People Who Die for Jesus

In his book What the Bible Says about Jesus, Donn Leach wrote; “Yet Jesus considers Himself, His mission, and the spiritual welfare of men of such surpassing importance that He calls for the absolute loyalty of the disciple to Himself even when that brings enmity from those most closely related to the disciple by blood or marriage.  It is even more important that self-preservation.  Jesus calls on men to be willing to die for Him.” Salvation was not just about being promised eternal life, but it was being rescued from the kingdom of darkness and being brought into the Kingdom of light (Colossians 1:13-14).  That means Christians are citizens of God’s Kingdom, and that our desire is to see God’s will done here on earth as it is done in heaven.  Let me ask you a question: Are you willing to die to see that happen?

To be honest, we cannot fully know how we would respond to a life and death situation until we experience that type of situation.  Peter, before Jesus’ arrest, was confident that he would stay with Jesus, even if it meant death.  Though you and I know the rest of the story.  When the apostle was confronted with the prospect of being captured he denied that he even knew Jesus.  Brave talk and positive thinking do not necessarily translate into courage when the chips are down.

Yet, isn’t necessary to think about such things in order to prepare for what may happen?  I think our imaginations can help us prepare for the tasks that lie ahead, and that includes the possibility of laying down our lives for the Kingdom.   One of the things the coaches I had for basketball and track asked the team to do was visualize the game or the race.  It was about mentally preparing for success.  So, on the one hand, we cannot know for certain how we would respond to the threat of death, on the other hand, we can prepare for that possibility by employing our imaginations to imagine our thoughts and feelings during such an experience.

There are other difficult situations that we have to prepare for besides the prospect of dying for our faith.  Some of us will face the difficult reality of being shunned by family because of our Christian faith.  The temptation to walk away from faith, or at least water it down, has to be so appealing during those moments, and yet Christ thought His Kingdom and mission were so important for you to walk away from your family instead.

The scenario can play itself out in a number of different ways: to break the law or lose your job, to pursue a forbidden love or stay single for the rest of your life, to party each weekend or lose your buddies.  You get the picture.  To die for Kingdom and to give up our lives for Christ is just the ultimate example of the choices we face over and over again in our lives.  Will we remain faithful to Christ or will we give into the pressure?

How can we develop the type of faith that will stay with Jesus even when our world crumbles around us?  I think this is question needs to be asked of the Church as a whole and not only just for ourselves.  Remember, one of the Church’s tasks is to build each other up in faith.  In other words the Church is to facilitate the spiritual growth of each member.  Spiritual growth is not just a personal responsibility, but it is also a corporate responsibility.  The Church should help Christians become people who are able to remain faithful amidst family conflict, persecution, and the threat of death.  Is your church family producing such people?

Being a follower of Jesus is tough.  Jesus was always very straight forward about this fact.  He never tried to candy coat the reality what it meant to follow Him.   It remains the same today, though because of our blessed situation in the United States we have forgotten this reality.  It is tough to follow Jesus, and that is true in United States as it was in the Roman Empire during the first century.  To be a Christian doesn’t mean that we believe certain things about Jesus, but that we trust Him enough that we would die for Him.  The question we need to answer is: How can we become people who will die for Jesus?

Breaking Free

The writer of Hebrews implores us to strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up (NLT), which implies that there are weights that slow us down that are not sins. For me one of those weights is depression. It was only last November that I began to admit to myself the extent depression effected my life. Now I realize that depression has held me back ever since college, and possibly even before that.

I admit this for two reasons. The first reason is because the last wave of depression that I experienced, which I am still coming out of, robbed me of my desire to write. I would set down to write a post because I didn’t want to neglect my blog, but I couldn’t generate anything. I was in a deep funk, and even contemplated deleting Paul’s Ponderings, but I realized that I actually had a pretty good thing going here and so I didn’t act on my impulse. Though that is why I decided to change look, I thought a new template would give Paul’s Ponderings a new feel.

The second reason, and the most important reason, is because I wanted to remind us that spiritual transformation is often messy work. Some times we think it would be nice if God would honor our faith by zapping us full of peace, joy, gentleness, self-control, love, etc., because change at that level is very difficult, and it is a slow process. What I am saying is that we shouldn’t be surprised to discover that we have to deal with issues like depression, addictions, anger, and fear for they are a reality in our lives. On the other had we should not just allow them to exist in our lives, and as the author of Hebrews said, we need to make the effort to strip ourselves of these things.

In my struggle with depression the book that has proved to invaluable to me is Dallas Willard’s Renovation of the Heart which emphasizes the healing of the whole person: heart, mind, body, and soul. I would recommend it to anyone who is really serious about spiritual transformation. Willard writes; “Spiritual formation in Christ is an orderly process. Although God can triumph in disorder, that is not his choice. And instead of focusing upon what God can do, we must humble ourselves to accept the ways he has chosen to work with us. These are clearly laid out in the Bible, and especially in the words and person of Jesus” (p.10). God can do many things in order to heal us and make us whole again, but it is through the process of sanctification laid out in the Bible that is truly able to change our lives.

Part of this process is prayer. I find it interesting that having been a Christian my whole life, it is just now (after 4 years of Bible College, a semester of Seminary, and 13 years of ministry) that I am discovering prayer. I guess this points to how hard headed (maybe hardhearted) I am. The big deal for me is not allow my feelings to get the best of me so I can be disciplined in my prayer time. When it comes to my time of prayer and I don’t feel like praying I start by reciting the Lord’s Prayer and that usually helps lead into a greater time of prayer, and what I have discovered is that I need those extended times of prayer to stay connected to God and hold the depression on bay.

There are other activities that I have found useful in breaking free from depression such as having a daily To Do list, daily Scripture reading, and taking advantage of the opportunities that God places before me. I won’t bore you with the details, but rather I want to leave you with this: Depression, addiction, or any other life problem doesn’t disqualify you from God’s Kingdom, but they do mean we have to be intentional in the way we live. That lesson gave me the motivation to face my depression and then turn to follow Jesus.

Hey There

To all my loyal readers. It has been 3 weeks since I have posted here at Paul's Ponderings, which is hard to believe, but I have not given up blogging. There has been an issue in my life that I had to work through that has kept me from blogging, but now I am ready to get back to writing. Tomorrow I will catch you up to speed with what has been happening in my life, so sorry about the wait, and I hope that you will remain a loyal reader.

Discover the Good in Trouble

We would like life to be comfortable and easy, and yet we all know that life is anything but easy.  Life is difficult and full of unexpected problems.  We can react to these problems in one of two ways.  We can see them as thorn in our sides or we can see them as a way God grows us into the people He wants us to be.  Erwin McManus wrote Seizing Your Divine Moment; "It becomes more than obvious the longer you walk with God that His teaching environment for us really is life. And allowing us to fail is not a punishment from God, but a part of God's process for shaping who we are." 

Spiritual growth is not easy. It requires more than reading books, singing songs, listening to sermons, and giving a few dollars. For spiritual growth to happen we have to follow Jesus, and we do that by applying God's Word to our lives.

Since this is the path of spiritual growth Satan, our great enemy, will throw many different obstacles along the way in hopes of tripping us up. He throws out fear, and we hold ourselves back from going into the unknown with Jesus. Satan sits the trap of temptation and we miss out of the experiences God has planned for us as we pursue the pleasures of sin. He digs the hole of guilt and we fall in overwhelmed with the evil we have committed and forgetting to rely on God's grace and forgiveness.

The good news is that God even uses Satan's obstacles as opportunities to make us better people. Just as Joseph told his brothers; As far as I am concerned, God turned into good what you meant for evil‚ (Genesis 50:20; NLT), we can recognize the good that can come out of our failures. God is so powerful that He can even turn evil into good!

If we are going to become product citizens of God's Kingdom it is going to require us to apply what we have heard. God's Word does us no good if all we are doing is listening to what it says. Ultimately we have to start living it out in our lives. What many of us Christians need is not another book to read or class to attend, but to do the good we already know we are to do. Spiritual maturity is the process that happens as we begin to live by faith, regardless of the consequences.

Dear brothers and sisters, whenever trouble comes your way, let it be an opportunity for joy. For when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be strong in character and ready for anything. ~ James 1:2-4; NLT

James says that we should approach trials with joy, because we know God can use them to produce in us a stronger Christian character. Because God loves us He will not waste our painful experiences, our failures, or our troubles. He will use them to make us stronger, and in many cases, He will use them for the benefit of others.

When trials, troubles, and failures come our way shouldn't get discouraged and wonder where God is. Rather we should respond with trust knowing that through even the most horrible of circumstances God can bring about His will and create us to be a little more like Jesus.

To Be Different

One of the expectations God has for His people is that we live differently than the rest of the world.  There are areas in life where I find this quiet easy to do, but there are other areas when it is a huge struggle.  I want to be different, but the way of the world seems to be the better way to go.

When we don’t live differently from the world, not only are we saying that we don’t trust God to provide for our lives, but we also hide the light God has placed in our lives.  It is through the process of being different and stand apart from the world that we become lights in the darkness.  For this reason the apostle Paul wrote:

Don’t participate in the things these people do.  For though your hearts were once full of darkness, now you are full of light from the Lord, and your behavior should show it!  For this light within you produces only what is good and right and true (Ephesians 5:7-9; NLT).

Since it is essential for the followers of Christ Jesus to be different there is a question we need to ask ourselves: How do we prevent ourselves from being influenced by this culture in which we live?  I believe the writer of Hebrews has provided us with some answers to these questions:

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily hinders our progress.  And let us run with endurance the race that God has set before us.  We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, on whom our faith depends from start to finish.  He was willing to die a shameful death on the cross because of the joy he knew would be his afterward.  Now he is seated in the place of highest honor beside God’s throne in heaven (Hebrews 12:1-2; NLT).

In these two verses we find four actions we must do if we are going to live differently from the world.

First we must remember the people of faith who have gone before us. Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith...

Hebrews 11 is filled with the examples of faith.  Men and women who trusted God through the ups and downs of life.  The writer of Hebrews then tells us: be encouraged by these people.  The examples of Abraham, Moses, Ruth, David, Esther, Daniel, and Peter should give us encouragement as we attempt to live faithful lives in our culture.  Remember there is a reason God preserved the examples of these men and women on the pages of Scripture so lets learn from them.

It is also important to remember that through the past two thousand years more and more people have been added to this huge crowd of witnesses.  People like Martin Lurther, John Calvin, Alexander Campbell, Jim Elliot, C. S. Lewis, Lillian Trasher, Rachel Scott, and Si Steele (my grandfather).  In other words we are still surrounded by witnesses, both living and dead, of the life of faith.  We can gain encouragement and wisdom by turning to their examples faith.

The second action we need to do is remove the hindrances; let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily hinders our progress.

Change is difficult.  One reason it is difficult is because it means admitting that our way is wrong.  If we were already living faithful and righteous lives then change wouldn’t need to happen.  A second reason why change is hard is because sin tends to be habit forming.  Therefore, our bodies have developed the habit of not trusting God, and like any other habit it is hard to break.

Keeping those things in mind we still need to face the reality that there are areas in our lives that need to be changed.  We all have junk in our our lives which will need to dealt with.  Part of the problem is that each one of us have a different set of junk that needs to be dealt with, and therefore there are no easy answers in the process of life change.  Yet whatever our sins and issues maybe they are all hindering us from become the people God created us to be.  That is why it is so essential that we deal with them, even if that means going to a professional for help.

The universal weight that is hindering us is sin.  Yes, the weight of sin will different for us, but each of us has sin in our lives.  We need to attack it, struggle with it, confess it to God, and continually turn our hearts back to God (that is what repentance is).  We cannot go with God and allow sin to remain in our live unchecked.  If we are not struggling to rid our lives of sin then we are not living a life of faith.

The third action we must do is run the race; And let us run with endurance the race that God has set before us.

I like what Erwin McManus wrote in Seizing Your Divine Moment:

“God has created you to do something.  It is not enough to stop the wrong and then be paralyzed when it comes to the right.  God created you to do good.  And doing this requires initiative.  There is a subtle danger of hiding apathy behind piety.  Getting rid of the sin in your life?  Great.  Now it’s time to do something” (p. 35).

God has created us to do good.  That means we are to bring love and truth into the lives of other people.  I like to say that we have been blessed so that we can be a blessing.  Running the race that God has given to us is about doing the good works that God has planned for us when He created us (Ephesians 2:10).  When we use the blessings (talents, resources, and relationships) God has given us to bring good into this world then we are running the race of faith.

The final action is to remember Jesus; We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, on whom our faith depends from start to finish.
First, we need to remember who Jesus is and what His life means for us.  Jesus is the Messiah and the Son of God.  His sinless life allowed Him to become the perfect sacrifice for our sins, His brutal death was the price that redeemed us from our sins, and His resurrection not only confirms the reality of our forgiven sins, but it also becomes the promise of new life for you and me.

Second, we need to follow the example of Jesus.  The way Jesus lived, loved, and worshipped God are the examples for us in how we are to live our lives.  Jesus’ life and teachings provide us with the best interpretation of the Law, God’s expectation for how His people are to live, and so it is only by following the example of Jesus that we can live up to that example.

We can only keep our eyes on Jesus and reflect on his life by learning about his life.  I think one of the reasons we fall is because we have created an image of Jesus that appeals to us rather than discovering who Jesus really is.  So if we are truly going to understand Jesus then we need to spend time in God’s Word, especially in the Gospels, so we can have a better understanding and appreciation of who Jesus is and what He did for us.

Followers of Jesus Christ need to be different from the rest of the world.  This doesn’t mean that we seek ways to be strange and to stand out from the crowd, but it does mean that we are intentionally following Jesus rather than allowing ourselves to be pushed along by the trends and fades of this world.  Let’s face it, the easy way to live is to participate in the activities of this world and to go along with our culture, so we must fight the hard fight to be different.  This fight begins, not by making a list of resolutions or trying to summon up the strength to tackle the sinful habits and the dark passions of our hearts, but by falling on our knees and crying out to God for love, forgiveness, and His Holy Spirit.  In other words, this is not about our strength, but it is about relying on God for His strength, and that is what will make us different from the rest of the world.

Living With Fear

In his book Uprising Erwin McManus wrote:

How often have we surrendered our freedoms under the weight of our fears?  This is one of the main reasons we abdicate living for existing.  As mundane and routine as it is, existing does provide for us a level of certainty, predictability, and safety.  Freedom is wild and wide-open.  It is filled with uncharted territory and unmapped terrain.

I have discovered that in my quest to live the life that God created me to live the chain that holds me back the most is the chain of fear. I have a fear of rejection, a fear of failure, and a fear looking stupid.  These fears keep me from pursuing the life God has called me to live as I opt for the life I can arrange because it feels safer.

If we are truly going to live life then we have to trust God and face the fears that haunt our lives.  I believe that true life is found on the other side of our fears.  That would make fear a tool that Satan uses to keep us away from the life God has for us.  Jesus said this about life; The thief’s purpose is to steal and kill and destroy.  My purpose is to give life in all its fullness (John 10:10; NLT).  Jesus promises His followers a full life, but before He makes that promise He reminds us that Satan’s plan is to take away our life.  So I ask you; What better way to take away your life than to cause you to fear the very path which will bring us to life?

Here is the problem we have to deal with in our hearts: How do we face our fears?  I wish I had an answer to this, but I don’t have one.  This is a question I constantly struggle with myself.  I know that God has a life waiting for me on the other side of my fears, I know that God provides what I need to get me through my fears, but I feel paralyzed in my fear.  I want so desperately to live a life of courage and to be bold, but I keep hiding in the shadows.

With that being said let me offer a couple of suggestions I have thought about in connection to facing the fears that plague our lives.  First, we need to have companions.  Solomon wrote: Two people can accomplish more than twice as one; they get a better return for their labor.  If one person falls, the other can reach out and help.  But people who are alone when they fall are in real trouble (Ecclesiastes 4:9-10; NLT).  Part of fear, at least in my experience, is the feeling of loneliness.  In a fellowship we are able to encourage each other and to walk side by side into the uncertainty of fear.  Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego were able to stand tall when everyone else bowed because they had each other.  Peter and John were able to stand before the Sanhedrin because they were together.  It is not enough to have a pep talk before being sent on our way, but we also need companions willing to travel the journey of fear with us.

The second idea is that we need to take it one step at a time.  In the movie version of The Return of the King there is a scene when Frodo and Sam look over the final leg of their journey to Mount Doom and see that there are 10,000 Orcs which stand between them and their destination.  Sam says to Frodo; “We have to go in there Mister Frodo, but let’s make it down this hill for starters” (my paraphrase).  Rather than focusing on the entire task of making it through the army of Orcs Sam decides to take it just one step at a time.  In the end the Orcs are called off to battle Aragorn and the army of men which had marched to the Black Gate, so in the end the journey through Mordor turned was not as bad as first thought.  I think the same can be said about our fears.  If we take it one step at a time we will discover that the situation isn’t as scary as we first thought.

We have to face the fears that darken our hearts and rob us of life.  The more we ignore our fears the bigger they grow inside of us.  Only as we move to confront them do we discover that these fears diminish in size.  It is also through the experience of facing our fears that we learn to trust God.  The more we trust God the easier it become to move forward in obedience in the future.

The quest for life goes through the valley of our fears.  To discover the full life God has created for us to live, we need to take steps to conquer these fears one step at a time .  Only then can we really enjoy living life.

Sunday Quote: The Purpose of the Bible

"The Bible is there to enable God's people to be equipped to do God's work in God's world, not to give them an excuse to sit back smugly, knowing they possess all God's truth." ~ N. T. Wright, Simply Christian, p. 184