June_30

SHARING BREAD

⁶⁷ “You do not want to leave too, do you?” Jesus asked the Twelve.

⁶⁸ Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. ⁶⁹ We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.”

John 6:67-69 (NIV)

Never does the God-Man appear more human and easier for our fleshly eyes to relate to than when He experiences the very human emotions of sorrow, rejection, suffering, pain, or on the flip side, even leaping joy.  Who cannot be stirred to remembrance of our own like emotions?  How easy it is for us to relate!  Who has not been privy to rejection, who has not suffered sorrow or who has not leaped with joy over victory?  Many of Jesus’ followers had just proven turncoat choosing rather to wallow in the mud than to be washed clean by the blood.  His penetrating question to His guys reeks with discouragement and sadness even though fully aware that the hearts of those who turned were never truly His. I am reminded of the words penned by the prophet Isaiah:

³ He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering.  Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.   Isaiah 53:3 (NIV)

All the fullness of the Godhead dwelling in bodily form, Jesus was sent from heaven with salvation for the souls of men sparkling in His eyes.  Our Lord was rejected by the very ones He came to save.  Ever aware of all men’s hearts, rejection nonetheless pierces our Savior like a sword – perhaps not so much due to the rejection of Him per se, as much as the rejection of what would have brought them life to the fullest and yet they could not be bothered.  The God of all hope longs to fill us with His joy and peace as we rely upon Him resulting in life to the fullest.  It was almost as if Jesus prodded for some encouraging words from His Twelve – no doubt aware of encouragement being as oxygen to the soul.  How often do we miss the glorious opportunity to breathe such life into another sojourner simply by an encouraging word?  A heartfelt exhortation reviving the downtrodden is more than ever needed in our day.  We most often find it easier to criticize and berate rather than give a genuine word of affirmation – shame on us!  Peter steps up to the plate with words aptly spoken – speaking apples of gold on plates of silver in our Lord’s ears – reviving His soul like the spring rains.

¹¹ A word aptly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver.   Prov 25:11 (NIV)

 

⁴ The tongue that brings healing is a tree of life,   Prov 15:4 (NIV)

 

²³ A man finds joy in giving an apt reply– and how good is a timely word!   Prov 15:23 (NIV)

 

I don’t believe for one minute that Peter was a random choice to speak such words of encouragement to our Savior.  Peter, being one of the three in Jesus’ inner circle of companions was here used by God – prompted by the Spirit – to strengthen our Lord with his words of affirmation.  God knows what His children need, when they need it and from whom they are to receive it.  Jesus got a kick out of Peter.  He enjoyed his company – his zeal brought a smile to our Lord’s face.  Usually the first to speak for the group, Peter would impetuously and boldly blurt out even if he sometimes did not know what he was talking about!  In our verses for today He shines with a mature response full of assurance and faith.  That had to have put a smile on our Savior’s face and strength in His steps.    Interestingly, we find another account in Scripture where Satan entices Peter to speak words to our Lord to dissuade Him from following the course set out for Him.  Ever like Satan to counter God’s goodness with evil.  The enemy always lies in wait like a roaring lion seeking to turn, through evil devices, even the Savior aside, as if that were possible. Peter was incited to speak words to our Lord which, if the Lord had followed his advice, would have dealt a deathblow for all of us – including Peter!  Can’t the ones closest to us help us or hurt us the most?  We find in Matthew the following account:

²¹ From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life. ²² Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. “Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to you!” ²³ Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men.”   Matt 16:21-23 (NIV)

 

“Satan doesn’t surrender his prey without a fight.  He comes racing after the converted soul, chariot wheels churning the dust, seeking to discourage you, to defeat you.  He pursues you with the intensity of Pharaoh.  He may use your old friends, a spot of persecution, or discouraging responses by your family.  He may show you a hypocrite in the church or afflict you with a general slacking of zeal.  He may launch a missile of temptation right at your heart or fire a volley of trials and troubles into your life.”  Robert J. Morgan

 

⁸ Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. ⁹ Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings.   ¹⁰ And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast. ¹¹ To him be the power for ever and ever. Amen.   1 Peter 5:8-11 (NIV)

 

What I glean from this:

• Like me, Jesus experienced the very human emotions of sorrow and suffering, rejection and joy – He can relate to everything I go through.
• I am to “breathe life” into others with an encouraging word.
• Satan is a roaring lion seeking to devour me.

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June_28

SHARING BREAD

⁶⁵ He went on to say, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless the Father has enabled him.”

⁶⁶ From this time many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed him.

John 6:65-66 (NIV)

Calling themselves adherents, followers, and disciples – though not part of the twelve – these “many” shrank back from Jesus’ Words – their apostate actions proving His teaching to be unpalatable to their tastes.  God both draws and enables the willing to come to Him – apart from this drawing or enabling us with grace and strength we would have no heart to follow.  The willing heart appropriates this grace – Jesus turns no one away who seeks Him.  Our Lord states it is impossible for mere fleshly hearts to follow:

⁴⁴ “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him up at the last day.   John 6:44 (NIV)

 

“The grace of God does not find men fit for salvation, but makes them so.”   Augustine

The carnal heart is so ensnared with sin and unbelief that unless God opens our blind eyes, drawing and enabling us, we are left in a helpless and hopeless state.  The prophet Isaiah tells us:

¹⁰ “You are my witnesses,” declares the LORD, “and my servant whom I have chosen, so that you may know and believe me and understand that I am he.  Before me no god was formed, nor will there be one after me. ¹¹ I, even I, am the LORD, and apart from me there is no savior. ¹² I have revealed and saved and proclaimed–I, and not some foreign god among you.  You are my witnesses,” declares the LORD, “that I am God.   Isaiah 43:10-12 (NIV)

¹ Who has believed our message and to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?    Isaiah 53:1 (NIV)

 

It is certainly a lamentable fact that so few people believe, willingly choosing to reject God’s Surety for their salvation.  Like Orpah, Naomi’s daughter-in-law, who, though hugged and kissed and wept her model for the faith goodbye forfeited her call and turned back to her people and her god – never to be heard of again in Holy Writ:

¹⁴ At this they wept again. Then Orpah kissed her mother-in-law good-by, but Ruth clung to her.   Ruth 1:14 (NIV)

Contrast to Ruth’s actions of clinging to Naomi while stating one of the most beautiful expressions of immovable resolution regarding a loving committed relationship to another human found in literature.  It was an instance of the grace of God inclining the soul to a resolute choice of that which was the best:

¹⁶ But Ruth replied, “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. ¹⁷ Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the LORD deal with me, be it ever so severely, if anything but death separates you and me.”   Ruth 1:16-17 (NIV)

 

While Orpah is not mentioned again in Scripture, Ruth is not only mentioned but prestigiously so – being found in the genealogy of our Lord Jesus – one of only five women mentioned, one of which being Mary, Jesus’ mother:

⁵ Salmon the father of Boaz, whose mother was Rahab, Boaz the father of Obed, whose mother was Ruth, Obed the father of Jesse, ⁶ and Jesse the father of King David.  David was the father of Solomon, whose mother had been Uriah’s wife,   Matt 1:5-6 (NIV)

 

Orpah certainly showed affection for Naomi and was reluctant to part from her company yet allowed herself to be persuaded to yield and follow her own corrupt inclinations – back to her own gods – even though she found herself in a favorable position for an effective call away from it.  She did not love Naomi well enough to leave her country for Naomi’s sake – she being blinded to the fact that it would have been even more for her sake to depart her false deity.  Many esteem and have affection for Jesus in in much the same way – they love Jesus and yet leave Him because they do not love Him enough but love other things more.  Like Jonah states, they find themselves clinging to their idols and forfeit the grace that could be theirs:

⁸ “Those who cling to worthless idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs.   Jonah 2:8 (NIV)

 

“What is needed is not mere present professions, but perseverance to the end in the power of faith.”    Ignatius of Antioch

 

What I glean from this:

• God both draws and enables the willing to come to Him – He reveals and saves – opening the eyes that ware blind and removing the shackles of those in bondage.
• Sadly, many reject God’s Surety in Jesus.
• When I cling to worthless idols, I forfeit the grace that could be mine.  

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June_25

SHARING BREAD

⁶¹ Aware that his disciples were grumbling about this, Jesus said to them, “Does this offend you? ⁶² What if you see the Son of Man ascend to where he was before! ⁶³ The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life. ⁶⁴ Yet there are some of you who do not believe.” For Jesus had known from the beginning which of them did not believe and who would betray him.

John 6:61-64 (NIV)

In our verses for today, Jesus asks of His feigned followers if His Words were a stumbling block to them – the grumblings of the rabble being a sure sign even to the average onlooker.  Yet Jesus’ penetrating view goes deeper still.  Pristinely knowing the thoughts and hearts of all men as if they were in clear view, Jesus was well aware of the real infidels – their first grumble occurring over Jesus’ statement that He came down from heaven.

⁴¹ At this the Jews began to grumble about him because he said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.” ⁴² They said, “Is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can he now say, ‘I came down from heaven’?” John 6:41-42 (NIV)

Knowing this unbelief, Jesus continues by describing to them in interrogatory fashion the plan for His future miraculous ascension as if prodding them with an even greater feat. The unbelief of hypocrites always lies open and bare before the eyes of our Lord Jesus.  Scripture tells us:

¹³ Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account. Heb 4:13 (NIV)

 

The rabble’s complaints should come as no surprise as we should not expect regenerate belief and behavior out of an unregenerate – Jesus always considered the source of the action or word.  Scripture tells us that spiritual things are not discernable to those without the Holy Spirit – they are as foolishness to them regardless of the intellectual abilities they perhaps possess. Spiritual things are simply senseless to the sensual mind. It would be likened to a deaf critic of Beethoven or a blind critic of Van Gough.  Yet the man guided and strengthened by the Spirit understands, evaluates and applies what is revealed.  That is why Jesus tells us that it is the Spirit that gives life, the flesh counting for nothing.  Paul states in 1 Corinthians:

¹⁴ The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned. 1 Cor 2:14 (NIV)

 

“You can scrub a pig, sprinkle Chanel No. 5 on him, put a ribbon around his neck, and take him into your living room.  But when you turn him loose, he will jump into the first mud puddle he sees because his nature has never been changed.  He is still a pig…..The Bible teaches that when we come to Christ, we are spiritually born again.  God’s Spirit comes to live within us and change us.  Our motives change, our objectives change, our dispositions change, our eternal destiny changes….It begins now, as we open our hearts to Him.  Is your life ‘being transformed…from glory to glory’?”   Billy Graham

¹⁷ Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! 2 Cor 5:17 (NIV)

 

¹⁸ And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. 2 Cor 3:18 (NIV)

 

What were we made for? To know God.  What aim should we set ourselves in life?  To know God. What is the eternal life that Jesus gives? Knowledge of God.  What is the best thing in life, bringing more joy, delight, and contentment, than anything else? Knowledge of God.  What, of all the states God ever sees man in, gives Him most pleasure? Knowledge of Himself.   J.I. Packer 

 

Jesus tells His listeners that the Words He has spoken are both spirit and life – not the letter of the Mosaic Law bringing death because of our inability to keep it rather the Spirit which brings life because of Jesus’ ability to keep it perfectly.  The Law was given to show us our need for a Savior – Jesus being the answer to our need for life.  Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians:

 ⁴ Such confidence as this is ours through Christ before God. ⁵ Not that we are competent in ourselves to claim anything for ourselves, but our competence comes from God. ⁶ He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant–not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.   2 Cor 3:4-6 (NIV)

What I glean from this:

• Jesus knows my thoughts and the condition of my heart.  Nothing is hidden from His sight.
•  Spiritual things are discerned only by the Spirit – He brings Truth to life in my heart.
• It is the Spirit that enables and equips me to know God.

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June_23

SHARING BREAD

⁶⁰ On hearing it, many of his disciples said, “This is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?”

John 6:60 (NIV)

Not willing, no, not me.  Can’t go there – certainly not willing to believe this teaching.  This time Jesus has simply gone too far.  The actual wording used in our verse for today indicates this type of hype.  Those adherents who were previously accepting and embracing Jesus’ instruction – making it their rule of conduct – upon hearing and understanding His most recent teaching regarding being the Bread of Life sent from heaven, sadly, took immense offence and became unwilling to follow.  Fickle fair weather followers of our Lord Jesus are certainly nothing new.  Ever since Jesus’ feet trod upon this dusty earth the world has had its fill of them.  Oh we love it all right when our path is strewn with rose petals and the sun is brightly shining.  We find it easy to follow hard after a god that will do what we want when we want or at least stay within the boundaries of what we deem logical or acceptable or right.  Interestingly, holding to this particular train of thought, exactly who is it are we making out to be god – God or ourselves?   Where do we come off thinking we are on equal playing fields with the great “I AM”?  Do we really believe we are able to comprehend all of His ways?  Seriously, do we actually believe we have the ability to create anything “ex nihilo” (out of nothing)?  God clearly and thankfully tells us in His Word:

⁸ “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the LORD.
⁹ “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.  Isaiah 55:8-9 (NIV)

Our eyesight being veiled and our thoughts and abilities limited, it is a wonder that God does not often pose the same questions to us as He did to His servant Job – particularly in light of an arrogant attitude we may perhaps possess:

¹ Then the LORD answered Job out of the storm. He said: ² “Who is this that darkens my counsel with words without knowledge?  ³ Brace yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer me. ⁴ “Where were you when I………” Job 38:1-4 (NIV)

God proceeds to ask Job a litany of questions beginning with where was Job when He created all things – holding all things together merely with His powerful Word.  Job’s correct response should be ours as well:

¹ Then Job replied to the LORD: ² “I know that you can do all things; no plan of yours can be thwarted.  ³ You asked, ‘Who is this that obscures my counsel without knowledge?’  Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know.  ⁴ “You said, ‘Listen now, and I will speak; I will question you, and you shall answer me.’ ⁵ My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you. ⁶ Therefore I despise myself and repent in dust and ashes.”   Job 42:1-6 (NIV)

God, on the other hand, makes known the end from the beginning – from ancient times what is yet to come.  Again, the prophet Isaiah tells us:

¹⁰ I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come. I say: My purpose will stand, and I will do all that I please.   Isaiah 46:10 (NIV)

 

Because God is righteous and just, slow to anger and abounding in love we can trust Him even when we only have a sliver of understanding of the edges of His ways.  He is both trustworthy and faithful.  He does not treat us as we deserve.  I am reminded of the words of Moses, God’s friend:

 ⁴ He is the Rock, his works are perfect, and all his ways are just. A faithful God who does no wrong, upright and just is he.   Deut 32:4 (NIV)

“I cannot understand Him, but I can trust Him.   And so today, when everything physical and emotional in me is completely drained, and there is not a single note of praise in my heart, I choose to praise Him anyway.  Not for what He does, but for Who He is.  When I cannot praise Him out of joy, I will praise Him out of obedience.  And I am learning that when I praise Him out of obedience from the depths of the pit, it is always more meaningful then when I praise Him out of an overflow of my heart from the heights of the mountain.  And because I know His nature, and I know that even when I don’t feel it, He is still a kind, loving, good God, then I know that soon, He will fill my heart with joy once again.  And the praise will flow easily from the depths of my heart.”    Laura Black

Are we disciples, like Laura Black, who know His nature even when we do not understand His ways, who cling to Him from the heights of the mountain to the depths of the pit or are we turncoats when the teaching and the trials of life become tough –  grumbling at the doctrine – offended by the suffering?  The scoffers in our verse for today thought none could accept this teaching yet thanks be to God many have found it the Rock upon which they stand, the strength that sustains them , the joy that overflows their hearts and the peace that passes their understanding.   

¹ Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.   Heb 11:1 (NIV)

 

What I glean from this:

• God’s ways are beyond my comprehension – His thoughts and actions towards me are for my good even though humanly I am not always able to discern that.  ¹¹ For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.   Jer 29:11 (NIV)
• I can trust God even when I only understand a sliver of His ways because I know His nature.
• Faith is being sure of what I hope for and certain of what I do not see.  

 

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June_21

SHARING BREAD

⁵⁷ Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me. ⁵⁸ This is the bread that came down from heaven. Your forefathers ate manna and died, but he who feeds on this bread will live forever.” ⁵⁹ He said this while teaching in the synagogue in Capernaum.

John 6:57-59 (NIV)

Got life?  Get Jesus.  There is a billboard sign in my city which reads “Shop for Life” advertising a nutritional grocery store advocating organically grown healthy foods.  Their slogan penetrated my core.  Certainly it is important to choose a wholesome and beneficial diet laden with rich nutrition for strong physical bodies yet what about our spiritual life?  We find these words regarding our Savior in the first chapter of John: 

 ³ Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. ⁴ In him was life, and that life was the light of men. ⁵ The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.   John 1:3-5 (NIV)

In the ultimate sense, life is in Jesus.  Both man’s physical and spiritual life come from above – life being man’s most important asset the loss of which is tragic. Over and over again throughout the gospels Jesus states He is life and it is through our faith in Him that we are assured the abundance of life in the here and now and eternal life in the hereafter.

²⁵ Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; ²⁶ and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?“ John 11:25-26 (NIV)

 

 ⁶ Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.  John 14:6 (NIV)

 

“The only Christ for whom there is a shred of evidence is a miraculous figure making stupendous claims.”     C. S. Lewis

 

No one can argue that life is indeed brief therefore our time for decision is at hand.  Scripture tells us:

 

²⁷ Just as man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment, ²⁸ so Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many people; and he will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him.   Heb 9:27-28 (NIV)

Sadly and unfortunately, those who are awaiting Jesus’ return constitute a smaller circle than those for which He came to die – those for whom His death has benefitted – that being the whole world.  I was reminded of the words of Moses to the Israelites in Deuteronomy regarding choosing well:

¹⁹ This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live ²⁰ and that you may love the LORD your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him. For the LORD is your life, and he will give you many years in the land he swore to give to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.   Deut 30:19-20 (NIV)

Moses’ successor Joshua offered a similar plea to the people stating his own firm resolution towards this Godly goal – spurring them for their good and God’s glory:

¹⁴ “Now fear the LORD and serve him with all faithfulness. Throw away the gods your forefathers worshiped beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the LORD. ¹⁵ But if serving the LORD seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your forefathers served beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD.” Josh 24:14-15 (NIV)

“The great difficulty is to get modern audiences to realize that you are preaching Christianity solely and simply because you happen to think it true; they always suppose you are preaching it because you like it or think it good for society or something of that sort…”   C.S. Lewis  

Jesus in familiar Jewish instructing mode ends His discourse on the Bread of Life by recapping Truth previously stated.  Repetition, repetition, repetition was the mainstay of Jewish teaching which emphasized to the hearer the importance of what was being taught.  Indeed, the “Shema” – considered to be one of the most important texts in the Old Testament –   found in Deuteronomy, attests to this fact:      

⁴ Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. ⁵ Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. ⁶ These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. ⁷ Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. ⁸ Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. ⁹ Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.   Deut 6:4-9 (NIV)

 

What I glean from this:

• In Jesus is life – both the abundant life now and the eternal life in the hereafter.
• My life is brief therefore as Peter states:  ¹³ But in keeping with his promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, the home of righteousness. ¹⁴ So then, dear friends, since you are looking forward to this, make every effort to be found spotless, blameless and at peace with him.  2 Peter 3:13-14 (NIV)
• “God loves you as though you are the only person in the world, and He loves everyone the way He loves you.”     Augustine

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June_18

SHARING BREAD

⁵⁵ For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. ⁵⁶ Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in him.

John 6:55-56 (NIV)

Talk about the original “soul” food (I simply couldn’t resist)!  Truthful, authentic, reliable, trustworthy, accurate, correct, dependable, factual, valid and legitimate all given to describe the “food” and “drink” Jesus offers. Succinctly put, our Savior both satisfies and sustains our spiritual hunger with His Bread of life.  Albeit worldly goods and pleasures may satisfy for a season – prior to the rust and moth and relationship destruction – yet nothing satisfies like our Jesus – everything else will simply be found wanting.  I am reminded of Jesus’ Words in Revelation describing His gracious demonstration of knocking at the door of our hearts laden with His overflowing flawless eternal sufficient supply to displace our faulty temporary temporal provisions:

²⁰ Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me.   Rev 3:20 (NIV)

 

With Christ on the outside, there can be no fellowship, no relationship – remaining in Him means inviting Him in – His life to become as our own.  Jesus gives us a wonderful illustration of this abiding or remaining in Him found later in John:

⁴ Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. ⁵ “I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. ⁶ If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. ⁷ If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you. ⁸ This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.   John 15:4-8 (NIV)

 

Communion between Christ and His believers will never fail on His side – it is we who move.  It is by faith that we have a close and intimate union with Jesus – He shares in our griefs and we in His joys.  The life of faith in our Jesus is incomparably excellent and is the source of all good – equipping and enabling us to bear much eternal fruit.

“To abide in Christ, who is our righteousness and strength, and not to be moved from him, is the very life and power of Christianity.  We do this when our thoughts are going out after him, our hearts cleaving to him, and our minds stayed upon him.  Now, to know Christ, and thus to abide in him, as our righteousness, brings peace and joy; which joy in the Lord is certainly followed with strength to overcome sin and the world, which believers renounce the more readily, as they have found something better in Christ.  May the Lord give me grace likewise immovably to abide in him.”   K. H. Von Bogatzky

 

Over 7,000 promises of God are sprinkled throughout the pages of Holy Writ as sparkling jewels – treasures that we may call our own as we steadfastly abide in Jesus.  Below we find but a small sampling to savor – Enjoy!

Do not grieve, for the joy of the LORD is your strength.”  Neh 8:10 (NIV)

 

¹ The LORD is my light and my salvation– whom shall I fear?  The LORD is the stronghold of my life–of whom shall I be afraid?   Psalms 27:1 (NIV)

 

³ Trust in the LORD and do good; dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture. ⁴ Delight yourself in the LORD and he will give you the desires of your heart. ⁵ Commit your way to the LORD; trust in him and he will do this: ⁶ He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn, the justice of your cause like the noonday sun.   Psalms 37:3-6 (NIV)

³ You will keep in perfect peace him whose mind is steadfast, because he trusts in you.    Isaiah 26:3 (NIV)

 

²⁸ Do you not know?  Have you not heard?  The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom.
²⁹ He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. ³⁰ Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; ³¹ but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.   Isaiah 40:28-31 (NIV)

 

¹³ You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. ¹⁴ I will be found by you,” declares the LORD,   Jer 29:13-14 (NIV)

 

⁸ Taste and see that the LORD is good; blessed is the man who takes refuge in him.  Psalms 34:8 (NIV)

 

²⁰ For no matter how many promises God has made, they are “Yes” in Christ. And so through him the “Amen” is spoken by us to the glory of God.   2 Cor 1:20 (NIV)

 

What I glean from this:

• What Jesus offers me is trustworthy, accurate, correct and dependable.
• Jesus desires for me to remain in Him – He is my Surety, Strength and Sufficiency.
• Jesus’ joys are heavenly – the earth’s are but earthly – I am to set my heart and minds on things above not on earthly things.  

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June_16

SHARING BREAD

⁵² Then the Jews began to argue sharply among themselves, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?”

⁵³ Jesus said to them, “I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. ⁵⁴ Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.

John 6:52-54 (NIV)

Jesus had a way of stirring things up did He not?  Time after time we see the crowds arguing and divided – not to mention confused – over what His Words truly meant.  We find a perfect example of this again later in John:

¹⁹ At these words the Jews were again divided. ²⁰ Many of them said, “He is demon-possessed and raving mad. Why listen to him?” ²¹ But others said, “These are not the sayings of a man possessed by a demon. Can a demon open the eyes of the blind?”   John 10:19-21 (NIV)

 

Acutely aware of what resides in a man apart from Him, it is no wonder Jesus stated the following Truth quoting from the prophet Micah:

 ³⁴ “Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. ³⁵ For I have come to turn “‘a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law-– ³⁶ a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household.’   Matt 10:34-36 (NIV)

It is no different in our day is it?  Division and arguing and confusion often occur regarding faith particularly among those we feel the closest to.  Most often it becomes a source of spiritual pride over who is right or who is wrong.  What we perhaps fail to remember is that it is not about our flawed perspectives; it is rather all about Jesus – His Words, His actions, His love towards others – studying and fleshing out His life for the world to see.  Arguing, particularly regarding the spiritual is shunned in Scripture.  Let’s face it; people are not won to our Lord Jesus by our arguing them into it.  Paul commands us in Philippians:

¹⁴ Do everything without complaining or arguing, ¹⁵ so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe ¹⁶ as you hold out the word of life–in order that I may boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labor for nothing.    Phil 2:14-16 (NIV)

 

“Meekness is the mark of a man who has been mastered by God.”  Geoffrey B. Wilson

We are to go to the Scriptures, like the Bereans who, being of noble character, diligently searched the Word to see if what the apostle Paul taught them was true.  They were commended in Holy Writ for this action.  We find the prophet Micah ending his quote with the following confident assurance in God for his salvation – trusting in what he knew to be Truth:

⁷ But as for me, I watch in hope for the LORD, I wait for God my Savior; my God will hear me.   Micah 7:7 (NIV)

 

Speaking over the arguing and rabble, Jesus gives us a red flag as He proclaims Truth – there is no life apart from Him:

“I tell you the truth, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.

 

The life of the world, being forfeited by sin, now ransomed by the flesh of Christ – His body broken, His blood shed.  Every Jew realized that life was in the blood.  We find in Leviticus:

¹¹ For the life of a creature is in the blood, and I have given it to you to make atonement for yourselves on the altar; it is the blood that makes atonement for one’s life.    Lev 17:11 (NIV)

God chose sacrificial blood as the ransom price for a person’s life.  In stating this Truth Jesus clarifies the mystery for His hearers – redemption is found in belief in Him.  The flesh and blood of Christ are the promises of the covenant and eternal life.

What I glean from this:

• I am to do everything without complaining or arguing.
• I am to hold out the Word of life to others as a shining star.
• My redemption is found in Jesus.

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June_14

SHARING BREAD

⁴⁸ I am the bread of life. ⁴⁹ Your forefathers ate the manna in the desert, yet they died. ⁵⁰ But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which a man may eat and not die. ⁵¹ I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.”

John 6:48-51 (NIV)

While temporarily satisfying the Israelites physical hunger, manna sent from heaven was not sufficient to satisfy forever.  Jesus – the Word made flesh – was about to teach the important Truth that bread and water only sustains the physical yet man’s need is far greater:

 ⁴ Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’ “   Matt 4:4 (NIV)

In our verses for today, Jesus tells us the Israelites partook of the manna yet died in the desert.  I wonder how often that occurs in our day and age.  We feast upon the temporal blessings sent from above yet die apart from Christ in our own “deserts” – our own parched and weary lands of brokenness.  Oh that we would be like King David when he cried out:

⁶ I spread out my hands to you; my soul thirsts for you like a parched land.   Psalms 143:6 (NIV)

 

The barren broken soul lays parched before its Maker.  The great spiritual need that all mankind possesses is a hungry and thirsty heart.  Jesus came to fill that need like water gushing forth in a dry desert – like a tender shoot from dry ground. Jesus, the Bread of Life, comes down from heaven to bestow upon us the Bread that we may eat of and never die.  Isaiah prophesizes the following concerning our Jesus:

² He grew up before him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground.  He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.  ³ He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. ⁴ Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted.  ⁵ But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.    Isaiah 53:2-5 (NIV)

 

The True Manna, coming down from heaven was the all-sufficient One.  A man may eat of this Bread and never die – that is he will never fall short of heaven – whereupon he enters into a blissful world of no more tears and no more death.  Freely Jesus states to His followers that they will live forever.   

Interestingly, just as bread must be given, broken and taken to sustain physical life, Jesus was given, broken and taken up to sustain our spiritual life – His broken body healing our brokenness – His wounds making us whole.  Our Savior offers us healing, reconciliation and restoration through His broken body.

“The strangest truth of the gospel is that redemption comes through suffering.”  Milo Chapman

“This is my body broken just for you for all you’ve been and all you’ve been through.  This is my blood, and when you’ve reached the end, I offer you again the body and blood.”   Janet Paschal

On the Sermon on the Mount Jesus gives us the surety of blessing and filling as we hunger and thirst after righteousness (Jesus) with the diligence we use in seeking food for our physical bodies.

⁶ Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.  Matt 5:6 (NIV)

After voraciously seeking our Savior and “feasting” upon His Word we are to apply what we learn to our lives – bread in the hand will not nourish, it is only when it is ingested that it satisfies.  The child of God will find this “food” and “drink” when ingested in the soul to be most pleasant and delightful and necessary. It is then that we are equipped to handle the assaults certain to come our ways.  Tribulation in this world is a guarantee – Jesus told us:

³³ “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”  John 16:33 (NIV)

“The gospel…should be seen as not only a message of good news for lost people to be saved from sin’s penalty, but also a message of good news for Christian people to be saved from sin’s domineering power. The goal of the gospel is not merely to forgive us, but to change us into true worshippers of God and authentic lovers of people.”  Dr. Steve Childers, True Spirituality

 

What I glean from this:

• My need is far greater than physical food – my soul’s appetite is even more voracious.
• Jesus is the Bread of Life – He alone satisfies my soul’s hunger.
• The path of Jesus is pleasant and delightful and necessary.

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June_11

SHARING BREAD

⁴⁷ I tell you the truth, he who believes has everlasting life.

John 6:47 (NIV)

Drawing attention to the importance of His Words, Jesus states plainly that those who believe in Him have eternal life.  No beating around the bush, no elaborate verbiage, Jesus both succinctly and concisely states the Truth in polished smoothness.    Life eternal, which belongs to God – who is not affected by the limitations of time, is bestowed upon those who believe in His Son.  There are two things man dreads – lack and death – Jesus meeting both needs with His overflowing sufficiency for His followers.  We find earlier in this same chapter of John:

³⁵ Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.   John 6:35 (NIV)

 

Jesus tenderly reminds us of the benefits of being His sheep when He contrasts Satan’s ways to His own:

¹⁰ The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.   John 10:10 (NIV)

Fullness, sufficiency, abundance, strength, righteousness, peace – all words that so describe what our Savior desires to bestow upon the sheep of His pasture.  I am reminded of the comforting words of King David in Psalm 23:

¹ The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.  Psalms 23:1 (NIV)

 

Again, David states the following Truth for us to savor in Psalm 37:

³ Trust in the LORD and do good; dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture. ⁴ Delight yourself in the LORD and he will give you the desires of your heart. ⁵ Commit your way to the LORD; trust in him and he will do this: ⁶ He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn, the justice of your cause like the noonday sun. ⁷ Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for him;   Psalms 37:3-7 (NIV)
²⁵ I was young and now I am old, yet I have never seen the righteous forsaken or their children begging bread. ²⁶ They are always generous and lend freely; their children will be blessed. Psalms 37:25-26 (NIV)

 

The very good news for believers is their surety of the abundant life in the here and now and their future eternal life with the Father in the hereafter.  Yet, just as good as the news is for those who choose to believe, is the sad news of those who harden their hearts to the Truth.  Those who kick against Him, desiring to go their own way – rejecting God’s Remedy will not see life as God’s wrath remains on him.  John clearly states:

 ³⁶ Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on him.”   John 3:36 (NIV)

Wrath is our holy God’s necessary righteous reaction to all evil.  This wrath remains on all unbelievers – it is future wrath but it also exists now.  Man is given two options – trust in the Son who though perfect took the fullness of God’s wrath upon Himself on the cross as our substitute to again provide access for our relationship with the Father or reject God’s Remedy for our restoration.

“We came into this world wretched, miserable, and undone creatures, in cruel bondage to sin and Satan, under guilt and under wrath, hostile toward God—the fountain of blessedness—and in a state of condemnation leading to everlasting destruction. But when a man is converted, he is brought out of that state of woe and misery into a sure title to glory, honor, and peace forever. When once a man is converted, all this blessedness that we have heard of is his; he has an absolute right to it. God’s work is accomplished for it; His faithful promise is given.”  Jonathan Edwards

 

“While I regarded God as a tyrant I thought my sin a trifle; But when I knew Him to be my Father, then I mourned that I could ever have kicked against Him.  When I thought God was hard, I found it easy to sin; but when I found God so kind, so good, so overflowing with compassion, I smote upon my breast to think that I could ever have rebelled against One who loved me so, and sought my good.”  C.H. Spurgeon

 

What I glean from this:

• Satan’s plan is to destroy me; Jesus’ plan is to save me.   “The essential fact of Christianity is that God thought all men worth the sacrifice of His Son.”    William Barclay
•  If I reject God’s Remedy, God’s wrath remains on me.  

• Jesus offers me fullness, sufficiency, abundance, strength, righteousness and peace.  ¹¹ For the LORD God is a sun and shield; the LORD bestows favor and honor; no good thing does he withhold from those whose walk is blameless. ¹² O LORD Almighty, blessed is the man who trusts in you.   Psalms 84:11-12 (NIV)

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June_09

SHARING BREAD

⁴⁶ No one has seen the Father except the one who is from God; only he has seen the Father.

John 6:46 (NIV)

Sometimes I think we have a tendency to lower God to our own playing fields.  He is not our cosmic buddy or pal, winking at sin and “getting down with his bad self” to entertain and pander us.  He has no bad self.  God is perfectly holy, totally unapproachable Light – where, Scripture tells us, no one can see, survive or even draw near apart from the saving work of Jesus.

⁵ This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all.   1 John 1:5 (NIV)

God is the ultimate Ruler of the universe, the eternal One, whose thoughts and ways are boundlessly higher than our own – indeed, God’s Word tells us that His thoughts and ways are infinitely above ours – higher than the heavens are above the earth by comparison:

⁸ “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the LORD.  ⁹ “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.     Isaiah 55:8-9 (NIV)

God is so frighteningly far from our level that it is beyond our fleshly comprehension.   I am reminded of Paul’s words to his beloved Timothy in his fitting doxology to God:

God, the blessed and only Ruler, the King of kings and Lord of lords, ¹⁶ who alone is immortal and who lives in unapproachable light, whom no one has seen or can see. To him be honor and might forever. Amen.   1 Tim 6:15-16 (NIV)

Beyond our wildest imaginations, beyond our thoughts and dreams, is the eternal One that is totally Other.  He is the great “I AM”.  In our verse for today Jesus tells us that it is He alone that has seen the Father.  We find earlier in John similar words regarding our Savior:

¹⁸ No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father’s side, has made him known.   John 1:18 (NIV)

Jesus came to make His Father known to us by disclosing God’s essential nature which is pure love.  He was sent on a mission from God to restore fallen man to a right relationship with the Father.  God had prepared a plan for the salvation of man, Jesus secured it and the Holy Spirit applied it to all believers – the Trinity working in perfect unity.  God’s loving purpose in revelation was restoring relationship.  A perfectly holy God cannot commune with sin.  Sin separates us from His majesty.

“The revealed truth of God is that without the atonement He cannot forgive – He would contradict His nature if He did.  The only way we can be forgiven is by being brought back to God through the atonement of the Cross.  God’s forgiveness is possible only in the supernatural realm……Once you realize all that it cost God to forgive you, you will be held as in a vise, constrained by the love of God.”  Oswald Chambers

“(Why does God) bother to speak to us?  The truly staggering answer that the Bible gives to this question is that God’s purpose in revelation is to make friends with us.  It was to this end that he created us rational beings, bearing his image, able to think and hear and speak and love; he wanted there to be genuine personal affection and friendship, two-sided, between himself and us—a relation, not like that between a man and his dog, but like that of a father to his child, or a husband to his wife.  Loving friendship between two persons has no ulterior motive; it is an end in itself. And this is God’s end in revelation. He speaks to us simply to fulfill the purpose for which we were made; that is, to bring into being a relationship in which he is a friend to us, and we to him, he finding his joy in giving us gifts and we finding ours in giving him thanks”.    J I Packer, God Has Spoken

 

⁹ However, as it is written: “No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him” — 1 Cor 2:9 (NIV)

 

 ²⁰ Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, ²¹ to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.   Eph 3:20-21 (NIV)

 “God delights in His covenant and so we are sure He will not turn back from it. It is the joy of His holy heart. He delights to do His people good. To pass over transgression, iniquity, and sin is the recreation of Jehovah. Did you ever hear God singing? It is extraordinary that the Divine One would solace Himself with song, yet a prophet has thus revealed the Lord to us: ‘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.’ (Zephaniah 3:17). The covenant is the heart of God written out in the blood of Jesus.”  Charles Spurgeon, Grace, God’s Unmerited Favor

 

What I glean from this:

• God is not on my level.
• God is boundlessly above all I can even imagine.
• Amazingly, God loves me.

 

 

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