Impressed by Military Mathematics

“Doom to those who go off to Egypt thinking that horses can help them, Impressed by military mathematics, awed by sheer numbers of chariots and riders— And to The Holy of Israel, not even a glance, not so much as a prayer to God.” (Isaiah 31:1, The Message) 

Mathematics in the kingdom of God and that in the world are radically different.  God + anything = victory in the kingdom of God.  The world, on the other hand says, "he who is strongest wins."

Here Isaiah calls out those Israelites who, when threatened by Assyria, rather than rely upon God, they turned to Egypt for help because they were using worldly mathematics; they were awed by sheer numbers of chariots and riders.  They should have relied upon God because God + anything = victory.

While we don't live in a theocracy, we do often struggle with the same sort of attitudes.  It is much easier for us to rely upon our own wits or finances or brains, than it is to be dependent upon our God.

Cry for Help and...

“Oh yes, people of Zion, citizens of Jerusalem, your time of tears is over. Cry for help and you’ll find it’s grace and more grace. The moment he hears, he’ll answer.” (Isaiah 30:19, The Message) 

God to his people through Isaiah.  Cry out for help and what you will receive is grace and more grace. 

Salvation comes in dependence.  God's people will receive grace when they cry out for help, in other words, when they acknowledge their need of help. 

This is one of the odd characteristics of God's kingdom.  Help comes in dependence.  Strength in weakness.   Wealth in giving.  Peace in the midst of tribulation and suffering.  God's kingdom is a strange kingdom indeed.

A Trusting Life Won't Topple

   “But the Master, God, has something to say to this: “Watch closely. I’m laying a foundation in Zion, a solid granite foundation, squared and true. And this is the meaning of the stone: a trusting life won’t topple.” (Isaiah 28:16, The Message) 

To a nation that was far from being faithful, God has a message: "A trusting life won't topple."  We take this to mean that if the people would trust their God, then they would be as solid and level as a granite cornerstone, laid at the very foundation of a building, set solidly, not able to be upset by nature or the weather or the passing of time.

What was spoken to the nation of Israel is as true for individuals as it was for them as God's covenant people.  Despite life events that tend to upend us, if our trust is in the Lord, then we won't topple.  We will remain solid in the storm, but we must trust.

"Whoever has the Son has Life"

“And this is the testimony, that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.” (1 John 5:11–12, ESV) 

One of my favorite passages because it so simply clarifies eternal life.  Do you have the Son?  Then you have life.  Do you not have the Son of God?  Then you do not have life.  Everything rests on Christ.  Why?  Because of Rom 5.10: 

“For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.” (Romans 5:10, ESV) 

In the death of Christ; in the pain and suffering of the cross; we are reconciled to God, and now Christ saves us by his life.  Christ's death offers us life.  All we need to do is be reconciled to God.  Yield.  Surrender.  Lay down our arms.  Lay down our lives.  

Whoever has the Son has life. Do you have the Son?

A Blunt Command

“ The command we have from Christ is blunt: Loving God includes loving people. You’ve got to love both.” (1 John 4:21, The Message) 

One cannot love God, if one does not love people.  There is no use separating our love for God from our feelings about people (usually if we're trying to it's because we don't love people).  The two are inextricably linked, so that if one doesn't love people, one cannot truly love God.

This is why we need to plead the Father for his heart so that we do love people. It's a mistake to think that we cannot learn to love people, or that learning to love them is somehow wrong.  If we lack love towards people all we need to do is ask of God.  He has a plentiful supply and will faithfully give love.

O Lord God do thou give me your heart of love for all! people.

God's Love Disappears When I...

“If you see some brother or sister in need and have the means to do something about it but turn a cold shoulder and do nothing, what happens to God’s love? It disappears. And you made it disappear.” (1 John 3:17, The Message) 

...Turn a cold shoulder to a brother or sister in need.  This is one of those scriptural directives that is clear and unambiguous.  We ought to help a brother or sister in need.  When we turn a cold shoulder God's love disappears in us (since this is a paraphrase Mr. Petersen is going for the spirit of the message, not the letter).  It's not that God's love disappears, it just disappears in us.  The ESV reads: How does God's love abide in him? As if to say, "How can you claim to have God's love in you when you don't even help a brother or sister in need?"  A good question.

Charity—especially to those of the faith—is most basic to the Christian life.  We need to remember this...and practice it faithfully.

Live Deeply in Christ

“And now, children, stay with Christ. Live deeply in Christ. Then we’ll be ready for him when he appears, ready to receive him with open arms, with no cause for red-faced guilt or lame excuses when he arrives.” (1 John 2:28, The Message) 

Good paraphrase here from The Message.  Stay with Christ.  Live Deeply in Christ.  This is a pretty good summation of the life of a Christian.  Yes, one could say a lot of things to describe it—be obedient, fear the Lord, walk humbly before him, etc.—but these two sentences encapsulate everything there is to know about being ready to receive Christ.  Just stay with Christ; live deeply in Christ.

What does it mean to live deeply in Christ.  That is for you to find out.  Indeed, one could argue that the pursuit of Christ is nothing more than learning what it means to live deeply in him; to trust in him in all situations; to enjoy him and confide in him as the closest friend;  to lift him high as God in the flesh; to study his life over and over in order to know him as he is and know God as he is.  It means all of this and more.

O fellow Christian, let's purpose together to live deeply in Christ!

Brimming with Beauty

   “Just as each day brims with your beauty, my mouth brims with praise.” (Psalm 71:8, The Message) 

As I write this, I'm looking out my front window at the golden glow of a warm, May sunrise.  I can hear a bluejay in the back yard calling out (probably trying to claim possession of all the peanuts).  Most of the migrational birds are back so the mornings are full of the call of bird's singing cheerily.  Does each day brim with beauty?  Absolutely, even though I often miss it because my mind is on other things (unfortunately).

A day that brims with beauty ought to lead my mouth to brim with praise.  God, who spoke and all of the beauty came into existence, is the one who takes the canvas of each day and draws on it new beauty for that day.  Sometimes he paints in gold; sometimes he paints in low clouds and shades of gray; sometimes he paints in rolling thunder and flashing lightning.  In its own way, it's all beautiful, and all of it—ALL of it!—is crying out, "created by God."

Oh Lord God, may my mouth brim every day with your praise.

Tyrannized by What We Want

“Think of your sufferings as a weaning from that old sinful habit of always expecting to get your own way. Then you’ll be able to live out your days free to pursue what God wants instead of being tyrannized by what you want.” (1 Peter 4:1–2, The Message)

The Message does a pretty good job here of hammering home how we get led astray but what we think we want.  Our sufferings can be looked at as a way to drag us away from the expectation that we always get what we want. We don't always get what we want, and suffering is used by God in our lives in any number of unexpected ways, with Jesus' suffering being the supreme example.

This releases us from the tyranny of our own desires, and tyrannize us they certainly do. There is nothing so enslaving as our own wishes.  We pursue them constantly thinking that by fulfilling our wishes we will gain happiness and contentment, but when we get what we want, we find it is not quite what we really wanted so off we go after something else, in an endless attempt at satisfaction, which we never find.  Satisfaction comes when we are freed from the tyranny of what we want and pursue the one who created us.  He made us that way!

 

Real Wisdom

“Real wisdom, God’s wisdom, begins with a holy life and is characterized by getting along with others. It is gentle and reasonable, overflowing with mercy and blessings, not hot one day and cold the next, not two-faced.” (James 3:17, The Message) 

“Mean-spirited ambition isn’t wisdom. Boasting that you are wise isn’t wisdom. Twisting the truth to make yourselves sound wise isn’t wisdom.” (James 3:14, The Message) 

James juxtaposes what wisdom is not, with what wisdom is in James 3.  Wisdom is not mean-spirited ambition, boasting, or twisting the truth to sound wise.  Sometimes the world thinks that this kind of behavior is wisdom.  It isn't.

Real wisdom begins with a holy life, or as Solomon put it: The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.  One of wisdom's marks is that you can get along with others.  

To get real wisdom then, our aim ought to be on Christ and his life, since Christ was God in the flesh.  If we emulate his character, we will be well on the way to the fear of the Lord.

How to End up with a Corpse on Your Hands

“Use your heads! Do you suppose for a minute that you can cut faith and works in two and not end up with a corpse on your hands?” (James 2:20, The Message) 

As paraphrased by The Message, you end up with a corpse on your hands when you cut faith and works in two.  Faith, not demonstrated in works that bring glory to God, is a corpse, a dead body, death.

There is an unbreakable connection between faith and works; or as The Message puts it: That seamless unity of believing and doing (vs. 25).  

True faith will always be accompanied by genuine works.

The Gift of Pressure

“Consider it a sheer gift, friends, when tests and challenges come at you from all sides. You know that under pressure, your faith-life is forced into the open and shows its true colors. So don’t try to get out of anything prematurely. Let it do its work so you become mature and well-developed, not deficient in any way.” (James 1:2–4, The Message) 

Pressure and/or testing is painful but purposeful, even though it isn't something we would normally choose.  Pressure exposes the truth of our commitment to Christ.  It forces us out into the open to live our faith.  It refines us.  It makes us into something useable.  It makes us into something precious, or perhaps we could say more precious.  

I like how The Message paraphrases it: So don't try to get out of anything prematurely.  It is natural to want to escape pressure.  It is biblical to embrace it with patience while God works.  

God of Lightning...and Cremation

“Then God sent lightning. The fire cremated the 250 men who were offering the incense.” (Numbers 16:35, The Message) 

We seem more worried about God's reputation than God does.  We try and lessen the shock value of passages like this in which God punishes 250 rebels by sending lightning to consume them.  God doesn't at all seem to care that some readers will read this passage with disapprobation. He in essence tells it like it is.

A couple of lessons here.  First is that God is very serious about open rebellion.  In this instance a small sector of God's people decide that the one whom God appointed to lead them is not worth following, not to mention that they are going to decide who is worthy to appear before God.  A bad idea indeed.  They will come to regret it. 

The second lesson is that we don't need to "protect" God's reputation for him.  Sometimes we may struggle at explaining why he does things, but this should not make us deny that he does those things (which is the foundation of the so-called "Open Theology" movement; to explain why God couldn't be the way the Bible says he is).  

How well C. S. Lewis captured this fact about God in the dialogue between Mr. Tumnus and Lucy in The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe. Talking about Aslan the Lion:

Lucy:    He's not a tame lion, is he?

Mr. Tumnus: No, but he is good.

Start running: Don't Quit!

“Do you see what this means—all these pioneers who blazed the way, all these veterans cheering us on? It means we’d better get on with it. Strip down, start running—and never quit! No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins. Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we’re in. Study how he did it. Because he never lost sight of where he was headed—that exhilarating finish in and with God—he could put up with anything along the way: Cross, shame, whatever. And now he’s there, in the place of honor, right alongside God.” (Hebrews 12:1–2, The Message) 

If you're going to run in a race, you've got to start running; if you're going to finish that race, you can't quit.  Simple but necessary words from the writer of Hebrews here.  We can read all the books ever written about the Christian life, but at the end of the day they won't do us any good unless we start running; start obeying;start behaving like we are people who follow Christ; or as The Message puts it: No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins.  

Our focus?  Jesus.  

Run.  Don't quit.  Focus on the goal: Jesus.  It seems so simple doesn't it? 

"God Said to Walk Through Where?"

“By an act of faith, Israel walked through the Red Sea on dry ground. The Egyptians tried it and drowned.” (Hebrews 11:29, The Message) 

“By faith, Noah built a ship in the middle of dry land. He was warned about something he couldn’t see, and acted on what he was told. The result? His family was saved. His act of faith drew a sharp line between the evil of the unbelieving world and the rightness of the believing world. As a result, Noah became intimate with God.” (Hebrews 11:7, The Message) 

Noah build a ship in the middle of dry land; Israel walked through the Red Sea on dry ground.  Two acts of faith.  

One can imagine both Noah's incredulity and that of the people around Noah, when God told him to build a gigantic boat that was not anywhere near the sea.  120 years worth of verbal abuse as Noah built and preached WITH NO RESPONDENTS!  Faith indeed.

One can also imagine the people of Israel staring at a narrow path through walls of water on both sides and asking Moses, "God wants us to go through there?"  

Faith is an interesting thing.  We are not guaranteed that we will survive our act of faith—witness those who were stoned, sawed in two, murdered.  There faith was just as great as Noah's.  We are only called to faith.  God is responsible for the outcome.  Life or death does not seem to matter so much as the act of faith itself.

"To Perfect Some Very Imperfect People"

“Every priest goes to work at the altar each day, offers the same old sacrifices year in, year out, and never makes a dent in the sin problem. As a priest, Christ made a single sacrifice for sins, and that was it! Then he sat down right beside God and waited for his enemies to cave in. It was a perfect sacrifice by a perfect person to perfect some very imperfect people. By that single offering, he did everything that needed to be done for everyone who takes part in the purifying process.” (Hebrews 10:11–14, The Message) 

I love the way The Message paraphrases this passage in Heb. 10.  The priests never make a dent in the sin problem...Christ made a single sacrifice for sins, and that was it!...It was a perfect sacrifice by a perfect person to perfect some very imperfect people.  

Just so.

The work of the priests was something that had to be done year after year after year.  It was not permanent because the world was awaiting the permanent work of Christ.  Christ died once—a single sacrifice—and the sin problem was resolved for good.  He made perfect some very imperfect people.

That means me...and you, if we believe that Christ died for sins according to the scriptures (1 Cor 15.3).

"I'm sick of your religion, religion, religion"

“ I’m sick of your religion, religion, religion, while you go right on sinning. When you put on your next prayer-performance, I’ll be looking the other way. No matter how long or loud or often you pray, I’ll not be listening. And do you know why? Because you’ve been tearing people to pieces, and your hands are bloody.” (Isaiah 1:14–15, The Message) 

The Message here captures pretty well the strength of God's word to Israel.  He is sick of their religiosity because it is only on the surface.  If it really went deep; if it really affected the heart; they wouldn't be content to both continue in sin and act religious.  Yet they are.  Israel had syncretized religion so that they could both appear religious and do what they wanted to do.

The church in America is rapidly taking on this trait.  People give lip-service to being faithful to God, but then go and do whatever they want to do, and call that faithful.  What the Bible's standards are is not a consideration.  We need to both speak against and guard against this tendency in every human heart.  It is much easier to follow the God we would like God to be, then the God who actually is.

God our Refuge

“God is a safe place to hide, ready to help when we need him. We stand fearless at the cliff-edge of doom, courageous in sea-storm and earthquake,” (Psalm 46:1–2, The Message) 

That God is our refuge is not a "new" truth to a follower of Christ.  That truth is something we learn early in our life of faith.  What I find interesting here is the application of the truth that the author makes.  We stand fearless writes the author at the cliff-edge of doom, courageous in sea-storm and earthquake (ESV: “Therefore we will not fear though the earth gives way, though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea,”).  

So one of the applications of the fact that God is our refuge is that we can turn our fear over to him and stand fearless while the world crumbles around us. This is powerful help indeed.