Monday, May 31, 2010

Christology

Philippians 2:1-11
"So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, 2 complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. 3Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. 4Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. 5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 9 Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, 10so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."

i want to look at verse 6-11 specifically because, as far as i know, these sum up the infinite person of Christ and His deity fairly well (haha, sum up infinity, but yeah, i said it).

first, Jesus is in the form of God meaning that He is God. then He became a man through the virgin birth. by becoming a man, he became the ultimate servant for the more power that you give up, the greater the servant you become. the creator served the creation, you can't lower yourself much more and yet Christ did. He submitted to the Father's will towards us, to serve us so that we may have life with Him. to serve us, He sacrificed Himself on the cross. since He did this, the Father has greatly exalted Him and made it so that He is the only way for us to get to the Father. He is the only one to save. only through Him do we have eternal life for He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. one day, every person and thing will confess that Jesus is Lord and this is all for the glory of the Father. so the Father glorified the Son, the Son glorifies the Father, the Son glorifies the Spirit and they all work together to show each other off. they are the epitome of love, for they love each person as much as themselves, serve each other, glorifying each other, and we, mankind, get to share in this in the fact that we were created for the glory of God. we were created so that the triune God could show Himself off through and to us. we are the example to the angels for how to act and worship. what a glorious thing. we are not robots or mindless zombies, but people who have wills that we are allowed to use to glorify God with.

we only have one life, are you going to use it the way the great triune God intended us to use it, for His glory and our satisfaction?

yes, God created us so that we would be most satisfied in this life when we are most saturated with Him. what a marvelous thing. our best life is the life that we are meant to live. the best thing that we can do is also the thing that we are supposed to do.

well, i can just keep going on this topic probably for eternity for God is infinite so i will end this here this time.

looming judgement

James 3:1 "Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness."

this verse has been in the back of my mind for awhile now and today, it is seriously looming over me. tomorrow i start my internship at the church and i have to finalize what passage i'm going to be teaching on this summer. just thinking through it all is seriously nerve racking. i feel very small, unlearned, and unqualified. "lucky" for me, i have an infinite God whom i can go do in prayer who will comfort and guide me as well as many older man around me who would love to help me if i asked. God is good to encourage we who are weak so that we can handle our small burdens of life for after He takes our burden of sin away, we have so little to worry about. all we must do is be faithful, which, in and of itself, is impossible for us, but through Christ, all things are possible.

Monday, May 24, 2010

here i stand, i can do no other

with the discussion of membership and apostasy, i would like to discuss offense and where we draw the line. i know i am young, but this is how i understand it and how i believe the bible stands on the topic and how i am going to live my life till proved otherwise.

the bible clearly says that the world will hate us, but not because of us (or at least it shouldn't be because of us, they should love us) but because of our message. we are to present our message the best we can so as to win men but men will still hate us unless God calls them. it is a very bad thing if the brethren has a problem with our message because they are to help us by way of accountability. so, what if a brother has a problem with our message? we are to sit down together and reason through scripture to either be reconciled or to agree that it is a minor doctrine and that there are 2 ways to understand it and that we are to both be fully convinced in our minds so that our conscience is clear.

where is the line though? where can we stop arguing and to live and differ in peace? the bible clearly draws lines as to where we can not fudge. the doctrine of Christ and of salvation and of the Trinity. i'm sure there are a few others but they escape me at the moment.

these things though are very much linked and important. they pertain to the kingdom of heaven:
- Christ: He is the Holy Son of God who is fully God and became fully man through the virgin birth. He then died on the cross and was buried and rose again on the third day. He was then taken up to heaven at the appointed time.
- salvation: when Christ died, He died for the sins of the world, taking all that sin upon Himself. He then defeated death by rising again, thus allowing us to rise again with Him in the last day.
- Trinity: Father, Son, and Holy Ghost: all separate and yet still one God. the Father is judge, the Son is the sacrifice and advocate for the elect, while the Spirit works salvation in the believer and works sanctification in him.

these things can not be altered

Saturday, May 22, 2010

personal holiness, but for who's sake?

i often find myself thinking about how i should be acting for my future congregation (if God gives me one) or future wife (again, if God gives me one :). i think about things like personal holiness, purity, knowing the bible, and things like these and how i need to have them in my life for their sakes, which is true, i should have them in my life for them, but truer still, i must have these sorts of things in my life for my sake and God's sake for i must desire a relationship with Him first BEFORE i can think of others.

when i say "before", so as to dispel some wrong notions, this "before" is not a measure of time but of importance. the first thing on a believer's mind should be God and how they (believer and God) are doing, and then second should be other people.

this comes back to the greatest commandment, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength" all commandments can be summed up in this one and the next one, "Love your neighbor as yourself" if you do these things perfectly, you fulfill the whole law. what a glorious thought! this shows that God had all male disciple (at least one thing) because God summed everything up into 2 things so that we could remember them :)

all things boil down to love so compare all that you do, if it is FIRST loving towards God and then loving towards ALL men, then you should do it.

(when i say "all men" i mean all but God does give some other laws about which men we are to follow at certain time, i.e. authority)

Monday, May 10, 2010

fill your mind with unseen things

of late, i have struggled upon the notion of having joy in life when there is so much sin, past and possible future, in my Mind that grieves me. How do you enjoy a person, God, when you know that you have and will continue to cause them pain?
i believe i have found a solution to beat the joy and the sin problem in my life and mind by way of a message given by SKH yesterday.
i must look at this in a logical progression.
first, how do we not sin? there is only one way that i see this could happen and that is if sin is removed from our minds. to have no sin in our thoughts would make it impossible for us to do, would it not? so then, the next question must be how do we remove sin from our mins? by replacing it with something else. so what can we put into our minds to replace the sin in our minds with something that is not sin? the only thing that is right and commanded to fill our minds (Mt. 22:34-40) is, in fact, God. He is the only one who can drive out sin and replace it with something better. but, what ho! Christ/God is also the thing that will bring us joy. by allowing Him to pervade our thoughts, we are filling our minds with what they were meant to be filled with. what a glorious and simple truth!
God created us so that He would be the greatest "thing" for us. this isn't arrogant but great, for He is infinite, eternal, and omnipotent. so He is always with us and we can't get away from Him. so to enjoy Him is good for He is always there to be enjoyed.

JUMP

i was thinking about it today, why don't we have more evangelist? the most common answer that most "christians" would give you if you were to ask them is, "well, i wasn't called to be an evangelist." how the devil do you know that? did God tell you? if you are hearing from God then you should be an evangelist.
no, i don't think it is a lack of calling. i think it is a lack of listening which is produced by a quantity of fear.
fear is a great motivator. if someone is afraid of me, i can make them do all sorts of things for me as long as i don't push them to far. now, replace me with the devil. he can make you not do many things (evangelize) by filling you with fear. he stops the kingdom of God from advancing because you are too afraid to do what you should be doing. the devil realizes that he has lost you but as long as he can make you not see the need to save everyone else, he doesn't lose any more. so he fills you with fear of people and gets you to focus only on yourself (i know God is sovereign, i am merely speaking on a human level here).
however, fear has an even worst cause and this should scare us more. fear is also the by-product of lack of faith, faith in God. we don't trust Him with many things, and if we don't trust Him with everything, then we have a fear of something. this fear produces sin, or possible could be or is sin on it's own.
i see this in myself as i think about witnessing to someone. i fear the unknown. i am scared of what might happen. this is how i know that other people are the same way, for there is nothign new under the sun.
so then, what are we to do? JUMP! and pray like crazy. watch as God does crazy good things through you as you trust in Him and do what He wants you to do.
He cares for the little birds and they are not made in His image as you are. so don't worry, be happy. trust God. Pray. He'll be faithful. stop sinning and ignoring the Spirit. do what is right. trust and obey. follow Christ. pick up your cross. leave father and mother and follow after Him.