the power of the almighty

I'm currently reading through the minor prophets. I love the minor prophets, in a rather odd way. They're little snapshots of a time when Israel was slowly drifting away from God, getting further and further away. Yeah, there are brief moments of revival; Zephaniah's warnings are believed to have been the impetus behind Josiah's reforms of the religious system in Judah. Yet time and again, no matter how strident the warnings, the people always seem to drift farther from God yet again, forever forgetting just how great God is.

This is a common thread throughout the minor prophets. The people get so entrenched into their materialism, into their deep apathy, into their worship of other gods, that they forget how amazing the one true God truly is, how well He's taken care of them.

Hosea condemns this drifting in likely the strongest language--

For their mother hath played the harlot: she that conceived them hath done shamefully.

...the spirit of whoredoms hath caused them to err, and they have gone a whoring from under their God. (Hosea 1:5, 4:12)

Joel speaks in the midst of physical destruction, just after a plague of locusts that is a judgment upon the people of Judah for their sin of idolatry. Amos rails against Israel's sins of gluttony and drunkenness, their lack of compassion for the poor, and their immorality.Obadiah speaks of Edom's attacks against "thy brother Jacob". Jonah's whole dilemma centered around the sin and immorality of Nineveh, as does Nahum's. Micah speaks of the greediness of the people of Jerusalem, of their apathy toward God, and their lack of trust in Him. In chapter two, he enjoins them to

Arise ye, and depart; for this is not your rest: because it is polluted, it shall destroy you, even with a sore destruction. If a man walking in the spirit and falsehood do lie, saying, I will prophesy unto thee of wine and of strong drink; he shall even be the prophet of this people.

Micah is referring to the place of rest and joy that was promised to the people of Israel all the way back in the Torah. Deuteronomy refers to the inheritance that God had promised (12:9). Even then, they'd not yet come to it, even within sight of the promised land of Canaan. Micah is warning the people that even this, this land of seeming plenty that he's talked about in the preceding verses, still isn't the one of ultimate rest that God has promised to his people. It is an illusion, built upon the greed of people, independent of the power of God; they've built it seemingly all on their own...and, in consequence, they've begun to listen to false prophets who speak to them only of further prosperity, rather than the judgment that Micah warns is coming.

Habbakkuk warns against wanton war, against robbing from others and enriching yourself through it. Zephaniah tells of Judah's spiritual adultery--trying to serve both the one true God and Molech, covering all the bases, per se. Verse twelve of chapter one tells of the people of Judah. They are

...[settled in complacency: they] say in their heart, The Lord will not do good, neither will he do evil.

They had denied the power that was God's, and refused to see the power that He held over all of them.

Yet consistently, these same prophets speak out powerfully about the power of God, affirming it over and over to God's chosen people, reminding them of His greatness. Habakkuk praises God most of all because

the Lord God is my strength, and he will make my feet like hinds' feet, and he will make me to walk upon mine high places.

Nahum takes the path of reminding the people of Nineveh of the destructive power of God's wrath:

But with an overrunning flood he will make an utter end of the place thereof, and darkness will pursue his enemies.

Jonah documents God's saving grace, not just toward Nineveh, but towards Jonah himself. Obadiah highlights the illumination that will come after judgement (verse 18). Amos simply shows how great God truly is.

For, lo, he that formeth the mountains, and createth the wind, and declareth unto man what is his thought, that maketh the morning darkness, and treadeth upon the high places of the earth, The Lord, the God of hosts, is his name.

Joel speaks of God's saving power, His ability to follow through on His word, His power to do great things. Hosea declares that God is a loving spouse to a wayward Israel, constantly drawing her back, and He has power over all the angels.

My favorite passages that demonstrate this attention to God's power, however, are found in Micah and Zephaniah. Micah chapter 7 talks about how God is going to build up his people once more--regardless of their sin, regardless of how far they strayed; it is only temporary. Micah gives hope. Even despite all the transgressions, God will still hear. He still cares. We are His flock, His heritage, and He will build us up again--and "the nations shall see and be confounded at all their might..." He continues on, and gives the most amazing picture of God's power toward us.

Who is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage? he retaineth not his anger for ever, because he delighteth in mercy.

He is all-powerful. He will cow all nations. He is supreme. And yet he forgives. He cares about us, so far beyond what we can ever imagine. Zephaniah continues this theme, in chapter 3.

The Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with joy; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with singing.

He is great, yet He saves. He is great, yet He rejoices over us. He is great, yet He will allow us to rest in His love. He is great, but he sings over me with great joy. God is mighty, yet He cares so wonderfully for each one of us. This was the thing Israel was consistently forgetting--God's power, and God's powerful love. I hope I never forget that truth, because it continues to amaze me every time I really, truly think about it.

- Kyla Denae

Confidence and Glory

Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the weakness of God is stronger than men. For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called: But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty; And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are: That no flesh should glory in his presence. But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption: That, according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord.

1 Corinthians 1:26-25-31

I find quite a bit of comfort in this passage. I'm not much at all. But through God, I am made wise and righteous...and it's only through him that I can be made so. I can have confidence--or, as this passage puts it, glory--in the fact that I am sanctified by the blood of Christ. I can worship him, glorify his name, with the knowledge that he has made me clean and called me to a great purpose...no matter how I looked before.

Not many wise after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called...

He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord.

爱於耶穌,
~Liberty (紫涵)

Christians and the Law

سلام لكم في هذا اليوم

So I've been seeing quite a bit about this lately. I don't know if it's because of a blog I stumbled across (which is more likely, because it's what provoked this thought in the first place), or a Facebook friend I added, but there is a section of Christians that seem to think part of our lives should be the Old Testament Law - in other words, the Levitical law that was handed down to Moses as a guide for the Hebrew people.

Now, I understand the desire to do something great for God, I really do. The problem is that I don't think we see God calling gentile Christians to follow the Law anywhere in the Bible. Hebrew Christians may be another deal - you'll have to talk to a more knowledgeable authority on that one - but nowhere do we see Jesus or his disciples telling gentile Christians they are supposed to follow the Law.

There was much dispute about this issue even in the early church. In Acts 15, we find the church leaders in an uproar about whether or not gentiles, as Christians, are supposed to follow the law. Remember that, just a few chapters earlier, these same people were getting angry with Peter because he went and witnessed to the uncircumcised heathen. Of course, then Peter had to explain about how God had basically slapped him upside the head and told him what was going to happen: that what God had called clean (the gentiles) could not be called unclean (by Peter). Fast forward. Paul and Barnabas are having some troubles with these same men, the ones from Judea, who are still stubbornly holding on to that circumcision issue. There's this debate going on about it, and they all come together for the express purpose of further debate, and deciding what the answer is.

Peter pretty much sums it up:

And God, which knoweth the hearts, bare then witness, giving them the Holy Ghost, even as he did unto us; And put no difference between us and [the gentiles], purifying their hearts by faith. Now therefore why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved, even as they.

He looks around at all his friends and basically says- "Okay, what are we doing here? Didn't Jesus come to give us free salvation, by grace alone? So why are we trying to shackle these baby Christians with all the weight of four huge books that were written to Moses? Aren't they saved by grace?"

Now to those who say- "Then what is the point of the Levitical Law? Was it just some mean joke God was playing on his people?" Not quite. In Romans 3 and 7, Paul explains the purpose of the Law.

Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin.

Romans 3:19-20

What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet. But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. For without the law sin was dead.

Romans 7:7-8

This, then, is the purpose of the law: to be a schoolmaster and show us our sin. The ten commandments tell us that lying, stealing, adultery (of the heart and the body), covetousness, and disobedience are wrong. Without them, we would not know that God disliked those things, that we are accountable to a mighty God.

Let's get some history of the Law real quick, just to know where this "schoolmaster" comes from. Much of what we call the law were specialized instructions - how to build the tabernacle, how the priests were to behave, etc. etc. Circumcision was reaffirmed as a sign of commitment to God from the Hebrews. There are over 600 items on the list in all - 350 things not to be done or partaken of, and 250 things they were required to do. When first given this law, the Jews emphatically declared their resolve to keep this law. Of course, reading the history that makes up much of the old testament, we see how well that worked out: failure after failure is recorded. Even the priests, the most important part of the Levitical law command chain, were unable to keep the law. There was no salvation to be won through the law, no goodie points to be had. It was simply impossible.

This was, of course, the point, as revealed in Romans. The law is a tool to be used to highlight how depraved mankind is, how they cannot make it on their own. The repeated failure by the Hebrew people was all to prepare them for the Messiah who would come and rescue them from that up-and-down cycle. In Hebrews 8, the author writes:

For if that first covenant [the law] had been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second. For finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah: Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the Land of Egypt; because they continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord.

He goes on to talk to his Jewish readers about how the laws "would be written on their hearts," and how God would forgive their iniquities (that was, of course, a quotation by the author from Jeremiah 31). So even to the Jewish people, God made the promise that he would eventually remove from them the old covenant: that is, the entirety of the law.

Some people will take the part where he talks about the law being written on their hearts and say- "You see? There we go. The Levitical law is written on our hearts, sort of like a conscience, and we're supposed to follow it." If that's so, then each one of us should feel the pricking of our conscience, that little voice of the Holy Spirit, whenever we eat bacon or wear nylon. But none (or very few) of us do, unless we're constantly thinking about how we should feel bad about those things. So what then is this law? I'm not sure. I haven't finished studying it out yet. I may have to come back in a few weeks and say "Oops, I was wrong. I'm going to give up pork and my Saturday shopping," but we'll see. ;)

The point of all this is, I suppose, that we don't have to follow the law because we are under grace. Christ fulfilled the qualifications of the law. He satisfied the justice of God. You see this all throughout the Gospels, in the epistles of the New Testament. We are no longer under the law, we are under grace. The law of the Spirit of life has made us free from the law of sin and death. The law is an all-or-nothing proposition. You can't pick and choose which qualifications you want- "Oh, I'm going to go to church on Saturday and abstain from pork, but not stone my child who rebels, or a woman I suspect of being a witch, and I'm going to let my heater come on on Saturday, because I don't like getting frozen."

Either you follow the law, or you do not. Either you try to be justified under it, or you do not.

I'm glad I'm free from that. I'm glad that Christ so loved me that he was willing to come and die for me, to bring me a new covenant. He died for me! The Lord of the Universe gave his perfect, sinless life for me! Why do I need to follow the law, when I am freed and perfected in him?

Do I still sin? Of course. But I can rest and have peace knowing that I'm not under the law, that I don't have to follow an endless set of qualifications to win brownie points, or whatever it is we're supposed to do by following the law. I am free, thanks to Christ. Are you?

To read more about this subject, I'd suggest procuring a copy of Andrew Farley's "The Naked Gospel." It's an absolutely amazing book. It will change your life. For real.

爱於耶穌,
~Liberty

Emergency Bible Numbers

سلام لكم في هذا اليوم

Found this today and thought I'd share. :))

• When you are sad, call on John 14
• When you don’t feel loved, call on Romans 8:38-39
• When you have sinned, call on 1 John 1:8-9
• When you are facing danger, call on Psalm 91
• When people have failed you, call on Psalm 27
• When God feel far from you, call on Psalm 139
• When your faith needs encouraging, call on Hebrews 11
• When you are scared, call on Psalm 23
• When you are worried, call on Matthew 6:25-34
• When you are hurt, call on Colossians 3:12-17
• When you feel no one is on your side, call on Romans 8:31-39
• When you are seeking rest, call on Matthew 11:25-30
• When you are suffering, call on Romans 8:18-30
• When you feel you’re failing, call on Psalm 121
• When you pray, call on Matthew 6:9-13
• When you need courage, call on Joshua 1
• When you are in need, call on Philippians 4:19
• When you are hated because of your faith, call on John 15
• When you are losing hope, call on 2 Thessalonians 2:16-17
• When you are seeking peace, call on John 14:27
• When you want to do good works, call on John 15
• When you want to live a happy life, call on Colossians 3:12-17
• When you don’t understand what God is doing, call on Isaiah 55:8-9
• When you want to get along with others, call on Romans 12:9-21

爱於耶穌,
~Liberty

Whatever ye have...

Suilaid!

Yesterday I was reading in 1 Timothy. In the sixth chapter, Paul is talking to Timothy about being content with whatever he has, no matter how much or how little it is.

"But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out. And having food and raiment let us therewith be content."
(1 Timothy 6:6-8)

God has really been speaking to me about this lately: to just be content with what I have, and let it be enough for me, no matter what my other circumstances are. These verses brought to mind these from Matthew, which first came to my attention a few weeks ago when I was reading a book about Hudson Taylor.

"Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they? Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature? And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which to day is, and to morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith? Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed? (For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you. Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof."
(Matthew 6:25-34)

In these verses, Jesus is basically saying: "What in the world are you doing worrying about it? Doesn't my father take care of every creature in the world? Don't you think he can take care of you? If so, then why worry?"

I can't say I've completely hammered this one down. I always want something- a new gadget, a book, a treat. But I'm working on it.

"Not that I speak in respect of want: for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content."
(Philippians 4:11)

爱於耶穌,
~Liberty