and therefore each moment is different and unique.  Because God is our ability to respond, He is present in us.  If God simply gave us a responsibility, He would not have to be with us at all.  It would now be a task to perform, an obligation to be met, and something else to fail at.

Relationship with God

Let’s use friendship as another example and how removing the element of life from a noun can drastically alter a relationship.  Say you and I are friends, and I don’t mean that we just simply know each other by association, but truly friends.  As friends, there is an expectancy that exists in the relationship (“expectancy” may be a noun, but what it consists of are actions, which are verbs).  When we see each other or when we’re apart, there is an expectancy of being together, of laughing, and talking to each other (notice how these are all verbs — things of action).  That expectancy has no concrete definition; it is alive and active and everything that is produced out of our being together is a unique gift that we share with no one else, otherwise we wouldn’t be such close friends.  But what would happen if I change that active expectancy to an expectation — implicit or explicit, spoken or unspoken?  Suddenly, a rule (law) has entered into our relationship.  With this expectation, you are now expected to perform in a way that meets my expectations or standards.  Our living friendship rapidly deteriorates into a dead thing with rules and requirements.  It is no longer about you and me on a personal level, but about what friends are “supposed to do,” or the “responsibilities” that make someone a good friend.  The same can apply with the role as husband, wife, mother, father, student, employee, etc.  One may say, “If we didn’t have expectations and responsibilities, wouldn’t everything just fall apart?”  This is only if you are of the world — apart from God and under the Law.  Responsibilities and expectations are the basis of guilt, shame, and judgement; and they provide the essential framework that promotes performance as the basis for identity and value.

We’ve all failed to live up to somebody’s expectations because as sinners, failure is inevitable.  God has no expectations of us because He’s never placed them upon us.  If He had, then we would be cursed with coming up short every time with each attempt, receiving only punishment and condemnation in the end (again, that was the Law); but through Christ we are promised salvation despite our shortcomings and many inevitable failures, past and future.  The idea behind placing expectations upon somebody requires that they do not know the future outcome of the relationship and is trying to control behaviour in order to get the desired result because human behaviour is, after all, unpredictable and unreliable.  Humans try to control behaviour largely through expectations (just think of job descriptions and requirements listed for a specific job position — those are set in order for the employer to control your behaviour were you to have the job).  However, God doesn’t need to predict our behaviour.  He knows everything there is to know about each and every one of us.  So why would He have an expectation other than what He already knows?  Because He has no expectations, we never disappoint Him.  What God does have is a constant living expectancy in our relationship with Him, and He gives us the ability to respond to any situation and circumstance in which we find ourselves.  As I said earlier, the “rules” and “principles” listed in Scripture are the ways that God has made it possible for us to be in relationship with Him.  Those “rules” and “principles” are criteria He put into order so that we may live good lives as He leads us towards sanctification (see 1 Thessalonians 4:1-8).  To the degree that we resort to expectations and responsibilities, to that degree we neither know God nor trust Him; and to that degree, we will live in fear.

We live by priorities — putting God first, then family, friends, however it is for you.  The trouble with living by priorities is that it’s a hierarchy.  If you put God at the top, what does that really mean and how much is enough before you call it quits?  How much time must you give God before you can go on about the rest of your day, the part that really interests you the most?  Or how much time is enough before you spend time with family or friends?  And vice versa?  You simply cannot calculate it.  You give God a certain allotment of time, and that allotment always changes, whether it increases or dwindles or varies in between both.  God doesn’t want just a piece of you and a piece of your life.  Even if we were able, which we are not, to give Him the biggest piece, that’s not what He wants.  God wants all of you and every part of you.  Put God at the centre of your life and you won’t need to live by priorities.  With God at the centre, which is where He desires to be, makes God the driving force of all your relationships.  With God at the centre, you are able to involve Him in every single aspect of your life.  If you truly want to put God first in everything, put Him at the centre of your life and He will be the driving force of every relational aspect of your life.

The Metamorphosis of Christianity, Part 2

Goodness
Of course, no one is good (Romans 3:10), but faith requires action.  James 2:17, “Even so faith, if it has no works, is dead, being by itself.”  Some misinformed Christians think this means that we are saved by good works and not by faith.  That’s not what it means at all.  Rather, we are saved by grace through faith — by no means of our own.  Ephesians 2:8-9, “For by grace you have been saved through faith.  And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”  Paul also wrote in Romans 3:28, “For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from works of the Law.”  In Romans, Paul was saying that we are justified and saved by faith alone with no works added to it, and James supplements to these words and affirms Paul’s previous statements on it by saying that faith becomes evident in works.  What he’s essentially saying is this:  If you say you have faith but have no good works, you might as well have no faith at all — it is dead.  Faith becomes known to other people by your good works; it is your faith that saves you and it is the good works of your faith that enables people to see Christ at work.  Don’t be a lazy Christian and do nothing with your faith.  We are not called to complacency; we are called to action, and we know this by Jesus’s Great Commission to the disciples (Matthew 28:18-20).  There are numerous ways to do good works according to your faith.  Give to the poor, as Jesus commands us (Matthew 5:42), humble yourself and serve others in humility as I mentioned with the fruit of love, and so on and so forth.  We all know what it means to be a Christian according to our actions; we just have to actually do those things.

Faithfulness

This fruit is faithfulness to Christ.  By this, Jesus says, “If anyone would come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow Me” (Luke 9:23).  Many English translations say, “he must deny himself,” but in the Greek the phrase is αρνησάσθω, which is the aorist middle passive deponent imperative verb from αρνέομαι, and because it is an imperative verb it is thus, “let him deny himself,” not “he must deny himself.”  When we follow Christ, He enables us through the Holy Spirit to deny our flesh and follow Him every day, hence “let him.”  So let the Holy Spirit empower you to follow Christ daily.  Of course, as sinful human beings, we often fail.  But fret not, “If we are faithless, He remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself” (2 Timothy 2:13).

But what does it mean to deny yourself?  It means to be in constant denial of your fleshly desires.  It is to ignore that little voice in your head that tempts you to commit premarital sex, to give in to pornography, to do this or that drug, to gossip about this or that person — anything and everything that goes against God’s Word.  It is to deny the ways of the world, “for the one who endures to the end will be saved” (Matthew 24:13).  From time to time, we will fail; as sinful human beings we are bound to failure.  But faithfulness is not being perfect and flawless in your dedication to any one thing, even God.  If God expected us to be perfect in our faithfulness, He wouldn’t call us to repentance.  Heck, we would not have needed to be saved from our sins.  Rather, because we are imperfect and therefore incapable of fulfilling the Law, Jesus fulfilled it for us (Matthew 5:17).  Faithfulness is staying committed to your faith in Christ, recognising your sinful mistakes, learning from them, repenting of them, forsaking them, and moving on.  That’s what faithfulness is.  That’s what it means to pick up your cross daily while following Jesus.

Picking up your cross daily also means to continue pressing on in the faith in the face of adversity.  Jesus told us to expect persecution.  In Luke 11:49 He said, “For this reason also the wisdom of God said, ‘I will send to them prophets and apostles, and some of them they will kill and some they will persecute.’ ”  Jesus prophesied to the Jews of what they would do to the prophets and apostles He’d send, which they indeed did kill and crucify the apostles.  This is a continuing prophecy, too.  In modern times we still see Christians being arrested and murdered.  Do not fear, however.  We have encouraging words from Christ Himself, “Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me.  Rejoice and be glad, for your reward in Heaven is great; for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you” (Matthew 5:11-12).  When others persecute and insult me, all I tell them is:  “Thank you.  You’re actually giving me a blessing,” and I usually quote the above passage to them.

Jesus enables us to pick up our cross daily and follow Him through all our inevitable sufferings.  Expect trouble.  Do not be surprised when you suffer.  Second Corinthians 1:5, “For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too.”  As we can expect to suffer in this world, we can also expect to be comforted by the Holy Spirit.  “For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathise with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.  Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 4:15-16).  Because Jesus was fully human, He suffered exactly as we suffered, so He perfectly understands each of our situations and is able to sympathise with us.  And because He is fully God, He never sinned, so He knows how to help us overcome our suffering.  It is because of Christ that we are able to boldly approach the throne of grace in order to receive God’s mercy and grace in time of need.

Gentleness
The gentleness of Christ is shown when He says, “Come to Me, all who labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.  Take My yoke upon you, and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.  For My yoke is easy, and My burden is light” (Matthew 11:28-30).  In the same way, many of us find ourselves in leadership positions in the Church that require us to listen to peoples’ problems and troubles, and even in our personal friendships.  As Christ is gentle with us and our troubles, so we must be with other people when they come to us about their troubles.  People will come to you when they need help, guidance, and encouragement.  It is important that you lead them in the Lord.  Be sympathetic, listen with genuine interest, be comforting and encouraging, and don’t be negative, critical, or condemning.  (Basically, don’t be like Job’s three friends.)  It helps to have a peaceful, calm demeanour about yourself that makes people comfortable with approaching you about what’s troubling them.  You don’t have to go looking for people to comfort; just be ready when people do approach you.  And if you do happen to notice someone who seems to be troubled, have the fortitude to take the initiative as a leader and speak to them through the love and meekness of Christ.

Self-Control
This fruit can cover a wide area of things.  I could preach about control over anger, sorrow, and any number of temptations.  Because this is such a wide topic, I will simply generalise.  “...for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control” (2 Timothy 1:7).  We have the power of the Holy Spirit to love and to have self-control over our temptations.  You don’t have control when you yell at someone in anger, or when you’re in a perpetual condition of sorrow that causes depression, or when you’re addicted to drugs or pornography, or when you commit premarital sex habitually, and the list goes on.  Because our society has become so sexualised, I will talk about sex.  You don’t have self-control over sex when you have premarital sex, when you masturbate, rape, commit bestiality or incest, or succumb to homosexuality.  I won’t be using this time to talk about the sins of homosexuality (I imagine that word sticks out more than any of the other sexual acts I listed).  Rather, I will be focusing on the heterosexual sins.  I don’t care who you are, each of us suffers with sexual temptation at some point in our lives, some more than others.

When we lose control, this is the reason why Paul wrote, “But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband,” and again, “But if they cannot exercise self-control, they should marry.  For it is better to marry than to burn with passion” (1 Corinthians 7:2, 9).  Marriage is not a necessity; not everyone needs to get married if it’s not their desire to.  However, if one cannot overcome sexual lust, he or she should marry since they cannot exercise self-control, for that is a much better option than to be inflamed with lust.  Then there are the famous words of Jesus, “But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matthew 5:28).  Jesus was saying that anyone who looks upon someone of the opposite sex to arouse illicit sexual desire has committed adultery of the heart.  For those who are single, by imagining or fantasising a sexual act with someone, you are committing premarital sex in your heart.  You are mentally taking their virginity, or mentally sacrificing your own, or in the case that neither of you are virgins you are nevertheless inflamed with lust — therefore adultery of the heart.  The same especially applies in the natural sense of adultery for those who are married.

To Be Continued...

God Is Love

*Edited July 11, 2015*

Here is 1 John 4:16b-21 as I've translated it from the Greek:  "God is love, and the one who remains in love remains in God and God remains in him.  By this, love has been perfected with us, in order that we may have confidence in the day of the judgement, because as that one is, we are also in this world.  Fear is not in love, but perfect love casts out fear, because fear has punishment, and the one who fears has not been perfected in love.  We love because He first loved us.  If someone says, 'I love God,' and he hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, he is not able to love God whom he has not seen.  And we have this commandment from Him:  that the one who loves God also loves his brother."

Love isn't something that God does; it is who He is.  The Greek word for "remain" is μένω (MEH-no), which can also be translated as "abide," or "to stay in."  The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines "abide" as "accepting or acting in accordance with."  So, to remain or abide in God is to accept and act accordingly to whom He is and what He demands.  We know who God is because it's revealed to us here that He is love.  Everything He does and commands is in direct relation to His love.  Sometimes it's tough love through His wrath or chastisement, and sometimes it's that nurturing love that we all adore in His mercy.  If we abide in Him and His love by acting in accordance with what He commands, He remains in us.  By remaining in God and His love, His love is perfected with us, meaning that we experience His perfect love by the gift of salvation when we declare Jesus as our Lord and Saviour, which is enabled through faith that is given to us when we read or hear God's Word.  That love (His promise of salvation) is not perfected when you refuse Jesus and His means of grace because when you reject Him, you don't have His salvation.  Because God's love is perfected with us by salvation, we will have confidence in the day of judgement because we know we have the promise of salvation because as "that one" (the referent being God) is in the world as its Creator, so also are we.  So He is never not with us.  There is no fear in love.  Perfect love, which is God's love for us when we abide in Him, casts out fear.  The fear of what?  The fear of condemnation — the fear of punishment as we justly deserve.  When God gives us the promise of salvation, we no longer have this fear.  The one who refuses this gift forces him or herself to continue living in the fear of condemnation and punishment, therefore God's love is not perfected with them.  However, just because they don't believe and therefore claim they don't fear it does not mean that the fear isn't real.  They'll experience that fear once Jesus returns (Revelation 6:15-17, "Then the kings of the earth and the great ones and the generals and the rich and the powerful, and everyone, slave and free, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains, calling to the mountains and rocks, "Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who is seated on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb, for the great day of their wrath has come, and who can stand?").

God loved us first by creating us (He didn't need to) and then saving us from damnation by our own doing (which He also didn't need to do), thus enabling us to love Him and to love others since His love remains with us.  If we say we love God but have hate for someone else, we're lying about loving God.  It is impossible to love the God of love yet have hate in your heart for someone.  You can dislike someone, but hate?  Hate is unacceptable in the Lord's eyes.  Likewise, if we say we love God but don't abide in Him (ac in accordance with what He says), then He is not in us and we are not in Him.  Just look at the Westboro Baptist Church cult members.  They claim to love God, yet they preach such immense hatred and self-righteously condemn others.  God's love remaining with people such as these is impossible.  However, it is also the same for those who condone sinful practises  such as homosexuality.  God's Word unmistakably speaks against it, yet out of ignorance people condone the sin.  That doesn't mean that such people are unlovable, however, especially by God.  But it does mean that people who condone sins such as this do not abide in God since they refuse to act in accordance with His commands.

It is impossible to love God whom we have not seen when we fail to love someone else whom we have seen.  God commands that those who love God also love his brother.

Trust In God [Updated]

Having trust in God is not always easy.  Perhaps it’s because you don’t have a very good relationship with God.  Perhaps it’s because you have a hard time putting your trust into something intangible.  Or perhaps it’s simply because you’re new to the whole idea of putting your complete trust in our omnipresent God.  No matter the scenario, we all fail to trust God from time to time.  Trusting God can be described in the term saving faith, or trusting faith.  When we sin, we’re telling God, “I don’t wanna do it Your way, God; I wanna do it my way,” and we fail to trust Him.  Do not fret, however.  “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).  Faith is defined perfectly in Hebrews 11:1, 3:  “Now faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen…  By faith we understand that the universe was created by the Word of God, so that what is seen has been made from things that are not visible.”  Most of us do not know what we can trust God with or even how.  Anything can apply — finances, health, relationships; but the two major aspects, I believe, are trusting Him with your safety & preservation and salvation, and the rest will follow.

I have a few more words to say about faith.  Everybody has faith.  It may not be in the same thing, but we all put our faith in something.  The question is not, “Will we have faith?”  Instead, the question is, “Where will we put our faith?”  What, or whom, is your idol?  Whatever we put above God, that thing becomes our idol — it becomes our god.  It can be your boyfriend or girlfriend, wife or husband, video games, food (gluttony), the existence of aliens, science, your rationality, some personal sins like homosexuality, other sexual immoralities, greed, gossip, and the list goes on almost infinitely.  Faith in God is putting your trust in His promises, because that faith is attached to  His promises.  God’s Word promises to protect us, to deliver us from evil, to give us all our needs (if we seek His kingdom first [Matthew 6:33]), and He even promises to discipline and chastise us when necessary, and His wrath against the wicked.  By faith, we put our trust and hope in the reality of Jesus’s second coming.  By faith, we trust that God created the universe out of nothing.  By faith, we trust God with the entirety of our lives.

First Timothy 6:17, “Instruct those who are rich in the present age not to be arrogant or to set their hope on the uncertainty of wealth, but on God, who richly provides us with all things to enjoy.”  Put your trust in God and nothing else, and He will provide everything for your heart.  We cannot put our trust in our wealth and materialistic things because of their uncertainty — they are temporary and unreliable.  God, however, is certain.  He is eternal and has proven His care for us since the beginning of creation.  Trust in Him and you can be sure that He will guide your heart in all your ways.  Trust and rely on Him and He will make your paths straight.  Do not allow Satan to belittle your ambitions and make your path crooked, for God is always faithful during troublesome times.  God always loves you, so remember His love for you and His protection over you as our Father.  He provides all healing, so trust and rely on Him and talk to Him through prayer and He will smile upon your face and you shall be healed.  Putting your whole trust and reliance on your riches and talents can only do so much for you.  Putting your hope and trust in God is limitless; He will keep you from all harms.  Putting your hope and trust in the impure, imperfect materialistic things of this world exposes a great susceptibility to the wiles of Satan.

The prophet Daniel is a perfect example of having trust in God.  Daniel 6:23, “The king was overjoyed and gave orders to take Daniel out of the den.  So Daniel was taken out of the den, uninjured, for he trust in his God.”  Daniel trusted that God would not allow him to die.  This is absolutely remarkable because God saved Daniel from hungry, untamed lions, all because Daniel trusted in God!  This is evidence that trusting God with your safety can and will keep you safe and even save your life some day.  When I was on a mission trip for flood recovery work in August of 2008, my team and I were helping rebuild a church in Iowa City, called the Christian Rock Church.  Our music minister, Pastor John Martineau (who was also the leader of the team), asked me to go up in a ceiling area and pull some wires.  I looked at the ceiling and became sceptical about my safety and afraid for my life because it was literally falling apart.  (Just as a side note, I was one year into my faith at this point.)  The safety precautions had me realise that I could possibly get severely injured or even die in the worst case scenario if the ceiling ever collapsed while I was up there.

However, I thought to myself, “Wait, God isn’t going to allow me to die.  My work here on this earth isn’t done.  God isn’t finished with me yet.”  After that quick thought and putting my trust in God, my fear immediately vanished and I willingly climbed up the ladder into the ceiling.  About thirty minutes while I was up there, Pastor John asked me to come down and help him and our other leader, Jim Walcholz, with some wires on that level.  On my way over to the ladder, a part of the ceiling collapsed from underneath me.  As I fell, my leg got caught on something and it twisted my left knee.  I hung for about five seconds.  As I was hanging, I swung myself up and grabbed onto the edge of something and just as I got a grip, my foot was immediately released.  When I was ready, I let go and landed on my right  foot, which was my one good leg.  In spite of my injury, my leg getting caught and my knee getting twisted simultaneously actually saved my life.  If my leg had not gotten caught, one of three life threatening possibilities could have occurred:  A) I could have landed head first on the cement floor; B) I could have landed head first on a large, sharp blade from a metal fan; or C) I could have landed head first on a sharp metal corner of a furnace that we had just installed the day before.  Pastor John mentioned that while I was hanging, my head was at least one inch above the sharp corner of the furnace, if that.  I ended up with a strain MCL (one of three major ligaments in the knee) as well as my knee being sprained simultaneously.

That night, we talked about the incident.  I can tell you right now that it was not luck.  I’ve said this before in previous blogs, but it needs repeating:  Luck is the most quintessential human delusion.  I cannot say that enough.  Back where we were staying, we discussed how miraculous my survival was and how it was actually a glorious event.  Pastor John was convinced that there was an angel holding me.  I thought to myself that this was very possible, but being new to the faith at the time I didn’t think much of it.  The next morning, we went  back to the site we were working at and to the area where I fell.  We examined the ceiling and there was absolutely nothing that could have grabbed on to my leg — no wires, no pipes, just absolutely nothing.  Then we looked at the ground to see if there was anything that could have fallen after my leg was released underneath all the insulation, but there was still nothing.  Another amazing thing during this supposed atrocity is that while I was hanging, all the witnesses there said that there was insulation literally everywhere in the air and on the ground (at least 5 inches thick) as I was hanging from the ceiling, and miraculously none of it got in my eyes.  And if you get insulation in your eyes, you either suffer permanent blindness or serious damage to the eyes.

This is where it gets even more amazing.  A fellow team member, Brian Birchmeier (who is mentally handicapped but nonetheless has great integrity, more than the average mentally healthy and stable human being), he mentioned that he saw a bright white light in the shape of a vine — an angel — fly through the nearest door to me at extreme speed, and when it reached me I immediately stop falling.  The amazing thing about Brian is that in spite of his mental condition, everything he tells you, he tells you exactly as he sees it; he literally does not lie.  He pretty much has that blunt honesty of a child (hence Jesus’s exhortation to have childlike faith).  He could not describe the angel’s identity entirely other than its shape as a vine because he looked away from the immensity of its brightness.  Sceptics will say that because of Brian’s mental condition, his information is unreliable.  One, if you knew Brian, you would not say that; and two, that is an incredibly mean spirited thing to say.  There is no other “rational” explanation for my miraculous survival.  The angel’s presence would certainly explain the lack of pipes or wood or anything else in the ceiling or on the ground that could have caught my leg.  Also, after saying all that, when I leaned up to catch myself, there was nothing that I could have grabbed — nothing but air.  Every time I think of that moment, it leaves me in awe.  Maybe I unknowingly grabbed on to the angel’s hand.  So, needless to say, God sent an angel to save my life.  Praise the Lord!  Or, since Jesus is the vine (John 15:5), maybe He saved me Himself.  Who knows?  Either way, because I trusted in my God, He went out of His way to save my life.

After the accident — no, incident — the Lord really laid on my heart Psalm 91:11-12:  “For He will give His angels orders concerning you, to protect you in all your ways.  They will support you with their hands so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.”  Those who say that God does not give each believer a guardian angel because “this verse doesn’t mean that,” that is a lie.  I was once unsure of this because others had told me that interpretation of this passage, but after my experience, I have to believe it’s true.  Again, maybe it was Jesus, but in the Old Testament He was always called “The Angel of the LORD” (emphasis on “the” added).  God also lay on my heart Proverbs 3:5-6, “Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.  In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct thy paths.”  The moral of my testimony is that if you trust God in anything, like your safety, He will keep you under His protection, and perhaps depending on the situation sending one of His angels to keep you safe if the predicament calls its necessity.  I trusted in God to keep me safe and away from death because I had faith that He was not finished with me, and indeed He wasn’t and still is not, for He sent an angel (or Jesus Himself) to prevent me from falling head first on either the cement floor; a large, sharp metal blade from a fan, or a sharp corner of the metal furnace, all of which offered instantaneous death.  Or if I were fortunate, I would suffer permanent paralysis or severe brain damage, but still alive.  I always wonder what would have happened if I chose not to trust in God and had gone up there anyway, especially since I was new to the faith at the time…  As Daniel trusted in God to save his life from death, I also trusted in the same God to save my life from death, and He followed through in both situations, thousands of years apart.

The verse I would use to define this message is Psalm 62:8, “Trust in Him at all times; ye people, pour out your heart before Him:  God is a refuge for us.  Selah.”  So, my brethren, trust in God, seek His comfort (the Comforter — the Holy Spirit), and fear not, for God is our refuge.  A refuge is protection from danger or trouble, and if you trust God to protect you from such things, you shall be protected.  As Psalm 9:9 confesses, “The LORD also will be a refuge for the oppressed, a refuge in times of trouble.”  If you’re in fear for your life or any other dangers, whether physical or moral or emotional or spiritual or financial, pray and trust in God.  If you’re in fear for your personal troubles, pray and trust in God; never fear.  God is our stronghold — He stands firm for each of us in our safety, happiness, and protection, and no one, not even the Devil, can move Him from protecting you and delivering you.  You can always trust in God in anything.  He will never let you down; I guarantee it.

The Metamorphosis of Christianity, Part 1

Picture the slow, gradual, and beautiful process of metamorphosis.  A caterpillar crawls around the surface of the earth eating as much food as it possibly can until it is perfectly ready to enter the next stage of its life — the cocoon.  While it remains in its cocoon, it is slowly being formed into its final stage — a beautiful butterfly.  As it breaks out from its cocoon, the former caterpillar spreads its beautifully patterned wings and flies off into its new life.  This is the Christian lifestyle.  We are all undergoing the slow, gradual process of Christian metamorphosis in order to ascend into the goal of our faith, which is salvation.

We are currently in the longest stage of life.  We are all caterpillars.  Christians are these small, cute, fuzzy little creatures who keep on feeding and getting fatter.  As Christians, we must continually feed on the Word of God all day, every day.  I don’t know about you, but I am constantly hungry for God’s Word, and I keep feeding on it every day.  As a result, I get fatter in my faith.  As we feed on God’s Word, our faith gets fatter and fatter, never bursting, never satisfied, until the completion of its metamorphosis.  Christians are never satisfied with their present knowledge of God’s Word or relationship with Christ (unless you’re one of those lukewarm Christians, or as Craig Groeschel labels it, “Christian atheists”).  Christians continually seek knowledge in the Word and seek a deeper personal relationship with Christ, and so they are always growing.  This is because God is infinite, and so we infinitely grow closer to Him.

We’re not normal caterpillars, however.  We are a new breed of caterpillars.  Caterpillars eat, then they form into a cocoon, and then they are butterflies.  We, however, feed on God’s Word and remain in the cocoon stage simultaneously, and then we become butterflies.  Allow me to explain this.  In describing the caterpillar’s condition in the cocoon, I said that it is slowly being formed into its final stage.  While we are feeding on God’s Word while crawling around on the earth, we are also slowly being transformed into our final stage — to ascend into the goal of our faith, which is salvation — beautiful butterflies in Heaven.

What do we feed on specifically?  We feed on the fruits of the Spirit.  Galatians 5:22-23, “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, [and] self-control…”  Everything Christ did was not as our Master, but as a servant.  Even though He is our Master, He served everyone during His time on earth and He continues to serve all of us today.  Matthew 20:28, “...just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many.”  Christ performed the ultimate service for paying the ransom once and for all (Romans 6:10; Hebrews 7:27; 10:10; I Peter 3:18).  Now, we are to serve Christ and to serve others, and the way to do this is by continually feeding on the fruits of the Spirit.  While you feed on the fruits of the Spirit, you begin to “be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect” (Romans 12:2) because “it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure” (Philippians 2:13).  While we are feeding on the fruits of God’s Spirit and His Word, God works in us, enabling us to do His will and work for His purposes and simultaneously transforming us by renewing our minds so that we may discern God’s good, pleasing, and perfect will.  The best way to do this is by serving others.

There are nine fruits of the Spirit, and I will be breaking down each one, discussing the vitality and use of each fruit and how its consumption simultaneously works in transforming us into our final stage.

Love

The first fruit is love, which the word itself appears over 530 times in the entire Bible.  Love is a very wide topic, and I will try to keep it as concise as I possibly can.  In its application here, a concise discussion may not be possible, but bear with me.  Typically, on a topic like this, teachers will begin with asking, “What is love?” and they would then quote 1 Corinthians 13:4-7.  It is true that that’s what love is, but what some of these teachers don’t realise is that only God can perfectly perform every single one of these actions (and prohibit Himself from doing for the negative actions listed), because God is love (I John 4:8).  Still, though, this passage serves as a terrific guideline for us.  It is good to use it as a guideline while remaining cognisant that we cannot be perfect in practising this list because Jesus gave us the command to “love one another.  By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:34-35).

The Greek word that is used for love in the Galatians passage is ἀγάπη (agape), which is not used to refer to an emotional affection, physical attraction, or a familial bond.  Rather, it is the love of choice, referring to respect, devotion, and affection that leads to a willing, self-sacrificial love (John 15:13; Romans 5:8; I John 3:16-17).  The same word in the Greek is used in 1 Corinthians 13:4-7, which is why I believe it is poor usage to use that passage at wedding ceremonies and the like because it’s not about emotional affection.  Again, it’s good to use as a guideline in a marriage or non-marital relationship, but it’s important to know that that’s not what the passage is about.

Now that we’ve eliminated the romantic emotional connection that love has, just what is love, really?  The best way to examine Christ’s love towards others is by examining examples of His selfless service.  Christ exemplified this in numerous ways, but for the sake of time I will only be highlighting selfless service and humility because I believe that is the core of the Christian lifestyle.  Because Christian means “follower of Christ,” as we examine Christ’s behaviour and selfless lifestyle, we must imitate that behaviour to the best of our ability.  Jesus gives us what I believe to be the perfect example of humility in that what we should do for each other He has done unto us, as He says Himself (John 13:15).  Just prior to this, Jesus washed His disciples’ feet.  We all know this “story” very well, but let’s examine it closely.  Before the Feast of the Passover, Jesus had begun to wash His disciples’ feet.  He began to wash Peter’s feet as Peter said, “Never shall you wash my feet!” (John 13:8a).  Peter is often ridiculed for being quick to profess his faith, but Peter’s reaction here is very understandable.  If Jesus Christ Himself were to wash my feet before the Passover, I, too, would be reluctant for Him to do so.  Jesus is our Master, and I imagine Peter having recognised this thought it impertinent and dishonourable for his Master, whom he serves, to humble Himself and wash his feet.  If Jesus were to offer to wash my feet, I would have the same reaction, saying, “Lord, let me wash Yours!  I’m not worthy of Your service.”  But Jesus humbles Himself before us not because we’re worthy, but because He loves us in His grace.  Jesus responded to Peter, “If I do not wash you, you have no part with me” (v. 8b), to which Peter replied, “Lord, then wash not only my feet, but also my hands and my head” (v. 9), finally realising that Jesus was modeling Christian humility and service and that unless the Son of God cleanses a person’s sin, no one can have a part with Him.  Jesus then replied, “He who has bathed needs only to wash his feet, but is completely clean” (v. 10).  What Jesus means here is that His cleansing for salvation never needs to be repeated, for His sacrifice has bathed our original sin, which is now covered.  We are completely clean but still only need to wash our feet, for we still live in and walk through the struggle of sin.

That’s the love that Christ has done for us.  So what example did Jesus portray to the disciples that we must do unto one another?  He was modeling loving humility.  After washing His disciples’ feet, Jesus said, “You call me Teacher and Lord; and you are right, for so I am.  If then, the Lord and the Teacher, washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet.  For I gave you an example that you also should do as I did to you.  Truly, truly, I say to you, a slave is not greater than his master, nor is one who is sent greater than the one who sent him” (vv. 13-16).  Although Jesus is our Lord and Teacher, He came not to be served, but to serve (Matthew 20:28).  Although Jesus is our Lord and Teacher, He humbled Himself before His disciples — His servants and students — and washed their feet, serving them selflessly.  This loving humility is what we must do towards one another.  Not literally washing each other’s feet, but selflessly and lovingly serving others in humility, no matter our position.  This is the great mark of leadership — having the authority to command and discipline, but humbling oneself to serving and loving others in complete humility.  The disciples were not greater than Jesus, and Jesus not greater than the one who sent Him, God (for He is God).  Yet in spite of His authority and ranking above His disciples, Jesus humbled Himself and made Himself equal with His disciples and washed their feet in loving humility.  That is what we must do — that is what love is.  If you’re in a position of leadership, humble yourself and serve others in humility.  You don’t need to be in a position of authority to do this.  As sinful human beings, we sometimes think we’re better than someone else, but that is never true.  Humble yourself before everyone, and serve them in humility as the Lord has done.

Joy

Misery is a dangerous condition to be in as a Christian.  This is Satan’s greatest weapon against the Christian.  When you become Christian, you catch Satan’s attention.  He paints a bull’s eye on your back and colours it in and will do whatever it takes to hit the target.  Jesus, however, calls us to joy, “through whom we have received reconciliation” (Romans 5:11).  It’s good to experience and be in touch with our emotions of joy, anger, sadness, and fear, but neither one should be a perpetual condition.  If all you are is angry, you’ll create nothing but animosity and hatred in your relationships with other people.  If all you are is sad, then you’ll prevent yourself from creating meaningful relationships with other people as well as prohibiting yourself from experiencing true happiness.  If all you are is timid and afraid, you’ll never stand up for yourself and what you believe in and ultimately Christ, unable to be steadfast for the Lord.  If all you are is joyful and disallow yourself to come to terms with other emotions, you’ll be completely incapable of sympathising with peoples’ dark emotions and will fail to comfort them in the Spirit

Again, experiencing each emotion is good, but we must come to terms with each and not let it control us or come into its perpetual condition.  Jesus expressed righteous anger when the people of Jerusalem were using the House of God as a house of trade (John 2:13-25).  (Righteous anger is far different than full blown anger.  The former is a strong reaction against something that opposes God’s will, and the latter is a strong reaction against something that opposes your will.)  Jesus expressed sadness when He heard that John the Baptiser was beheaded and was so sad that He isolated Himself in a desolate place (Matthew 14:3-13a) and when He wept at Lazarus’s tomb (John 11:35).  Jesus expressed fear at Gethsemane when He prayed to God to remove the cup of His wrath from Him if it be possible, but not as He wills it, but as God wills (Matthew 26:36-45); and He was also so stressed that He suffered a medical condition called hematidrosis, causing Him to sweat blood (Luke 22:44).

The basis of Jesus’ joy is John 15:1-11:

“I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser.  Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit.  You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you.  Abide in Me, and I in you.  As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me.  I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.  If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire and they are burned.  If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.  My Father is glorified in this, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples.  Just as the Father has loved Me, I have also loved you; abide in My love.  If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love.  These things I have spoken to you so that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made in full.”

Jesus says that there are two types of vines:  those that bear fruit and those that do not.  The question is, which are you?  You cannot bear the fruit of the Spirit unless you abide in Christ, which, as He says later on, is to keep His commandments.  If you abide in Him and bear the fruit of the Spirit, God removes (prunes) all things in your life that would hinder your fruit-bearing; He cuts away sin.  If you do not abide in Him and don’t bear the fruit of the Spirit, Jesus depicts Hell in that you will be gathered up and cast into the fire to burn.  When you abide in Christ and bear the fruit of the Spirit and He therefore abides in you, this glorifies God, which is the joy of Christ that He speaks of, which He desires each of us to possess.

Peace

Peace is probably the simplest, and biggest, goal that all of mankind shares.  We all have the same goal in mind:  world peace.  But I have some unfortunate news:  world peace is impossible.  By just simply examining the history of the human race, we can see that the more we strive for peace, the further we’re driven away from it.  Whether you choose to look at it from a Christian perspective (from creation till now) or a non-Christian perspective, we’ll see the truth in this.  Before the Fall of Man, everything was literally at peace.  All of creation was in peace and mankind was in perfect relationship with God.  Then once sin was introduced by Satan the serpent through Adam and Eve, all of creation became corrupt, and horrid things we are now familiar with has come into the world — death, illness, disease, rape, malnutrition, murder, etc.  When we examine simple historical events, we see that from war to war, we become farther and farther away from peace.  We are no closer to peace now than we were when the first murder was committed (Cain and Abel).

John 14:27, “Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you.  Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful.”  We have a false idea of peace in which it involves world peace — that we are all in agreement with one another on morals where there is no war and nothing ever goes wrong.  That is not the kind of peace Scripture speaks of, and that kind of peace is not something that can be accomplished through our means alone because Jesus does not give us peace as the world gives.  He gives us His peace, which comes from our greatest source, God the Father.  We Christians are very familiar with this verse, and perhaps quote it often.  But how many of us have actually considered what this means?  Do you know what it means to have the peace of Jesus Christ?  I’ll be honest that I haven’t always known what this means, and it took a couple years to discover what Jesus means by this.

I’ll tell you what it doesn’t mean, though.  Jesus is not saying that through Him, world peace can be achieved.  He is not saying that if the entire world becomes Christian (which is impossible), then world peace can be achieved.  (If the entire world were Christian, we’re still sinners infected by original sin and would still commit sins like adultery, murder, and other sins, and wouldn’t be at peace anyway.)  This ideology of world peace is done by our works alone.  But the peace of Christ is a gift, because He gives it to us.  Peace is not something that we can create or somehow consummate; it can only be given by Jesus Christ alone.  Peace will only be achieved when Christ comes again, and this peace will only be experienced in Heaven, not on Earth.  But this is not what Jesus is talking about either.  We know that Jesus is not talking about world peace because He says that He doesn’t give us peace as the world gives.  He gives us an entirely different peace.  What Jesus means is this:  Since you are a new creation in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17), you have our Saviour to look up to in faith just as the Israelites looked up to the bronze serpent in faith (John 3:14; see also Numbers 21:4-9).  After God had led the Israelites to destroy the kingdom of Arad, they began complaining to God and Moses that God had brought them out of Egypt simply to die in the wilderness.  In righteous anger, God sent snakes among them, and many Israelites who were bitten died.  After a while, the Israelites came to Moses, repented of their sins, and Moses prayed on their behalf.  In response, God commanded Moses to make a bronze serpent and set it on a pole and that whoever is bitten by a snake and looks up at the bronze serpent in faith will live.  Jesus brings up this part of Scripture, pointing out that the bronze serpent was pointing towards Him.  The only difference is that when the Israelites looked up in faith upon the bronze serpent they would be saved from temporal death, but when we look upon Jesus Christ in faith we are saved from eternal death.  That is the encouragement and peace we have.  We can look upon Jesus Christ in faith and know that we are saved from eternal death.  Also, as new creations in Christ and therefore a new identity, we can be completely at peace with whom we are as individual human beings.  Because God no longer sees us for our sins but now sees us in Christ, we can be completely at peace with ourselves and completely trust Him to sustain our lives, because He is our Source.

Let me explain this from my personal perspective so you can better understand what I mean.  It hasn’t been until recently that I’ve been completely at peace with myself — with life.  Because of how God sees me in Christ and how Christ views me, I accept who I am.  This is only possible through the peace of Christ that He gives us.  Because of His peace, I accept my personality and even my flaws.  For my entire life, I never accepted my personality and especially not my flaws because of the self-loathing I suffered with.  I defeated this self-loathing through the peace and grace of Christ that He has given me.  It is because of this peace that I am able to love myself and look past my flaws, as well as realising that where I am flawed, other fellow Christians make up for them.  Where I am weak at certain things, other people are strong in.  That’s the beautiful thing about the Church.  The Church is one body, of which we are all members of (1 Corinthians 12).  We all have different functions to maintain the function of the whole Church.  What the arms cannot do, the feet do.  We can’t walk on our hands, so our feet do that for us.  Likewise, where the pastor who knows nothing of financing an organisation (the church), a member or elder of the church who has a profession in finances can do that function of the body.

The best peace we have in Christ is what He concludes with by saying, “Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be fearful.”  The best way this can be explained is what Jesus says in Matthew 11:28-30, “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.  Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.  For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”  I’ll explain this from my personal perspective as well for a better understanding.  Because of the peace that Christ gives us, whenever I face something troubling or some sort of tribulation, I don’t worry too much and I don’t become fearful because I know my life is in the hands of Jesus.  I admit that I worry a little bit (because I’m human and imperfect), but I don’t allow worry and fear to become my perpetual condition, and this is because of the peace of Christ.  When I’m stressed, face a tribulation, or face something troubling, I remember everything that Jesus has done for me.  I don’t mean just what He did for all of us on the cross, but I mean what He has personally done in my own life.  I remember everything that He has brought me through, both where I didn’t recognise Him and where I prayed for deliverance and He answered.  I remember these things, and the Holy Spirit calms me and I become at peace.  It is because of His peace given to me that I don’t allow my heart to become troubled or fearful

Many of us may have read this passage in Matthew 11:28 numerous times as well.  I didn’t really know what a yoke was until I looked it up.  I wrote about this in my blog, The Yoke of Slavery, so if you read it and what I’m about to talk about seems reiterate, bear with me.  Paul wrote in Galatians 5:1, “It was for freedom that Christ set us free; therefore keep standing firm and do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery.”  When you’re set free from slavery, you can certainly experience peace for the first time in your life.  We have been freed from the curse that the Law pronounced on the sinner who has been unsuccessfully striving to achieve his own righteousness (this is all of us).  A yoke refers to the wooden crosspiece that was used to control domesticated animals (oxen, horses, etc.), and fastening it over the neck of two animals and attached to a plow or cart that they are to pull.  The Jews thought that the “yoke of the Law” was a blessed thing — the essence of true religion and salvation.  But Paul argued that for those who pursued it as a way of salvation, the Law was a yoke of slavery, hence the imagery here.  The use of the Law is to make our sins known, and immediately following must come the Gospel, which is the proclamation of our forgiveness of sins through the sacrifice of Christ.  When you talk about Christianity, you must include both Law and Gospel, not one or the other.  When you preach only Law, you get condemnation (because we are incapable of fulfilling the Law, which Jesus fulfilled for us [Matthew 5:17]).  When you preach only Gospel, you get the necessary grace and forgiveness of sins, but not the diagnosis nor the recognition of original (and personal) sin.  (I talk a little bit more about the yoke of slavery in the aforementioned blog.  It’s nice and concise, so if you’d like, you can refer to it.

So, having been set free from the condemnation of the Law, we now take upon the yoke of Jesus Christ.  What is His yoke?  It is grace, mercy, and forgiveness — the essences that make up His peace.  It is because of His yoke of peace that we can take upon ourselves — His grace, mercy, and forgiveness — that we cannot allow our hearts to be troubled or fearful.  Jesus Christ is humble and meek.  The yoke of sin is hard and heavy, and the yoke of Jesus Christ’s peace is easy and light.

Patience

We see multiple times in Scripture where Jesus said to His disciples, “You of little faith!”  Imagine that!  The apostles that we so look up to and read the writings of, and Jesus accused them of having little faith more than once!  The fact is, they were just as human as we are.  Jesus first says these words to them (and a large crowd of people) during His Sermon on the Mount.  In Matthew 6:24-34, Jesus calls the audience to observe the birds and take notice that God takes the time to feed them.  He says, “Are you not worth much more than they” (v. 26)?  Why would God take care to feed the birds and animals and neglect His specially created children?  Exactly, He wouldn’t do this.  So Jesus encouraged them not to worry about their life, what they will eat and drink, or what clothes they will wear.  Likewise, God takes the time to clothe the fields with grass, so how much more He will clothe us.  And this is where He first says, “You of little faith!”  And rightly so.  If we are so worried about having food, drink, and clothes tomorrow, we do have little faith because we are not trusting the God who feeds the rest of creation and clothes the entire earth on a daily basis, all without pausing while He takes care of us, His children.  This is why Jesus concludes that part of the section by saying, “So do not worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will care for itself.  each day has enough trouble of its own” (v. 34).  Take everything one day at a time.  Trust God in what He will supply tomorrow.

Jesus says the same words just two chapters later, this time directly to His personally chosen disciples.  We all know of this event.  It’s when Jesus calmed the storm and the sea.  Jesus was sleeping during the storm, and after all efforts to not let the ship sink, the disciples feared for their lives and woke Jesus, saying, “Save us, Lord; we are perishing” (8:25)!  Jesus then responds with, “Why are you afraid, you men of little faith” (v. 26)?  Immediately afterwards, He calms the storm and the sea.  Even though Jesus’s physical presence was on the boat with them, they feared that Jesus would allow them to perish.  This is a great place to see Jesus’s humanity.  He was so weary that He slept through a raging storm on the sea!  After the disciples woke Him, in His weariness He first rebuked them and then calmed the sea and storm.  Amazing!  If He could so easily calm the storm and sea in His weariness, then they certainly would’ve been fine while He peacefully slept.  Indeed, they had little faith.

Again, in Matthew 14:28-33, we read these words.  This is where Peter, after seeing Jesus on the water, walked on water and then began to sink.  Crying out for Jesus to save him, Jesus takes hold of him and says, “You of little faith, why did you doubt” (v. 31)?  Peter was doing just fine on the water until he saw the wind and became frightened, causing him to sink (v. 30).  Fear caused him to doubt.  I wonder how many times our own fear of our personal situations cause us to doubt God?  Think about this.  Fear causes a lack of faith.

We last see Jesus use these words in Matthew 16:5-12.  While they were in the region of Magadan (now a city in modern Russia), the disciples forgot to bring bread.  In verse 6 Jesus warned them about “the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees.”  They thought he was talking about actual bread, but He was warning them about these Jews’ dangerous influence.  The disciples discussed what this meant among themselves and concluded, “He said that because we did not bring any bread” (v. 7).  Then Jesus says, “You men of little faith, why do you discuss among yourselves that you have no bread” (v. 8)?  He then reminds them of the miracles He performed by making five loaves into five thousand, and seven loaves into four thousand.    “Then they understood that He did not say to beware of the leaven of bread, but of the teaching of the Pharisees and Sadducees” (v. 12).

Now, why did I walk you through all those times Jesus said to His disciples, “You of little faith”?  To make this point:  Jesus is infinitely and mercifully patient!  If you or I witnessed either one of those miracles that Jesus performed, we would probably never doubt for the rest of our lives!  But the disciples, whom Jesus personally chose, and who witnessed these miracles firsthand several times, doubted from time to time!  Yet, even though Jesus personally chose them, He was patient!  If Jesus was so patient with His disciples, then how much more He will be patient with us.  That doesn’t give you a reason to procrastinate, but use this as encouragement to not dwell in shame if you repent of a sin later than you think you should have, or any other reason that makes you think Jesus is impatient with you or disappointed.

As Jesus’s modern disciples, we are to mimic this.  We must use this as encouragement to be patient with one another.  We have many reasons to be impatient with each other, but Jesus is patient with us.  We don’t deserve His patience, but He is patient nonetheless.  How much Christlike love we truly show to people by simply being patient with them!  If you’re helping someone through a troublesome time, be patient with them; don’t push them.  You can’t expect them to recover at the rate you want them to.  Push them gently, but don’t shove them over the cliff of despair, for then they will only sink into a deeper pit and you’ll have to double back and retrace your steps.  As Paul put it simply, “We urge you, brethren, admonish the unruly, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak, be patient with everyone” (1 Thessalonians 5:14).  Whomever you’re admonishing, encouraging, helping, teaching, disciplining, whatever, exercise the patience of Christ.

Kindness

I cannot think of a greater example of Jesus’s kindness than what was told during the events of His arrest.  While He was being arrested, Peter cut off one of the high priest’s servant’s ear in frustration.  Jesus yelled, “Stop!  No more of this” and healed the servant’s ear (Luke 22:51; John 18:10).  Whenever I read this, I am always amazed at the lovingkindness of Jesus.  Here He is, being arrested, guilty of literally nothing, and He heals a fatal wound of whom one of His companions attacked, and still let Himself be arrested!  The greatest form of kindness is mercy, which is exactly what Jesus showed here.  Mercy is showing kindness even when you’re angry or offended, and when the opposing party deserves retribution.  Now, we all deserve retribution, but Jesus showed the ultimate kindness and mercy for us when He died for our sins.  Kindness does not need a reason to be shown.  If you spend time trying to think of a reason to be merciful to someone, you’ll find that you’ll never show any mercy.  Mercy is undeserving.  Of all people, we Christians should know this because through God’s mercy He gave His only begotten Son for our sins.  The word “kind” doesn’t even suit this sort of action, but mercy, its ultimatum.

We can show kindness in many ways.  We have the perfect guideline for showing Christlike kindness.  “...and while being reviled, He did not revile in return; while suffering, He uttered no threats, but kept entrusting Himself to Him who judges righteously…” (1 Peter 2:23).  Amazing.  When people criticise you in angrily insulting ways, do not revile in return.  I’m guilty of this.  Before I was wise, when an atheist would attack me about my faith with angry insults, I returned the same.  Now, however, I either say nothing or speak kindness.  For example, an atheist throws an insult at me and I say, “It’s okay, Jesus loves you anyway.”  I may say it sarcastically, but I nevertheless say it truthfully.  This frustrates them more than the most profane insult.  You can apply this to any situation.  If you’re criticised at work (if it’s not constructional), don’t criticise your employee in return.  What I usually say is, “I appreciate the feedback, and I’ll do my best to do better in the future.  By the way, I appreciate the way you do _________.”  Leave off with a comment of a job or task that they do well, then walk away.  One of my favourite proverbs is, “If your enemy is hungry, give him food to eat; and if he is thirsty, give him water to drink; for you will heap burning coals on his head, and the LORD will reward you” (Proverbs 25:21-22).  Such kindness!  Not only is genuine kindness the perfect revenge, but it finds favour with God.  And we can entrust ourselves in knowing that God judges righteously.

To Be Continued...