The IF

 The IF.

 

From what I have observed there is a great lack of understanding or just plain misunderstanding of this simple 2 letter word, if, when it comes to God and His working in our lives. When it comes to if it is very much a powerful word that we must properly understand so that we can receive all that God has for us as His people.  

The first thing we must understand about if is that the if is never on God’s part.  He has already done His part. His will is clear and established and in Jesus it is finished.  The believer’s mindset and prayers should never be “if God…..” because there is no “if God”.  To pray “God if it is Your will” prayers is to declare ignorance of God’s Word or unbelief in what God’s Word says.  The good news is that we don’t have to stay in ignorance or unbelief.  We can dig into His Word and be changed. Before praying a what if prayer would it not be more effective to search God’s Word, find out what His will is on the matter and just come into alignment with it?  Look at 1 John 5:14-15 “Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. 15 And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him.”  Why on earth would we waste our time and breath praying anything that we didn’t know was His will when we have a guarantee of that anything we ask according to His will He will hear and we will have?

The other problem I have noticed is the lack of understanding that certain things of God are conditioned on the if of our action or response.  Some examples:

 

2 Chronicles 7:14 if My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.

Matthew 16:24 Then Jesus said to His disciples, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me.

Matthew 17:20 So Jesus said to them, “Because of your unbelief; for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you.

Matthew 18:19 “Again I say to you that if two of you agree on earth concerning anything that they ask, it will be done for them by My Father in heaven.

John 10:9 I am the door. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture.

John 15:14 You are My friends if you do whatever I command you.

Romans 10:9 that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.

 

As we see from these few examples the if it never if God will do something it is if we will do something.  God has done His part He is just waiting on if we simply believe Him and walk in it. 

How about we take the if He out and put in we do?  What would happen if we would be a people who does what His will instead of simply sitting around inactive wondering If God is when the truth is He is waiting on us to humble ourselves, pray, deny ourselves, have living growing faith, agreement, do what He commands, confess Jesus and enter by Him?

 

 

 

An Honest Confession

 An Honest Confession

 

Philippians 1:6 being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ;

 

I have a confession to share with you.  Many times, in my life, and something that I still battle from time to time, I have taken the mindset that I could make happen in my life what only God could accomplish.  God would put something into my heart and I would accept it, get excited about it and start to run with it but at some point, I would get this attitude of “OK God, I got it from here” and then try to accomplish it by my strength. Guess how that turned out EVERY SINGLE TIME? 

Yes, every single time there was failure.  How could it end any differently?  Me and my abilities doesn’t equal God and His abilities, EVER!  Honestly it is the height of arrogance, and ignorance, that I ever thought that I could complete something that I couldn’t even start.  It was God who started it, He was the One who put those things in me to do.  Right now, as I write this, I still marvel at my ignorance in thinking that I could complete something that I didn’t even have the ability to conceive let alone start in me to start with.  

To help keep myself on track I remember Philippians 1:6 and Also Hebrews 13:20-21 and Philippians 2:13

 

Hebrews 13:20-21 Now may the God of peace who brought up our Lord Jesus from the dead, that great Shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, 21 make you complete in every good work to do His will, working in you what is well pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.

 

Philippians 2:13 for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure.

 

He is the one who makes me complete in every good work and through this I get to be a part of His will and live in His good pleasure. Objectively all I bring to the table is a bunch of weakness for His strength to be made perfect in. 

 

2 Corinthians 12:9 And He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore, most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.

 

As I live in Matthew 11:29-30 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. 30 For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.” I allow Him to do the work in, through and out of me.  He is the One carrying the load.  I am just walking next to Him and get to take part simply by being in relationship with Him.  I reap what He gets.  Really the only time the walk seems hard is when I am not walking in step with Him and I put a binding on the yoke.  This is especially true when I try and step out ahead and try and take the burden on my shoulders to move it along. 

I hope that this confession of mine will help one of you today.  

 

Blessings.

 

 

The Arrogance of the Sin Hierarchy

 The Arrogance of the Sin Hierarchy 

 

In my Christian journey I have seen, and been guilty at times, of putting people’s sins in to a hierarchy.  In this hierarchy we classify sins from minor to major based upon our judgements of what is minor or major.  From this we place value upon people, their lives, and testimonies 

If God doesn’t use a hierarchy, why do we?

 

Romans 5:12 Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned—

 

We tend to forget that the sin that Adam committed was disobedience in eating fruit from a tree God said not to.  It wasn’t murder, sexual, addiction related, lying, cheating, blasphemy.  He ate some fruit, that’s it. From that one act sin and death and all its offspring of sickness, illness, poverty, and every evil vile thing.  

Jesus’s death, burial and resurrection was to pay the price for the root of sin and hence all sin.  If there had been no other sin committed by humanity but this one sin by Adam the sacrifice of Jesus would have still been required.  My sin, your sin no other person’s sin required anymore nor any less the suffering, blood, death and resurrection of Jesus.  

For many years I miss understood Luke 7:47 “Therefore I say to you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much. But to whom little is forgiven, the same loves little.’”  I used to think this verse meant that those who sinned more or worse sins then someone who hadn’t sinned as much would love Jesus more.  That is not what the verse says though.  It says those “whom little is forgiven” “the same loves little” it doesn’t say “whom has sin little” “the same loves little”.  Remember the context of from which this verse comes from. Jesus was at a pharisees house.  This pharisee thought he was better than the woman who came and anointed Jesus’s feet and so Jesus askes him a question about debtors who both have their debts forgiven.  One debtor owed 10 times as much as the other.  Jesus asks who would love more of the two debtors.  The pharisee answers the one who owed more.  Jesus said that he answered correctly.  Now this would seem to contradict what I have previously said but Jesus’s point was to deal with the pharisee’s prideful attitude because he judged himself better than the woman and yet he had not showed the basic hospitality, respect and love for Jesus that the “sinner” woman had. She knew that she needed forgiveness, while the pharisee had let his own self-righteous attitude blind him to his need for the very same forgiveness. 

None of us are better or worse than anyone else.  All of our sin put Jesus on the cross.  Therefore, everyone’s salvation testimony is important and powerful BECAUSE it is NOT the multitude, or severity of our sin that is important.  NO!  What is IMPORTANT is the power of JESUS sacrifice that PAID FOR ALL OUR SINS and freed us from death.  

Simply put what He did matters more than what we did. We all should love much because we all have been forgiven much. Your sin, my sin, their sin was all leading all of us to the same hell. Don’t let self-righteousness rob you of loving much, to be able to love much means you were loved much.

 

Romans 6:23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. 

2 Verses

 In my unpacking of all the Lord showed, gave and taught me during my trip I keep coming back to these 2 verses.

 

Matthew 6:33But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.

John 15:5 “I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing.

 

For if I do anything else apart from what these verses instruct me to do I get out into my strength, my wisdom and my ability of provision which is not the place for me to be.  During this trip I saw and heard both the wonderful and the horrible.  I encountered things that from a natural perspective would make me run away and hide because there is no way I could add anything positive to keep what I experience going or to change the situation from the bad to the good.  

If I see myself as anything more or less than a conduit, a branch, that He can move through and produce fruit through not only am I in trouble but those I come in contact with are in trouble. The reason being that if I think I am the source then I put myself in the role of God obviously that leads to trouble.  If I think of myself less than I will do nothing block what God wants to do through me to touch others.  

If I seek anything else but the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, I wind up trying to add everything else myself.  If I don’t abide in Him and He in me I am that branch that is cut off and I wither and die.  Truly without Him I can do nothing but die but in Him I can do all things. 

That dirty “C” word.

 That dirty “C” word.

Yes everyone I feel led to talk about that “C” word that is so offensive to so many. CORRECTION!

Why do we dread not only receiving correction but giving correction when it is needed? If someone piloting a plane or a ship used applied our attitudes to receiving and giving correction there isn’t a plane or ship would ever make it to the intended destination. Being off just a fraction of a degree can mean missing the destination by miles.

Proverbs 3:12

For whom the LORD loves He corrects,

Just as a father the son in whom he delights.

Proverbs 12:1

Whoever loves instruction loves knowledge,

But he who hates correction is stupid.

Proverbs 13:18

Poverty and shame will come to him who disdains correction,

But he who regards a rebuke will be honored.

Proverbs 15:5

A fool despises his father’s instruction,

But he who receives correction is prudent.

Proverbs 15:10

Harsh discipline is for him who forsakes the way,

And he who hates correction will die.

We see from these verses in scripture the importance and blessings for those who receive correction. To receive correction means that we accept it with a willing and open heart. With an attitude of applying the correction to our life so that the proper change can happens and we can make it to God’s intended destination for us.

Of course one of the problems I have had in the past is that the Lord’s correction often comes through people. My problem with that was my pride and some bad experiences from people who gave abuse and called it correction.

The root of pride is fear and the way to overcome pride and fear is to submit to God and humble ourselves.

Abuse isn’t always physical or intended. There have been good Godly people who tried to bring needed correction into my life but for one reason or another they only accomplished hurting and confusing me. These times the enemy used to make it harder for me to accept correction as well as to be used by God to bring correction.

Matthew 18:15

“Moreover if your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he hears you, you have gained your brother.

When giving correction Matt. 18 starting in verse 15 is an excellent resource. The heart of these verses is to bring correction out of the Love of the Father and for wholeness to be accomplished. I once had someone who was over me in the denomination I was in try to correct me concerning difficulties I was having in the church I was pastoring. I really did need to be corrected but what I left with was a feeling of being blasted. Not because he yelled at me, I don’t even remember if he raised his voice at all. The problem was that he only pointed out that I needed to make corrections but not HOW to make them. It was like telling someone who never used a hammer and nails in his life to go fix the fence they had damaged. While the person may or may not have known that they damaged the fence and needed to repair it just telling them to repair it with instructing them how is foolish. It definitely isn’t really correcting them.

Matthew 5:23-24

Therefore if you bring your gift to the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you,24 leave your gift there before the altar, and go your way. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.

While it is very important to be willing to lovingly and correctly give correction when needed it is also very important to seek out and receive correction when needed.

After I got over my pride and healed from my hurts I learned how to receive correction and to actually seek it out. I have learned that correction is needed in my life and that one of the primary ways this comes is through others. I have found that if I approach those who the correction is coming from with the love of Jesus I am able to receive it with joy. Having learned that correction helps me get to the destination of God’s best also helps. That also helps me in situations like I described before. Now instead of walking away confused and hurt like I have been blasted I ask questions. I also have to explain sometimes that I don’t know how to fix the fence because I have never even used a hammer and nails or even where to get them. This then helps the other person understand that they need to give me more detailed instructions.

Real correction always helps and is always a blessing.