Posted by: jakinnan | April 6, 2013

Three Reactions to the Gospel

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For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. – 1 Corinthians 1:18

I have found as I travel that some people are more open to the gospel than others. I never know how it is going to play out, so I just give out the Word of God and invite people to come to Christ. And people will react in different ways.

The apostle Paul received three reactions to the gospel when he preached it: “And when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked, while others said, ‘We will hear you again on this matter. . . .’ However, some men joined him and believed” (Acts 17:32, 34).

We find the same reactions to the gospel today. Some will mock. The term “mocked” used in Acts 17 also could be translated “sneered” or “burst out laughing.” In other words, Are you serious? You actually believe that?

To these educated fools, it all seemed silly and unbelievable. But this very mockery was an indication they were going to perish because “the preaching of the gospel is to them that are perishing foolishness” (1 Corinthians 1:18).

Some will mock, while others will delay. We will hear you again on this matter. This is a very common reaction. What it actually means is, “I really don’t want to decide right now.” The devil uses this tactic to great effect. Don’t worry about it now. Deal with it later.

But some believed. Some repented and changed their minds, and among them was Dionysius the Areopagite, one of the judges who was an intellectual and ruler of the city.

Here is what I have come to realize. Conversion is God’s job, not mine. It is the work of the Holy Spirit in the life of an unbeliever. God holds us responsible for proclaiming the truth. But the rest is up to Him.

-Greg Laurie

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Posted by: jakinnan | April 6, 2013

Affection for the Savior

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Let Him kiss me with the kisses of  his mouth. – Song of Songs 1:2

For several days we have been dwelling upon the Savior’s passion, and for some little time to come we shall linger there. In beginning a new month, let us seek the Lord with the desire that glowed in the heart of this woman. See how she leaps at once to Him. There are no introductions; she does not even mention His name. She is in the heart of her theme at once, for she speaks of Him who was the only Him in the world to her.

How bold is her love! it was true condescension that allowed the sinful woman to anoint Jesus’ feet with spices–it was rich love that allowed the gentle Mary to sit at His feet and learn of Him; but in this picture we see strong, fervent love, aspiring to higher tokens of affection and closer signs of fellowship. Esther trembled in the presence of Ahasuerus, but the woman in joyful liberty of perfect love knows no fear.

If we have received the same free spirit, we may also ask the same. By “kisses” we suppose to be intended those varied manifestations of affection by which the believer is made to enjoy the love of Jesus. The kiss of reconciliation we enjoyed at our conversion, and it was sweet as honey dropping from the comb. The kiss of acceptance is still warm on our brow, as we know that He has accepted us through rich grace. The kiss of daily, present communion is that which we long to be repeated day after day, till it is changed into the kiss of reception, which removes the soul from earth, and the kiss of consummation that fills it with the joy of heaven. Faith is our walk, but intimate fellowship is our rest. Faith is the road, but communion with Jesus is the well from which the pilgrim drinks.

O lover of our souls, do not be distant. Let the lips of Your blessing meet the lips of our asking; let the lips of Your fullness touch the lips of our need, and immediately our joy will be full.

-Alistair Begg

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Posted by: jakinnan | April 6, 2013

A Spiritual Lobotomy

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Being unable to defeat God through raw power, Satan’s legions decide to wound God as deeply as possible by stealing the love of his Beloved through seduction. And having “seduced them to his party,” to ravish them body and soul; and having ravished them, to mock them even as they are hurled to the depths of hell with God himself unable to save them because of their rejection of him. This is Satan’s motivation and goal for every man, woman, and child into whom God ever breathed the breath of life. Like a roaring lion, he “hungers” for us.

Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings. (1 Peter 5:8-9)

God could have given up on the love affair with mankind. He could have resorted to power and demanded our loyalty, or given us a kind of spiritual lobotomy that would take away our choice to love him. Even now, he could easily obliterate our Enemy and demand the allegiance of our hearts, but the love affair that began in the laughter of the Trinity would be over, at least for us. And Satan’s accusation that the kingdom of God is established only through raw power would be vindicated.

-John Eldredge, The Sacred Romance

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Posted by: jakinnan | April 6, 2013

04/06/2012 Scripture

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“Don’t let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, and trust also in me. There is more than enough room in my Father’s home. If this were not so, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you? When everything is ready, I will come and get you, so that you will always be with me where I am.  And you know the way to where I am going.”

-John 14:1-4 NLT

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Posted by: jakinnan | April 5, 2013

Weep for His Pain

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With His stripes we are healed. – Isaiah 53:5

Pilate delivered our Lord to be scourged. The Roman scourge was a most dreadful instrument of torture. It was made of the sinews of oxen, and sharp bones were intertwined among the sinews, so that every time the lash came down, these pieces of bone inflicted fearful laceration and tore off the flesh from the bone. The Savior was, no doubt, bound to the column, and thus beaten. He had been beaten before; but this from the Roman soldiers was probably the most severe of His flagellations. My soul, stand here and weep over His poor, stricken body.

Believer in Jesus, can you gaze upon Him without tears as He stands before you, the mirror of agonizing love? He is at once fair as the lily for innocence and red as the rose with the crimson of His own blood. As we feel the sure and blessed healing that His stripes have wrought in us, does not our heart melt at once with love and grief? If ever we have loved our Lord Jesus, surely we must feel that affection glowing now within our hearts.

See how the patient Jesus stands,
Insulted in His lowest case!
Sinners have bound the Almighty’s hands,
And spit in their Creator’s face.

With thorns His temples gor’d and gash’d
Send streams of blood from every part;
His back’s with knotted scourges lash’d.
But sharper scourges tear His heart.

We may long to go to our bedrooms and weep; but since our business calls us away, we will first ask the Lord Jesus to print the image of His bleeding self upon the tablets of our hearts all the day, and at nightfall we will return to commune with Him and sorrow that our sin should have cost Him so dearly.

-Alistair Begg

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Posted by: jakinnan | April 5, 2013

The Humanity of Jesus

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Something has crept into our assumptions about Jesus that makes it almost impossible to relate to him, not to mention love him. I say “crept” because it has not been a conscious decision; few of the things that shape our actual convictions are. I think much of the creep has happened, ironically, as a result of our attempts to love and revere Christ. But crept in this notion has, and it has done great damage to our perceptions of him, our experience of him.

Something has crept into our assumptions about Jesus that makes it almost impossible to relate to him, not to mention love him. I say “crept” because it has not been a conscious decision; few of the things that shape our actual convictions are. I think much of the creep has happened, ironically, as a result of our attempts to love and revere Christ. But crept in this notion has, and it has done great damage to our perceptions of him, our experience of him.

It’s the notion that Jesus was really “pretending” when he presented himself as a man.

We who worship Jesus Christ hold fast to the belief that he was God. “Very God of very God,” as the Nicene Creed states. The heroic actions and miraculous powers of Jesus’ life attest to it. So, when we read what we would call the more human moments, we feel that Jesus was sort of . . . cheating. With a nod and a wink we know that what’s really happening is that Einstein has dropped in to take the first-grade math quiz. Mozart is playing a measure in the kindergarten song flute choir. After all, we’re talking about Jesus here. The guy walked on water, raised Lazarus from the dead. He never broke a sweat, right?

But then, what do you make of that terrible sweat in Gethsemane?

Deeply distressed.

Overwhelmed with sorrow.

Anguished.

This doesn’t sound like somebody cheating to me. He begs his Father, with tears, that this awful cup might be taken from him. Please, let there be some other way. He doesn’t want to do it. Sweat like blood pouring from his tormented brow. He pleads with his Father, and then he pleads a second time, and then a third. Does this sound like Einstein adding two and two?

He was human. Really.

-John Eldredge, Beautiful Outlaw

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Posted by: jakinnan | April 5, 2013

04/05/2013 Scripture

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In fact, we expected to die. But as a result, we stopped relying on ourselves and learned to rely only on God, who raises the dead.  And he did rescue us from mortal danger, and he will rescue us again. We have placed our confidence in him, and he will continue to rescue us.

-2 Corinthians 1:9-10 NLT

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Posted by: jakinnan | April 4, 2013

BBQ Chicken Wraps

BBQCHIX

Ingredients

7 oz pouch chicken breast
2   flour tortillas (soft taco size)
1⁄4 c bbq sauce
2 oz pepper-jack cheese
1⁄4 c french fried onions

Notes

BBQ is shelf stable and can be carried in a leak-proof container or you can use two tubs from a fast food restaurant. Pepper-jack cheese can be found at most grocery stores in sticks similar to string cheese, bring along 2 sticks. If you cannot find, carry 2 ounces of the cheese. Colby cheese or cheddar also works.

Instructions

At home:
Pack the fried onions into a snack bag. Tuck in 2 paper towels with everything.

In camp:
Open up the chicken pouch and add in the BBQ sauce, stirring well to break up the chicken.
Lay out a clean paper towel for each tortilla, divide the chicken between the two. Dice up a piece of cheese on each tortilla, then sprinkle on the onions. Roll up and enjoy!
Take more of the fried onions as a side treat too!

Courtesy of trailcooking.com

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Posted by: jakinnan | April 4, 2013

Solving Man’s Greatest Problem

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Forgive us our debts. – Matthew 6:12

Man’s greatest problem is sin. It renders him spiritually dead, alienates him from God and his fellow man, plagues him with guilt and fear, and can eventually damn him to eternal hell. The only solution is forgiveness–and the only source of forgiveness is Jesus Christ.

All sin is punishable by death (Rom. 6:23) but Christ bore the sins of the world, thereby making it possible to be forgiven and have eternal life through faith in Him (John 3:16). What a glorious reality!

Scripture speaks of two kinds of forgiveness: judicial and parental. Judicial forgiveness comes from God the righteous judge, who wiped your sin off the record and set you free from its punishment and guilt. At the moment of your salvation He forgave all your sins–past, present, and future–and pronounced you righteous for all eternity. That’s why nothing can ever separate you from Christ’s love (Rom. 8:38-39).

Parental forgiveness is granted to believers by their loving heavenly Father as they confess their sin and seek His cleansing. That’s the kind of forgiveness Jesus speaks of in Matthew 6:12.

When a child disobeys his father, the father/child relationship isn’t severed. The child is still a member of the family and there’s a sense in which he is already forgiven because he’s under the umbrella of his father’s parental love. But some of the intimacy of their relationship is lost until the child seeks forgiveness.

That’s the idea in Matthew 6:12. The sins you commit as a believer don’t rob you of your salvation, but they do affect your relationship with God. He still loves you and will always be your Father, but the intimacy and sweet communion you once knew is jeopardized until you seek reconciliation by confessing your sins.

As a Christian, you are judicially forgiven and will never come into condemnation. But never presume on that grace. Make confession part of your daily prayers so sin will never erode your relationship with your Heavenly Father.

Suggestions for Prayer:

 

  • Thank God for His judicial forgiveness of all your sins.
  • Ask Him to help you maintain the joy of your relationship with Him by quickly dealing with any sin that comes up in your life.

For Further Study:

Read Psalm 32:1-7.

 

  • How did David feel about forgiveness?
  • What happened to David before he confessed his sin?

-John MacArthur

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Posted by: jakinnan | April 4, 2013

Finished

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When Jesus had tasted it, he said, “It is finished!” Then he bowed his head and released his spirit. – John 19:30

The cross was the goal of Jesus from the very beginning. His birth was so there would be His death. The incarnation was for our atonement. He was born to die so that we might live. And when He had accomplished the purpose He had come to fulfill, He summed it up with a single word: “finished.”

In the original Greek, it was a common word. Jesus probably used it after He finished a project that He and Joseph might have been working on together in the carpentry shop. Jesus might have turned to Joseph and said, “Finished. Now let’s go have lunch.” It is finished. Mission accomplished. It is done. It is made an end of.

So what was finished? Finished and completed were the horrendous sufferings of Christ. Never again would He experience pain at the hand of wicked men. Never again would He have to bear the sins of the world. Never again would He, even for a moment, be forsaken of God. That was completed. That was taken care of.

Also finished was Satan’s stronghold on humanity. Jesus came to deal a decisive blow against the devil and his demons at the cross of Calvary. Hebrews 2:14 says, “Only by dying could he break the power of the devil, who had the power of death.” This means that you no longer have to be under the power of sin. Because of Jesus’ accomplishment at the cross, finished was the stronghold of Satan on humanity.

And lastly, finished was our salvation. It is completed. It is done. All of our sins were transferred to Jesus when He hung on the cross. His righteousness was transferred to our account.

So Jesus cried out the words, “It is finished!” It was God’s deliberate and well-thought-out plan. It is finished—so rejoice!

-Greg Laurie

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