We have turned away

‘My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water. Jer. 2:13 NIVUK http://bible.com/113/jer.2.13.NIVUK

Humility

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, Phil. 2:3 NIVUK http://bible.com/113/php.2.3.NIVUK

Unity and humility

A Christ-like attitude is the key to this unity. Any disunity in the church would have detracted from Paul’s ‘joy’ (2:2). Disunity so often comes from ‘selfish ambition and vain conceit’ (v.3a). The key is to consider others better than yourself (v.3b), to look not only to your own interests, ‘but also to the interests of others’ (v.4). ‘Don’t push your way to the front; don’t sweet-talk your way to the top. Put yourself aside, and help others get ahead. Don’t be obsessed with getting your own advantage. Forget yourselves long enough to lend a helping hand’ (vv.3–4, MSG). In other words, you are to have the same attitude as Jesus, who let go of his natural, legal and social status, and made himself ‘nothing’. He took ‘the very nature of a servant… he humbled himself’ and ‘became obedient to death – even death on a cross!’ (vv.7–8). He took the path of downward mobility, humble service and unselfish love. If you are ever anxious about your relative status, remember that Jesus made himself lower than we could ever imagine.

Give God the glory

John Wimber because of a talk he had given or a healing that had happened through his ministry, he used to say, ‘I’ll take the encouragement, but I’ll pass the glory on.’ The psalmist gives us a great example of passing the glory on – bouncing it back up to God. He starts: ‘Not to us, O Lord, not to us but to your name be the glory, because of your love and faithfulness’ (v.1).

Your life

Dietrich Bonhoeffer put it, ‘Your life as a Christian should make non-believers question their disbelief in God.’

Be filled with the Holy Spirit

Being filled with the Spirit leads to singing ‘psalms, hymns and spiritual songs’ (v.19) instead of ‘drinking songs!’ (v.19, MSG). It leads us to worship the Lord Jesus in our hearts and to give thanks to God – the very opposite of grumbling and complaining. It is characteristic of the Spirit-filled community to be grateful to God for all things, in all places and at all times.

God waits

All day long I have held out my hands to an obstinate people, who walk in ways not good, pursuing their own imaginations –
Isaiah 65:2 NIVUK
http://bible.com/113/isa.65.2.NIVUK

Vision of the church

Paul’s vision of a holy church is a community that rids itself of all bitterness, anger and slander, and that welcomes those who are ex-offenders, those struggling with lifestyle issues, those who are divorced, those who have messed up. It is a community of people in need of forgiveness and a place where forgiveness flows freely because forgiven people forgive.

Grace

Grace ‘Make a clean break with all cutting, backbiting, profane talk. Be gentle with one another, sensitive. Forgive one another as quickly and thoroughly as God in Christ forgave you’ (vv.31–32, MSG).

Encouragement

Encouragement is like verbal sunshine. It costs nothing. But it warms hearts and even changes lives.

Anger

‘Go ahead and be angry. You do well to be angry – but don’t use your anger as fuel for revenge. And don’t stay angry. Don’t go to bed angry. Don’t give the Devil that kind of foothold in your life’ (vv.26–27, MSG). Although anger is not intrinsically sinful, it often leads to sin. In anger, the devil sometimes finds a foothold in our lives that easily becomes an addiction. Anger is an emotion that we need to handle with care. On the other hand there is a positive side to anger. It can be a God-given emotion. God expresses anger (5:6), but of course he does so under control. Jesus’ anger was a righteous anger towards sin. It was Wilberforce’s passionate hatred of slavery that eventually led to the abolition of the slave trade.

Fear of the Lord

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom; all who follow his precepts have good understanding. To him belongs eternal praise.
Psalm 111:10 NIVUK
http://bible.com/113/psa.111.10.NIVUK

Old and. New Testaments

Reading the Old Testament is like going into a dark room full of furniture. We get a sense of what is inside the room by feeling the sofas, chairs and pictures. But, as we read the New Testament, it is as if a light is switched on and we see the room clearly. Jesus places the Old Testament in new light. To paraphrase St Augustine, ‘In the Old the New is concealed, in the New the Old is revealed.'

Repentance

the child’s definition of repentance: ‘being sorry enough to stop’. Repentance also involves turning to God: ‘Let them turn to the Lord, and he will have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will freely pardon’ (v.7b). No matter how far you have fallen, God will forgive you. He is ‘lavish with forgiveness’ (v.7, MSG).

Sealed with the Spirit

In-dwelt by the Holy Spirit ‘Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit’ (v.13). The Holy Spirit has come to live within you. In the ancient world when a package was dispatched a seal was placed on it to indicate where it had come from and to whom it belonged. You have been sealed with the Holy Spirit.

Redeemed

‘Redeemed’ was the word used for the buying back of a slave – a captive set free for a price.

Grace

Grace is love that cares and stoops and rescues. You have peace with God.

Burdens

You are responsible for your own life: ‘Each one should test his own actions… for each one should carry his own load’ (vv.4–5). We also have a responsibility for other members of the team: ‘Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfil the law of Christ’ (v.2). Paul assumes we all have burdens. The word used means ‘heavy burdens’. It is a wide-ranging term that includes suffering, illnesses, physical disabilities, sorrows, grief, worries, responsibilities (financial and other), temptations, errors, doubts, weaknesses and failures (moral and other). In other words, it includes any and every load that is hard to bear.

Be enthusiastic

St Paul wrote something similar: ‘Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervour’ (Romans 12:11). We should be as enthusiastic as the day we first encountered Jesus. As Bear Grylls says, ‘Be the most enthusiastic person you know. Enthusiasm sustains you when times are tough, encourages those around you and is totally infectious.’

Never give up

Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never – in nothing, great or small, large or petty – never give in, except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.’ In today’s generation, our lives have become so instantaneous that anything requiring patient perseverance can appear unattractive. We require instant returns and instant results. But sometimes the biggest pay-offs are a long time coming.

True freedom

That is true freedom – not the absence of morality, but the freedom to serve others in love: to love your neighbour as yourself (v.14). If we continue responding to conflict as the world does, ‘biting and devouring each other’, we will destroy each other (v.15).

Faith through love

For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.
Galatians 5:6 NIVUK
http://bible.com/113/gal.5.6.NIVUK

Life of faith

The Christian life is a life of faith. We do not work for our salvation; we wait for it (v.5). Meanwhile, ‘The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love’ (v.6b).

Focus on the source

Oswald Chambers writes, ‘The river of the Spirit of God overcomes all obstacles. Never focus your eyes on the obstacle or the difficulty. The obstacle will be a matter of total indifference to the river that will flow steadily through you if you will simply remember to stay focussed on the Source.’

Saved

On one occasion he was approached by a zealous undergraduate who asked him, ‘Are you saved?’ ‘Ah,’ said the Bishop, ‘a very good question. But tell me: do you mean…?’ And then he mentioned three passive participles of the Greek verb ‘to save’, indicating that his answer would depend on which of the three the student had in mind (the English translation is given here in italics). ‘I know I have been saved,’ he said; ‘I believe I am being saved; and I hope by the grace of God that I shall be saved.’
Bishop B.F. Westcott, was Regius Professor of Divinity at Cambridge University.

Depend on the grace of God in weakness

The people of God depend on the grace of God. Mother Teresa wrote, ‘I don’t think there is anyone who needs God’s help and grace as much as I do. Sometimes I feel so helpless and weak. I think that is why God uses me. Because I cannot depend on my own strength, I rely on Him twenty-four hours a day. If the day had even more hours, then I would need His help and grace during those as well.’

Paul expresses this dependence when he writes about the thorn in his flesh. Three times he pleaded with the Lord to take it away. But God said to him, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness’ (2 Corinthians 12:9). His grace is not only amazing; it is ‘sufficient’. It is enough.

In the World, but not of it

The second-century Letter to Diognetus described the Christian’s lifestyle in the following way: ‘They live in their own countries, but only as aliens. They have a share in everything as citizens, and endure everything as foreigners. Every foreign land is their fatherland, and yet for them every fatherland is a foreign land… It is true that they are “in the flesh”, but they do not live “according to the flesh”. ‘They busy themselves on earth, but their citizenship is in heaven. They obey the established laws, but in their own lives they go far beyond what the laws require… They are poor, and yet they make many rich… Christians dwell in the world, but are not of the world.’

Perfect peace

as we read the Bible, it is clear that this promise of ‘perfect peace’ is not dependent on circumstances. God’s peace comes to you even in the dark places – in the midst of your most difficult struggles and challenges.

Bear Grylls

He writes, ‘Faith in Christ has been the great empowering presence in my life, helping me walk strong when so often I feel so weak.’ In the midst of extraordinary challenges, Christ is the empowering presence who brings us peace.

Do not brag

For it is not the one who commends himself who is approved, but the one whom the Lord commends.
2 Corinthians 10:18 NIVUK
http://bible.com/113/2co.10.18.NIVUK

Life is a battleground

great Welsh preacher, Dr Martin Lloyd Jones, once said, ‘There is no grosser or greater misrepresentation of the Christian message than that which depicts it as offering a life of ease with no battle and struggle at all... sooner or later every believer discovers that the Christian life is a battleground, not a playground.’

Giving

What you give to the Lord he multiplies – your time, gifts, ambitions and money. Giving should be fun Giving should never be forced or grudging, but rather voluntary and cheerful ‘for God loves a cheerful giver’ (v.7). The Greek word for cheerful is hilaros. We always quip at HTB that our giving should be hilarious! It should be fun to give. Giving takes away the burden of financial worry Paul writes, ‘and God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work’ (v.8). Giving does not mean handing over financial responsibility to God – but it does mean handing over the worry and the burden of it. Giving ‘enriches’ you When God invites you to give, he is pleading not just to your emotions but also to your reason: ‘Thus you will be enriched in all things and in every way so that you can be generous’ (v.11, AMP). Materially, you will have enough to give away generously (v.11). Your characters will be enriched (v.10). God will be praised (v.11). Giving transforms your character Paul speaks of ‘the harvest of your righteousness’ (v.10b). Giving purges the character from the constricting grip of materialism that destroys lives. Giving inspires others ‘Your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God. Because of the service of which you approved yourselves, people will praise God’ (vv.11b–13a). Giving meets people’s needs Generous giving blesses other people and supplies the needs of God’s people – ‘helping meet the bare needs of poor Christians’ (v.12, MSG). Giving is evidence of real faith Generous giving is an act of obedience, which should accompany ‘your confession of the gospel of Christ’ (v.13). Giving is an act of trust – in doing it you are saying that it is God, not yourself or anyone else, who ultimately provides for your needs. Giving makes you a stakeholder in the church Paul speaks of ‘your generosity in sharing with them and with everyone else’ (v.13b). In the same way as when you share a flat or apartment you share in the bills, as you share in the needs of the community you reap the benefits of that community. For example, every time someone comes to know Christ through the community you share in the blessing. Giving is a response to God’s gift to you God so loved you that he gave his one and only Son so that you might have eternal life (John 3:16). Our giving is a response to God’s amazing grace. His ‘indescribable gift’ (2 Corinthians 9:15) is the gift of his Son. ‘Thank God for this gift, his gift. No language can praise it enough!’ (v.15, MSG).

Allow Jesus

The more you allow the rule of Jesus in your life, the more he directs your plans, decisions, conversations and thoughts – the wiser you will become and, instead of being ‘taken over by the fear’, the more you will experience his peace. Peace does not come from money, riches, success, promotion, clothes or diamonds. It comes from living under the rule of Jesus in justice and righteousness, following his example of rich generosity.

True riches

The way of true riches is ‘humility and the fear of the Lord’ (v.4a). This brings ‘riches and honour and life’ (v.4b, AMP). It may sometimes bring material wealth. But the New Testament tells us that it always brings something of far more lasting value – spiritual riches in Christ.

Purpose

Purpose in life is far more important than property or possessions. Having more to live with is no substitute for having more to live for. It has been said that ‘the two greatest days of your life are the day you were born and the day you find out why’.

The purpose and goal of your life should never revolve around material things. Rather, ‘Whoever pursues righteousness and love finds life, prosperity and honour’ (v.21). Make this the aim of your life – to pursue a right relationship with God and a right relationship with others.

Love should be your aim: ‘Sinners are always wanting what they don’t have; the God-loyal are always giving what they do have’ (v.26, MSG).

The irony is that those who pursue righteousness and love find what the hedonist is seeking: ‘life, prosperity and honour’ (v.21b). But these are by-products. They should not be your aim or purpose. Rather it should be God’s kingdom and his righteousness. Jesus promises ‘all these things will be given to you as well’ (Matthew 6:33).

Eternity

Secularisation has led to the world – and now even the church – forgetting about ‘eternity’. We focus on, and value, the things we can see and handle. ‘Eternity’ is a vital part of the message.

Meditation

If you know how to worry, you know how to meditate! All you need to do is change what you think about and you will be practising Christian meditation. ‘Meditation’ (v.34) means what we think about, what we allow our mind to dwell on. Our actions and our words are vital.

What is important

The media is dominated by money, possessions, houses, cars, food, physical beauty and outward success. The Bible is very different. It stresses the importance of the inward and unseen aspects of our character: the thoughts, beliefs and attitudes that determine our outward behaviour. ‘For what is seen is temporary but what is unseen is eternal’ (v.18).

Spirit brings freedom

The Spirit of the Lord brings radical freedom to our lives. Freedom from legalism, guilt, shame, condemnation, self-hatred and self-rejection. Freedom from the power of sin, selfishness, manipulation and control. Freedom from the fear of death and fear of what others think of us. Freedom from comparing ourselves with others. You are free to know, love and serve God. You are free to use your life and energy to love others. You are free to be yourself. You can approach God with boldness (2 Corinthians 3:12). You do not need to veil your face. As you look into the face of Jesus, he changes you into his likeness. The change is gradual, little by little, ‘from one degree of glory to another’ (v.18, AMP). When you spend time with another person you tend to become more like them. People gaze at celebrities and reproduce their mannerisms and their appearance. If you are captivated by Jesus, you will be transformed into his image. We see a thousand faces a day, images are everywhere, but the Spirit reveals the most important face of all to us. As you spend time in the presence of the Lord you become more and more like him. You are transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory.

Optimist

Sir Winston Churchill said, ‘The pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; the optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.’ By this definition Paul was definitely an optimist!

Anointed

Do you realise that right now you are ‘anointed’ by God? ‘Anointing’ is not just for special Christian leaders or speakers. It is for all of us. Do you know that this anointing gives you power over sin, temptation and evil? Do you know that this anointing gives you access to God in prayer and worship? Do you know that this anointing enables you to proclaim God’s message to other people? All of this is possible because God has given you the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit not only guarantees your future; he is the down payment in advance. ‘He anointed us, set his seal of ownership on us, and put his Spirit in our hearts as a deposit guaranteeing what is to come’ (2 Corinthians 1:21–22). When you exchange contracts on a house it is usually accompanied by a deposit, which not only guarantees what is to come but is also a part payment in advance. God ‘by his Spirit has stamped us with an eternal pledge – a sure beginning of what he is destined to complete’ (v.21, MSG). By giving you the Holy Spirit, God has already given you this deposit in advance of what one day you will receive in full.

When things go well

This is a warning. If things go well, do not become proud. Keep trusting and obeying God.

Written on our hearts

You show that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.
2 Corinthians 3:3 NIVUK
http://bible.com/113/2co.3.3.NIVUK

Covenant

Tim Keller defines a covenant as ‘the solemn, permanent, whole self-giving of two parties to each other. It is a stunning blend of both law and love… a relationship much more intimate and loving than a mere legal contract could create, yet one more enduring and binding than personal affection alone could make.’

The Bible as your Life

The only Bible some people will read is your life. Paul writes to the Corinthians, ‘Your very lives are a letter that anyone can read by just looking at you. Christ himself wrote it – not with ink, but with God's living Spirit; not chiselled into stone, but carved into human lives – and we publish it’ (3:1b–3, MSG).

Forgiveness

Forgiveness is absolutely vital in the Christian church. Lack of forgiveness is one of the ways that the devil can get in – it opens a door for his schemes. Forgiveness shuts him out: ‘In order that Satan might not outwit us. For we are not unaware of his schemes’ (v.11).

Church as home

We need to recapture this New Testament vision of church as a home. Of course, the early Christians did not have church buildings. They met in homes (v.19). Paul writes to the Corinthians, ‘If Timothy shows up, take good care of him. Make him feel completely at home among you’ (v.10, MSG). The church is the family of God. God is our father. Paul sees the whole church as a family. He talks about other Christians as his ‘brothers and sisters’ (v.15). The church is not an organisation you join; it is a family, where you belong.

Do what is right

To do what is right and just is more acceptable to the Lord than sacrifice.
Prov. 21:3 NIVUK
http://bible.com/113/pro.21.3.NIVUK