The Lord Is Able to Make Us New  

Recently my wife was using our microwave oven when she noticed a little piece of plastic sticking up around the keypad. It turns out that it was one of those clear coverings used to protect a new appliance. When we first purchased and set up our microwave, we had evidently overlooked that protective piece of plastic and had failed to remove it. It had fit so well and was so transparent that we hadn’t noticed it up until now – and we’ve had this oven for several years. So when my wife peeled off the plastic, it resulted in that part of the appliance looking brand new again.

Wouldn’t it be nice if we could peel off a layer of our skin every so often and become like new? Our faith in Christ doesn’t offer us such a physical renewal. If it did there would probably be crowds of people flocking to Christianity for all the wrong reasons. However, the Bible does assure us that there is a definite newness provided for those who put their faith in the Lord. Our bodies may not suddenly become young-looking again, but our spirits and our hearts can be made new.

Even in the Old Testament it looked ahead to a time when God would do such a work of transformation in His people. “I will cleanse you from all your filthiness…I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you…I will put My Spirit within you” (Ezekiel 36:25-27). The New Testament affirms the reality of such a change made possible for those who enter into relationship with Christ. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new” (II Corinthians 5:17).

 Through what Jesus did for us at the cross, He can peel away all the filthiness associated with our past sins, including the shame and guilt. No matter what we’ve done, He can cleanse us of it. We may still have some consequences of past actions that affect our lives, but we can look brand new spiritually to God. We can have clean hearts and a new spirit as the Holy Spirit comes to live within us.

However, this transformation goes beyond simply our appearing to be new in God’s sight. He actually changes us and makes us new in certain respects. The Bible declares that we “should walk in newness of life” (Romans 6:4). There should be a difference evident in some of our actions and in how we live our lives. The Lord can not only change our behavior, but He can begin to peel off some of the layers of selfishness and ungodly attitudes that have plagued us. He can replace our self-centered desires with the greater desire to please Him and to do His will. Rather than primarily looking out for ourselves, He can instill within us a love for Him and a love for other people that will rise to be the main motive behind our actions.

This is good news. No matter how we may have messed up in the past and regardless of the extent of our moral filthiness, faults, and weaknesses, we can be cleansed and made new through faith in Christ. Too often we begin to think, “This is just how I am and nothing can be done about it.” Don’t believe it. There is a newness available in Christ. He can peel away what’s bad and replace it with His righteousness. He can put a new spirit within us that will empower us to live for Him. Let’s put our trust in the One who can make us new.

 

Can We Get Too “On Fire” for Jesus?  

For some of us our mouths start watering whenever we pass by a Krispy Kreme doughnut shop with its “hot now” sign lit up. It lets us know that some of those warm, melt-in-your mouth treats are ready and available. Recently I woke up one morning to the news that one of those long-standing bakery stores in our area had caught fire and burned overnight. I couldn’t help but wonder if the iconic “hot now” sign was turned on at the time. Obviously something in the building got too hot on that occasion.

It’s not unusual at times to hear references to the idea that people need to get “on fire” for the Lord. It’s a concept conveying that we ought to become more dedicated, passionate, and enthusiastic about our relationship with the Lord and our service to Him. It stands in contrast to those who are simply going through religious motions, complacently following their rituals and traditions, and those whose love for the Lord has grown cold. It expresses the need for a personal revival, a stirring of our hearts, and a deepening of our relationship with God.

While many of us might agree with the idea of pursuing such spiritual fire in our lives, others might be hesitant to do so. They want to have some degree of a warm relationship with the Lord, but not go too far. They don’t want to become a fanatic or be labeled as an extremist. It raises the question – can we get too hot in our pursuit of God and in our relationship with Him?

Jesus affirmed that the greatest commandment is to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. He insisted that we can’t love anyone, not even our own family, more than we love Him. He told His followers to seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. In certain parables Jesus indicated that one’s relationship with God is worth making every effort to pursue and that nothing is more valuable. He describes it as a hidden treasure and a pearl of great price which is worth selling everything else you have in order to possess it.

None of that sounds like it’s compatible with some carefully measured response out of a fear of going too far. We don’t give God a little of our love. It’s with all our heart, all our soul, all our mind, and all our strength. We don’t welcome Jesus in as simply one of the many parts of our life. We put Him first. We don’t see our relationship with Him as one of the things we do, but as our main pursuit. When it comes to living for the Lord, we shouldn’t just be sticking our toes in the water to test it out or settle for cautiously wading in the shallow end – we ought to be diving in.

I don’t believe we can get too “on fire” for Jesus. Certainly we can get off track if we’re not careful. If we stray from God’s Word along the way, if we let our emotions override the work of the Holy Spirit, or if we by any means let ourselves get in the way of God’s fire in our lives, it can turn into a destructive wildfire. However, if we let the Holy Spirit, God’s Word, and godly wisdom guide us, that growing fire in our lives can be a powerful force the Lord can use to provide light, life, and inspiration.     

Some of us need to stop being concerned about being labeled “extreme”. Let’s go all out for Jesus. May the “hot now” sign always burn brightly in our hearts and lives.

 

Jesus Is the Perfect Giver of Love  

As we observe Valentine’s Day this weekend, are you looking for love? Or are you celebrating a love that you’ve already found? In either case, I would like to point you to the perfect person for the occasion. And I do mean perfect. He outshines any of the characters in those Hallmark love stories. As you may have guessed by now, I’m referring to Jesus.

Jesus knows absolutely everything about you and still loves you anyway. He is aware of your strange little quirks as well as your more admirable qualities. He knows all about your past, including any skeletons lurking in your closet. He is familiar with your weaknesses as well as your strengths. He has witnessed your proud achievements and He knows all about the times when you’ve shamefully faltered. Nothing about you, even in the inner recesses of your heart and mind, are hidden from Him. Yet He still loves you.

At the same time, Jesus loves you enough to inspire you to be better than what you are. Although He loves you as you are, He wants you to be the best you can be. He desires what is good for you and will encourage you and enable you to possess it. He not only guides you to follow the best paths in your life, but He makes you better as you walk in intimate fellowship with Him. The more you’re around Him, the more you become like Him. He can actually transform your character and impart His own wonderful qualities to you. You won’t ever be perfect as He is in this life, but you can keep growing to resemble your greatest of loves.

Jesus also loves you enough to tell the truth. He will be honest with you about the way this world really is, as well as about yourself. He will let you know about the reality of sin in order than you can experience the joy of salvation. He will point out your personal sin and guilt so that you can see your need to receive forgiveness and cleansing. He will give you the hope of a glorious eternal existence with Him in heaven, but will also warn of the reality of the awful prospect of hell. He won’t tell you that you’re safe and good when you’re not. He’ll love you enough to reveal the issues in your life which need attention so that He can help you deal with them. He’ll love you enough to discipline you when you need it, not simply to punish you, but to correct you and to get you back on the right track.

 Jesus’ love for you is more than a warm feeling which may come and go over time or depending on the circumstances. He is fully committed to you. He will truly love you forever, even if you fail to receive His love or reject Him altogether. If you refuse His love and face the consequences in this life and in eternity of doing so, it will break His heart. He would do anything for you. He would give His very own life for you. And that’s exactly what He did. “Walk in love, as Christ also has loved us and given Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God” (Ephesians 5:2). “Christ died for the ungodly…God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:6, 8).

No one loves you more than Jesus. So if you’re looking for love, look to Him. And if you’re already receiving and experiencing the blessings of His love, rejoice in it, be grateful for Him, and share His love with others.

 

Stay Focused on a Great God  

Last Saturday I went over to our church building to transfer some music video files over to our church computer. These were a combination of contemporary praise songs and traditional hymns we would be using in our worship service the next day. After loading them, I took time to play them back to make sure that they were working properly. As I did so, I ended up enjoying a wonderful time of personal worship. These particular songs focused exclusively on God, who He is, His greatness, and His character. There alone in the sanctuary I found it a blessing to pause for a few moments and be reminded about the wonderful, mighty, eternal God whom we serve.

In these times in which the challenges and hardships of life garner so much of our attention, I believe we would all do well to regularly take time to get refocused on the person and character of our God. We need often to remind ourselves that He is greater than the difficulties and obstacles we encounter. Maybe you receive such inspiration through contemporary songs that remind us that there is none like our God. Or maybe you receive more blessing from looking through a hymnal at the words of such classics as “How Great Thou Art”. Spending time in certain passages of the Bible that focus on the marvelous qualities of our Creator and Lord, such as many of the Psalms, may be helpful. Or maybe you’ll find it worshipful to bow quietly in prayer and meditate on all the wonderful attributes of the Almighty. Our world tends to keep our problems in front of us all the time. We need to be intentional to keep the One who is the answer to our problems even more in the forefront of our minds.

In the midst of a pandemic that threatens the globe with sickness and death, we can remember that there is a God who is present everywhere to offer hope, comfort, and healing. No one is quarantined from His presence. He offers faith to those who are fearful. He is the Great Physician who can use the medical professionals, but who can also go beyond what their wisdom and skill allows. He is the Comforter who helps us when we’re suffering pain and grieving over our loss. He is our loving Father who stands beside us through it all.

In times of social turmoil and unrest, we can remember that there is a God who can give us peace in the midst of the storm. He can bring true justice where it’s needed. He can protect those who are unfairly treated. He will one day right all wrongs and make sure that people reap what they sow. Yet He will also show mercy to those who humble themselves before Him.

In times when we may be questioning the wisdom of our political leaders, we can remind ourselves that we serve a God who is still on the throne. He can use those in power or He can overrule them according to His will and purposes. He can even change the hardest of hearts. He may give an ungodly society what it wants, but He can also restrain evil and overturn the plans of the enemy.

In times of confusion, we can remember that there is a God of truth. He has revealed His will in Christ and through His written word. We can still depend on those revelations in spite of a society that has turned away from them. And God is still here to give wisdom to those who ask Him for it.   

So whatever you’re facing today, stay focused on the greatness and goodness of our God. If He is for us who can be against us?

 

Do You Have a Personal Testimony about Jesus?  

As I listened to the tributes given to baseball legend Hank Aaron upon his recent death, I was reminded that I was privileged not just to know about him as a figure from the past but to have witnessed his exploits and to have been impacted by them. I grew up in the Atlanta area as a youngster at just the right age to idolize such a sports hero during the prime of his career. I was there in the stadium on a few occasions to see him hit some of his round-trippers. I was there glued to my TV set the night he hit his record-breaking shot. I experienced regularly opening up a newly-purchased pack of baseball cards, hoping it might contain that elusive, grand prize of a Hank Aaron card. It’s one thing to hear about someone from the past or to watch video clips of their career highlights, but it’s another to have been an eye-witness who lived through those times and was influenced by that person.

The Apostle John emphasized that aspect of his relationship with Jesus. He wasn’t just reporting secondhand information. He hadn’t drawn his conclusions about who Jesus was based on what other people had reported or because of what historical records said about Him. He had been there. He had seen it all for himself. “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, concerning the Word of life--the life was manifested, and we have seen, and bear witness, and declare to you that eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested to us-- that which we have seen and heard we declare to you, that you also may have fellowship with us; and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ” (I John 1:1-3).

John was there to see Jesus hit His homeruns. He heard the powerful Sermon on the Mount. He saw Jesus hit it out the park as He healed the sick, restored sight to the blind, and even raised the dead. John saw how Jesus overcame the opposition of the religious leaders of the day. He experienced the heartbreak of apparent defeat on the day of Jesus’ crucifixion, only to witness the grand slam of the empty tomb a few days later. Jesus wasn’t just some legendary, mystical figure to John. He was a very real person whose life and exploits John had witnessed firsthand.

Of course, none of us were there as John was when Jesus was on earth in the flesh. However, have we personally encountered Jesus for ourselves and been impacted by His life-changing power? Or is He merely a spiritual hero, a historical figure, or a legendary idol whose example and teachings inspire us? Even though Jesus died long ago, we still have the opportunity to have a personal relationship with Him. We can know Him. His Spirit can live in us and work through us. He can enable us to experience victory over sin in our lives. The home run He hit at the cross can still score us peace with God, forgiveness of sin, and cleansing of all unrighteousness. We can have a testimony similar to John – “I know what Jesus can do, because He has done it for me. I’ve seen it. I’ve experienced it. He has changed my life.”

Let’s make sure that we know Jesus as more than simply a legend from the past, but as our present living Savior whom we’ve personally encountered and who is still hitting home runs in our lives today. 

 

Rise to the Bottom and Change the World  

Recently I heard someone refer to the movie The Poseidon Adventure, not the remake but the original film that I remember going to the theater to watch in my early teens. As you may know, this disaster flick is about a passenger ship that gets capsized by a huge wave. The story follows a group of passengers who try to survive this ordeal by making their way up away from the rising waters toward an area where they might be rescued. The odd aspect of their journey is that as they were moving upward, they were actually getting closer to the bottom of the vessel due to its inverted condition.

Maybe some of us today feel like our world has been turned upside down. Long-held Christian values are no longer esteemed by our society. Right is often considered to be wrong, while evil is sometimes celebrated as good. Truth is blurred, ignored, or even considered to be irrelevant. A rushing river of spiritually murky, dangerous water is rising to fill the vacuum created by a society that has forsaken God and His Word. What do we do as followers of Christ who find ourselves living in these topsy-turvy times?

I believe we need to do what those passengers were forced to do in that movie. We need to rise to the bottom. We need to move upward and toward a solution by intentionally moving in the direction that we normally would think of as being downward. Maybe that sounds contradictory, however Jesus spoke in similar terms. He said that in order to save our lives we need to be willing to lose them. He also informed His disciples that the path upward toward true greatness was found by taking the low road of humble service. He also indicated that it’s those who willingly accept the lowly place in life who will eventually be exalted. The way up is the way down.

I believe that principle still holds true for us today. How do we successfully make our way through the winding, strange corridors of this upside-down world? We rise toward the bottom. We humble ourselves in prayer and repentance. Instead of seeking to gain earthly power, we look to heavenly powers to win these battles. Instead of angrily raising our fists, we meekly bow our knees. Instead of cultivating a spirit of rebellion against man, we encourage a spirit of submission to God. Instead of taking up arms in an insurrection, we take up the spiritual armor God has provided for us. Instead of fighting by means of violence, hatred, and vengeance, we do battle through faith, truth, prayer, and righteousness. Although there’s a place for us to be involved in politics and social action, as we do so we can’t let ourselves get caught up in the conventional wisdom of a worldview that doesn’t allow for the intervention of God and doesn’t value His guiding principles for living. In this upside-down world, we need to keep conducting ourselves like people who truly believe in Jesus and who are seeking to be like Him in our actions and spirit.  

The early followers of Jesus were accused of turning their world upside down. The truth is that they were actually making progress toward getting it right-side-up again. If we can rise to the bottom, maybe we will not only survive this crazy world we find ourselves living in today, but we might even help right the ship. A capsized society needs those who can turn it upside-down. Instead of primarily pursuing a political or social revolution, let’s focus even more on seeking a spiritual revival. That could really change the world.

 

In a Changing World Jesus Is the Same  

I’ll admit that I’m not always quick to embrace change, even when I know it may be necessary. For example, whoever the new permanent host of Jeopardy ends up being, it just won’t be the same without Alex Trebek. Hey, I felt the same way when Bob Barker left The Price Is Right. However, there are even more significant changes going on in our world. In addition to all the adjustments we’ve had to make because of the pandemic, we’re about to experience having a new President, a different balance of power in Congress, and new policies which will inevitably affect all of our lives to some degree. Our whole society is evolving (or degenerating, depending on how you evaluate those changes) into something almost unrecognizable and unimaginable for some of us who have been around a while. Change can be hard to swallow, whether it’s for the better or for the worse.

So when we’re facing times like these when we have no choice but to turn a corner and face something new or different, it’s comforting still to be able to keep our feet planted on something stable and unchanging. For those of us who are trusting Jesus as our Savior, we have such a sure and firm place to stand. The Bible assures us that our faith rests on Someone who hasn’t changed and won’t change, no matter what else in this world gets revised, cancelled, or fades away and regardless of whomever may retire or die.  

 God declares, “For I am the Lord, I do not change” (Malachi 3:6). His Word also assures us that we have a Heavenly Father “with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning” (James 1:17). And maybe the clearest and most comforting statement of all is this: “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever” (Hebrews 13:8). We don’t have a lot of “forevers” in our lives anymore. Of course, very few things are actually eternal, but we’re losing many aspects of life that we thought would at least be around for a long, long time. Whether it’s celebrities who have been part of our lives for many years, political figures, family members, institutions, freedoms, long-held societal values – times are a-changing.

Therefore it’s reassuring to know that our God is still the same. There are truly “forevers” in relation to Him that we can still count on. He still loves us, in spite of all we have done to distance ourselves from Him and in spite of our world’s rejection of His guidance as to what is best for us. God is still good and just, even as we face the consequences of our rebellion against Him and judgment for our sin. God is forever faithful. Not one of His promises will fail. His Word is still true. What He says still goes, even if a growing number of people seem to disagree with Him. He is still seated on His throne as the Ruler of all things. He hasn’t been overthrown. He can’t be impeached and removed from office. And He’s still the Judge over all the earth before whom we’ll be standing to give an account of ourselves one day.

Forever. Less and less in this life seems to fit that description. Maybe that’s a good thing. Could it be that some of us were clinging to or depending too heavily on some of those aspects of life that are now being altered? Maybe these changing times will spur us to cling more tightly to that which doesn’t change. Let’s draw closer to the Lord. Let’s stand firmly on His Word. Let’s claim His promises. Hold tightly to Jesus, the One who is forever the same.