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A Straight Path

25 Monday Sep 2023

Posted by in Studies, Whole Armor of God

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Hello Readers and welcome-or welcome back-to Renaissance Woman!

I am continuing my study on the Whole Armor of God and the passage of scripture I am using is Ephesians 6:10-18a.  We are to put on and take up the Whole Armor of God so that we might be able to stand against the wiles of the devil and withstand in the evil day.  I want to spend some time studying “the wiles of the devil” and “the evil day” but, first, am going to look at the Armor piece by piece.  While “girding your waist with truth” is mentioned first, I have not been able to draw my attention away from the Breastplate of Righteousness.  The word ‘righteousness’ has been echoing in my mind for weeks now.  It is a fascinating word and is the subject of this week’s post.

What do we mean when we use the word ‘righteousness’?  An online search resulted in this definition for righteous: “1. (of a person or conduct) morally right or justifiable; virtuous; 2. very good, excellent.”  My New World Dictionary agrees, defining righteous as: “1. Acting in a just, upright manner; doing what is right; virtuous [a righteous man] 2. morally right; fair and just [a righteous act] 2. morally justifiable [full of righteous anger], 4. [Slang] good, excellent, satisfying, pleasant, authentic, etc.; a generalized term of approval.”

I can’t disagree with anything here.  My personal definition of righteousness has been those things pertaining to acts or conduct which would lead to approval.  Specific to Believers, we are “righteous” if we do the Will of God and keep His commandments: doing the right things lead to His approval of us.  This belief appears to be rooted in the Bible because Revelation 19:8 speaks of the wife of the Lamb clothed in fine linen which is the righteous acts of the saints.  One of the most quoted scriptures on righteousness is Genesis 15:6: “And he (Abram) believed in the Lord, and He accounted it to him for righteousness.”  I don’t know that any believer would say Abram or Abraham as he became, possessed righteousness but he did something-he believed-and his act of believing was credited to him as righteousness thus indicating God’s approval. 

Our belief being a work is reinforced by the words of Jesus.  John 6:29 quotes Him saying; “This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent.”  The same chapter declares the will of God to be that Jesus lose nothing of what the Father has given Him and that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him may have everlasting life.  We do the work of believing and this belief is not only proof of our righteousness but our ticket to everlasting life and being raised on the last day (see John 6:38-40).

I would be curious to know how many of you reading this believe what I’ve written in the last paragraphs.  It is certainly what I’ve been taught from various pulpits.  There is no denying it appears to be backed by scripture and thus forms the picture of how I spent a great deal of my Christian life.  There is certainly a finished work of the cross.  There is no Jesus+.  Eternal life is the free gift of God in Jesus Christ but there is no escaping the fact that I must do my part.  I must believe and if I am not living victoriously then I have not believed hard enough and have to take care lest I lose my garment, be made to walk naked, and have my shame exposed (see Revelation 16:15).  If I fail to properly do the work, I lose God’s approval and risk spending an eternity separate from Him.   

However, is the meaning of righteous and righteousness moral conduct and right acts?  The word “righteous” comes from the Old English righwis (rightwise).  The first definition of “right” in the New World Dictionary is “not curved; straight;” and the dictionary states that definition is now only used in mathematics.  When I read down to the third and fourth entries, I find: “in accordance with justice, law, morality…fact reason, some set standard” which is how I find “right” is usually defined.  “Wise”in the Old English meant “manner, state, condition”.  So then being righteous or right wise was being morally correct and acceptable in one’s manner, state, or condition.

Looking at the Greek word translated as “righteousness” throughout the New Testament (Hebrews 1:8 is the exception), I found another definition that serves to expand the meaning a bit more.  The word is dikaiosune (G1343) and the Strong’s defines it as “equity (of character or act) justification, righteous.”  Dikaioma (G1345) meaning “an equitable deed” and dikaios (G1346) meaning “equitably” are both used in the New Testament as well and all three words are related to dikaios (G1342) meaning “equitable, holy, innocent, just” and come from the root dike (die-kay, G1349) meaning “right (as self-evident) justice (the principle, a decision, or its execution):-judgment, punish, vengeance”.  In turn, dike is related back to deiknuo (G1166) which means “to show”. 

I thought ‘equity’ and ‘equitable’ were worth looking up.  The meaning is “fair, just, impartial” and that fairness, justness, and impartiality pertains to laws or, in other words, a set standard which I feel brings me full circle.  I don’t find that my heading down this path has changed all that much how I define ‘righteousness’ or ‘righteous’.  For a believer, our set standard is Jesus Himself and therefore ‘righteousness’ is being aligned with and acting in accord with all He has revealed Himself to be which is shown in how we conduct ourselves day to day.  Which is impossible.

Bless religion’s heart but it has tried to make righteous conduct possible.  Various denominations all have their set standards of what righteous behavior looks like and it is presented to the congregation as rules to be followed.  If the congregation breaks the rules (which we inevitably must), there are various other acts we can perform to show not only how sorry we are but to work our way back into God’s good graces.  Wherein lies the rub: all of these rules of conduct and acts of repentance are built on the foundation that God the Father is disapproving and must be appeased.  We please Him by doing our work of believing but, if we should falter one iota in our belief, then we have doubted.  Our doubting does NOT please God and we should not expect to receive anything from Him (see James 1:6-8). 

Are you exhausted?  Burdened?  Heavy laden?  Are you hopeless?  Does the Bible itself increase your feelings of hopelessness?  Do you read a passage like Matthew 5: 20 where Jesus says, “For I say to you, that unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven” and know such a requirement is not possible?  When you read Isaiah 64:6 which states, “all our righteousnesses are like filthy rags” are you struck with the fear that God’s expectations are too extreme, that He knew we could not attain them, and that He just might not be equitable Himself?

This is too massive a subject to be dealt with in one post so I plan to continue looking at righteousness in the upcoming weeks.  I would urge you to see that the foundation of the Father being angry with you is an illusion.  When you see that, everything built on it crumbles to dust.  The foundation that can never crumble is Jesus the Christ, the Son of the Living God who is the very image and expression of The Father.  There is no difference in their characters.  Jesus is the one who knew no sin yet was made to be sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.  We are In Christ and therefore our righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees as far as the east is from the west because our righteousness is His!  It is not just our manner but our condition and state of being that now is the righteousness of Jesus Christ.

In Jesus Christ we can rest in our rightwiseness.  The conduct of our lives will show His righteousness because it is no longer us who live but Christ who lives in us.  Christ in us and us in Him is the will of the Father.  Paul opens His letter to the Ephesians with this: “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, by which He made us accepted in the Beloved.”   

This is what our Heavenly Father willed before we walked this earth and before we ever committed a sin.  He will carry the work He has begun in us on to completion and He will do so because He is equitable and acts in accord with the only set standard that could apply to the I AM: His own character which is agape.  That first definition of ‘right’ is “straight, not curved”.  He makes our paths straight.  He does so because of His goodness and not because we have worked so hard at believing that He is pleased enough to ease our way a little.  He leads us in paths of righteousness for His Name’s Sake!

Unless noted otherwise, all Scriptures are quoted from The Holy Bible, New King James Version, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1982

References

Guralnik, David B., Webster’s New World Dictionary of the American Language, Second College Edition, William Collins + World Publishing Co., Inc., Cleveland • New York, 1953, 1976

Strong, James, LL.D., S.T.D., The New Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville Tennessee, 1990

Requiescat in Pace

06 Monday Mar 2023

Posted by in Isaiah 45:7, Studies

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Hello and welcome-or welcome back-to Renaissance Woman!

This post is the conclusion to my study of Isaiah 45:7 which I began in January of last year!  I don’t know that I’ve ever devoted so much time to one single passage of scripture but, every time I began to look at a single word, vistas opened up before me so vast I still have not fully comprehended them.  I could continue in this single passage of scripture for the rest of my life, I think.  I have merely taken a peek beneath the surface with this study and do look forward to exploring the depths in later studies.  For this post, let us take one more look at Isaiah 45:7:

“I form the light and create darkness, I make peace and create calamity; I, the Lord, do all these things.”  That’s from the New King James Version.  The Amplified renders it: “I form the light and create darkness; I make peace [national well-being.  Moral evil proceeds from the will of men, but physical evil proceeds from the will of God], and I create [physical] evil-calamity; I am the Lord Who does all these things.”

I mentioned in one of those early posts how the Amplified translation bothered me.  It seemed to me that stressing God created physical evil rather than moral evil was not only splitting hairs but a heavy-handed attempt to let God off of a hook He seemed to put Himself squarely on.  No such distinction was made in how the Hebrew word for evil was used in other passages so either God created darkness and evil or there was a terrible misunderstanding of this particular passage.  Coming back to the Amplified version of this passage after the last year of study, I find it still bothers me but for different reasons. 

Whether physical rather than moral evil is meant, we are still left with a problem with God creating any sort of evil at all.  Even translating the word as “calamity” rather than evil has caused a twisted view of God to permeate the church.  Malcolm Smith addresses this in his booklet No Longer A Victim.  In the chapter entitled “Confronting God”, Bishop Smith talks about the evils and sufferings people have endured and the question that arises: “how can a loving God allow this?”  He relates what one woman he was counseling said, “…I am the victim of the Almighty God Himself.”  Bishop Smith then goes on to say:

“Historically, the Church has not helped us here, for we have been taught that this is indeed the way things are.  We have been told that every cruel and vicious evil to rake across our lives is God’s strange strategy of love.  The Church has taught the world to label every tragedy caused by nature on a rampage as ‘an act of God’, while telling those inside the Church that the terrible tragedy is ‘the will of God’.” (Smith, 30)

I can see why the translators of the Amplified Bible chose to make the distinction between moral evil and physical evil.  The Bible does make clear there are those evils that flow out of the darkened hearts of mankind.  I was recently reading a study and came across Jeremiah 19:5: “’(they have also built the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire for burnt offerings to all, which I did not command or speak, nor did it come into My mind)’”.  I have shared scriptures in previous studies about the heart of humankind and Paul has his list of “works of the flesh” in Galatians 19:21 so both the Old and New Testament do make it clear there are many “evils” that cannot be blamed on God but that human beings are responsible for.

While I do understand the distinction, I’m not convinced it would have been necessary if the translators had taken a close look at the meaning of “create”.  If the translators define create as “to make something out of nothing” then this passage is definitely a problem and caveats do need to be made to attempt to clarify the difference between the evil that originates in the heart of humankind and that which would come from God.

I found no basis for defining “create” as “to make something out of nothing” in the original Hebrew nor the English definition found in the dictionary.  When I look up “create” in the New World Dictionary, I find the base of our English word is kre and means “to grow” or “to cause to grow” like cereal.  The entire definition of “create” is as follows: 1) to cause to come into existence; bring into being; make; originate; esp., to make or design (something requiring art, skill, invention, etc.) 2) to bring about; give rise to; cause [new industries create new jobs] 3) to invest with a new rank, function, etc., 4) to be the first to portray (a particular role in a play). 

A simpler definition I hold in mind whenever I read the word “create” after conducting this study is “to cause something new to come into being and grow towards a specific purpose”.  It is a definition that fits every occurrence of the word in the Old Testament from Elohim creating in Genesis 1, to the Sons of Eli creating in 1 Samuel 2:29, and to the Israelites creating in Joshua 17:17-18.  Applying it to Isaiah 45:7 I find there is no basis for thinking this passage is saying God “creates calamity” in that He is the origin of it.  I find no scriptural basis for calling physical evils like tornadoes, floods, and earthquakes “acts of God” and claiming they arise from His will.  In this, I am in agreement with Bishop Smith who writes: 

“Instead of slandering God by placing the cries of this world’s anguish at His door, we must take the sin of man seriously…mankind fell, that man sinned, and he is now set against the love plans of the God who created him.  By default, man is now fighting the blueprint of his architect-and he is pursuing a pathway of self-destruction.  The truth is that outside of the salvation that comes to us from God in Jesus Christ, we will all destroy ourselves and our neighbors.  The tornados, hurricanes, volcanos, floods, and earthquakes are merely a physical expression of the spiritual state of man, who is the lord of the planet.” (Smith, Page 33)

I am aware of the Bible recording an instance where God did cause a flood and volcanoes and upheaval to deal with the evil of humankind.  This is a vast and complex subject I would like to devote a future study to and I am also aware I cannot possibly discuss it in any detail here.  I would like to point out the story of the flood was an instance of God having to drastically intervene in the history of mankind.  Amos 3:7 says, “Surely the Lord God does nothing unless He reveals His secret to His servants the prophets” and I find the story of the flood is no exception.  Noah was the human instrument in that situation.  It took a great deal of time to build the ark and, while the Bible is not explicit in Genesis, I imagine doing so caused some curiosity.  2 Peter 2:5 describes Noah as a “preacher of righteousness” so I find there is enough evidence to suggest the Biblical flood was not something that happened without warning.  His covenant also still stands that He will never allow a flood to destroy the earth (See Genesis 9:9-17). I do not see that this story of the flood provides us with a Biblical basis for assigning all floods as well as volcanoes, earthquakes, etc. to God. Especially as they tend to happen without warning and the Bible is clear: God never does anything unless He first reveals His secret.

We do not need to go looking for a prophet in this day and age. The Book of Hebrews opens with, “God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds” (verses 1-2).  This speaking to us through His Son is what I find prophesied in Isaiah 45:7. Instead of a picture of God claiming calamity as His own creation, I see a glorious picture of the heart of our God and how He has chosen to deal with humankind.

Let us look at this passage again and see it as a prophecy of Jesus Christ.  Jesus is the one in whom “was life and the life was the light of men.  And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it” (John 1:4-5).  He is the light of the world appearing in the very midst of darkness.  He is also the peace made.  At His birth all of creation echoed with the cry, “Glory to God in the highest, And on earth peace, goodwill toward men! (Luke 2:14).  The Hebrew word translated “peace” in Isaiah 45:7 is shalom and doesn’t just mean “peace”.  It means “completeness, soundness, welfare, peace” and we are, each one of us, made complete in Him (Colossians 2:10).

I see no reason to interpret this passage as God stating He is the one who creates the calamities that befall us.  I definitely see no reason for the Amplified to have said the “peace” Isaiah 45:7 speaks of is “national peace.”  That is an unnecessary addition in my opinion.  What I do see in Isaiah 45:7 is a foreshadowing of the truth expressed in Galatians 1:3-4: “Grace to you and peace from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father”. 

Humankind is still so darkened in its understanding.  As those around us continue to live as beings independent from God determining for themselves what is good and evil, we will live in the midst of great evils.  We do not live here alone.  The Holy Spirit is the presence of God in the world today and He brings Jesus and the Father right into our hearts and therefore in the midst of whatever circumstance we find ourselves.  We walk in darkness.  Jesus is the light in our darkness and, as the Holy Spirit opens our eyes to see Him more and more every moment, He causes something new to come into being and grow until there is no more darkness.  The same is true for whatever evil that might befall us.  He is our peace, our completeness, our welfare, our very life in the midst of the greatest of evils and He causes something new to come into being and grow until death itself is swallowed up in His life.

Jesus Christ is the One who spoke to the tempest and calmed the raging storm.  Since John 1:18 says, “No one has seen God at any time.  The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him,” then Jesus Christ is the will of God.  The will of our Father as revealed in Jesus is love-union with Him, light instead of darkness, perfect peace, deliverance from all sorts of evils, and a calming of the storms.  To say devastation is His will for us is a terrible slander.

Let us rest in the Peace that Jesus Christ is: the Peace that only the Lord can give.  May that peace flow out of us to the world around us.

Amen.

Unless noted otherwise, all Scriptures are quoted from The Holy Bible, New King James Version, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1982

References

The Comprehensive Study Bible, The Zondervan Corporation, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1984

Brown, F., S. Driver, and C. Briggs, The Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon, Eighteenth Printing, Hendrickson Publishers, Peabody Massachusetts, 2018

Smith, Malcolm, No Longer A Victim, Pillar Books and Publishing Company, Tulsa, Oklahoma, 1992

Strong, James, LL,D., S.T.D., The New Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1990

It’s A Heart Thing-Part Two

16 Monday Jan 2023

Posted by in Isaiah 45:7, Studies

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Image by StockSnap from Pixabay

Hello and welcome to Renaissance Woman!

This week I am continuing my study of Isiah 45:7 and am still looking at the words of the Lord: “I create evil.”  If you read last week’s post, you will see the record in scripture is clear: God knows evil, God uses evil, and God turns away from the evil He has determined to do.  What I do not see recorded in scripture is God is the source of evil. 

I think it’s important to review-just in case anyone reading this has the same reaction I do when hearing “evil”-is that what the scriptures are intending to convey don’t always align with what we think when we read a word.  Those things I think of when I hear the word “evil” are comprehensively listed in Galatians 5 verses 19-21: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries.  These the Apostle Paul calls “the works of the flesh” and God is not the source of any of these things.  These are the things that originate out of the human heart and mind. 

None of the passages describing the evil that God does are referencing any of these things.  In this sense “evil” is not a great translation for the Hebrew word ra.  I don’t find “bad” any better of a choice because I find I still have a knee-jerk reaction at the thought of God doing bad things.  There are some translations that have chosen “calamity” but the translators aren’t consistent. For the sake of clarity in this post, and because “evil” and “bad” carry a mental connotation I have not quite rid myself of, I will use the term “injurious to happiness” when describing the actions of God.

I cannot deny, and I don’t think any believer will disagree; God does do things that are injurious to our happiness.  We expect Him to do so because we know that we are sons of God and that “whom the Lord loves He chastens, and scourges every son whom He receives” (Hebrews 12:6-7).  Chastening and scourging never feel good but we submit to their processing because we know that the end result will be us fashioned into the image of the Lord Jesus Christ.  What is injurious to our happiness in the present moment is meant to bring us to a glorious result and we rest in the fact that “all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose” (Romans 8:28). 

As I read through the scriptures in the Old Testament containing ra (evil), I saw that the injurious to happiness acts of God were always in response to the actions arising out of the hearts of humankind.  I quoted Jeremiah 17:9 in a previous post: “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who can know it?”  This is not a rhetorical question nor does it go unanswered.  Verse 10 says, “I, the Lord, search the heart, I test the mind, even to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his doings.”  

This promise is echoed in other scriptures:

Deuteronomy 32:35: “Vengeance is Mine and recompense; their foot shall slip in due time; for the day of their calamity is at hand, and the things to come hasten upon them.”

2 Chronicles 16:9: “For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose heart is loyal to Him.”

Proverbs 15:3: “The eyes of the Lord are in every place, keeping watch on the evil and the good.”

Isaiah 13:11: “I will punish the world for its evil and the wicked for their iniquity; I will halt the arrogance of the proud, and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible.”

These passages are echoed in the New Testament as well.  Jesus Himself says, “Woe to the world because of offences!  For offenses must come, but woe to that man by whom the offense comes!” and Paul consoles the church at Thessalonica saying, “it is a righteous thing with God to repay with tribulation those who trouble you” (2 Thes. 1:6).  With all these passages in mind, I can obey the admonition in Proverbs 20:22: “Do not say “I will recompense evil’; Wait for the Lord and He will save you.”

My first instinct when someone injures me is “how dare he/she/they?” and to retaliate.  However, because of the promises of God that He will indeed repay everyone according to their deeds, I can put that person in the hands of God and trust that He will indeed repay them.

But there’s a problem.  I’ve already quoted scriptures in Jeremiah where God promises to change his mind and turn away from the injurious acts He has determined to do if the person or people will turn their hearts to Him.  I also find these passages in the Bible:

Proverbs 16:4: “The Lord has made all for Himself, Yes, even the wicked for the day of doom.”

Ezekiel 33:11 “Say to them: ‘As I live’, says the Lord God, ‘I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live’.”

In the New Testament, Peter writes, ““the Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9).

I am reminded of the story of Jonah.  God wished to send him to the people of Nineveh to issue a warning to turn from their wicked ways and turn their hearts toward God.  Jonah eventually does so but he has no expectation his warning will be heeded and goes up onto a hilltop in order to better see the destruction God is about to rain down on the people.  The people do heed the warning, they do turn their hearts, and there is no destruction.  Is Jonah thrilled?  No.  In fact, he is angry at God.  Despite being a prophet of the Lord, he did not share God’s heart for the people.

How often have I not shared in God’s heart?  How often has my desire been for the ground to open up and swallow my enemies or at least a little fire and brimstone and not “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do?”     

There is a passage in his epistle to the Romans where Paul instructs us to: “Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse.  Rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep.  Be of the same mind toward one another.  Do not set our mind on high things, but associate with the humble.  Do not be wise in your own opinion.  Repay no one evil for evil.  Have regard for good things in the sight of all men.  If it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men.  Beloved, do not avenge yourselves, but rather give place to wrath; for it is written, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,” says the Lord.  Therefore “If you enemy is hungry, feed him; If he is thirsty, give him a drink; For in so doing you will heap coals of fire on his head” (Proverbs 25:21-22) Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good” (Romans 12: 14-21).

Everything in this passage is possible to do while continuing to carry resentment and the desire for revenge in my heart.  I can, through will power, put on a good show, so to speak.  It is not possible to genuinely live out everything in this passage without the life of Jesus Christ made a reality in me by the Holy Spirit.  My cry is that of David: “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.”  This cry is perfectly answered by God in the prophecies found in Jeremiah 32: 40-41 and Ezekiel 36: 25-27.  These prophecies are made a reality in this day we live in.  What is impossible with man is possible with the Father through the finished work of Jesus Christ and the ministry of the Holy Spirit.

Our new heart is already a reality.  It is the gift of God. Jesus has already come to this world, lived as one of us, been crucified, risen from the dead, ascended to the Father, and sent the Spirit.  The Spirit has been lavishly poured out into our hearts declaring to us who we really are in Jesus Christ and teaching us how to live out of this new heart.  We are new creations in Christ Jesus and the new heart that has been put in us is His heart.  We are, in this very moment, partakers of His divine nature.

We human beings are truly beautiful.  God Himself called us good when He made us.  We are capable of doing such great things.  We are not stupid.  We know both good and evil and we exercise our power of self-will every day.  We oftentimes do good to our fellow beings even when everything in us doesn’t want to do it.  We can, and often do, act in direct opposition to our feelings.  This is not enough for me.  I can do all the good that is in my power to do and still be aware of how far I fall short.  The word of God stands firm: “Now this I say brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; nor does corruption inherit incorruption” (1 Corinthians 15:50).  There is no amount of preparation I can do on my own heart.  All I can do is respond to the truth as the Holy Spirit opens my eyes.  This is the truth: I have been crucified with Christ.  I am dead to sin and to my old way of life.  I am alive to Jesus Christ.  It is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me.

Living out of this new heart is not instantaneous.  My flesh still carries the memory of how I used to think and act.  But now, whenever that memory tries to assert itself, I tell it no, there is a new heart and new law at work now, and I make the deliberate decision to, as Paul says, “by the mercies of God…present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service.  And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God” (Romans 12:1:2).

Not by might, nor by power, but by Your Spirit.

Amen.

Unless noted otherwise, all Scriptures are quoted from The Holy Bible, New King James Version, Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville, Tennessee, 1982

Because He Lives

04 Monday Oct 2021

Posted by in Personal Essays, Writing

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Today, the Fourth of October, is the twenty-third anniversary of the car accident that left me differently-abled.  Since Post Day for the blog fell on Anniversary Day, I wanted to do something special.  I thought and thought and searched for the perfect words to say…what?  What do I know after twenty-three years of living differently-abled that will mean anything to anybody?

I recently read a quote by a spiritual leader whose writings I have read and admired in the past, something that made the quote so astonishing.  This leader was talking about us believers taking a carnal rather than a spiritual approach to our enemies and said our carnal approach could put us in a place where God cannot help us.  I don’t have the full context of this quote so perhaps I am interpreting these words in a way the writer never intended. However, I was struck by any leader saying we humans could end up in a place where God could not help us, regardless of the context.  I declare to you today such a statement is not true. I know Paul’s words are the truth: “For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created things, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38-39). He is truly the One who keeps His promise never to leave nor forsake us and I know from experience we are never beyond His help.

At the time of the car accident, I was not living a life in Jesus Christ. I believed in Him certainly but, sick of the rules and regulations and a Father God I could not please no matter what, I had walked away from trying to live a Christian life. I was miserable, of course, but God never once let go of me.  In fact, He was with me the moment I woke up in that car after the accident.  His presence urged me to get out of the car and He was with me every step of the mile and a half journey I had to take to find help.  He was with me as I went away from rather than towards town and He was with me when I found the men who, by a remarkable coincidence, had postponed their fishing trip a week and were thus close by to get me to help and save my life. 

I didn’t die in my car accident and I know that isn’t the outcome for many. I lost a family member in an accident a few short months after my own. What about death? Isn’t that a sign that God didn’t help? That is not a subject that can be addressed in the limited space I have today but let me quote again that neither death nor life…shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. I can tell you He was with me through this experience as well and I can assert along with Paul that death and the grave do not have the final word (1 Corinthians 15:55-57). We can trust Jesus even in these circumstances. He is the Living One and he holds the keys of death and hell (Revelation 1:18). (Note: while these passages have the words grave and hell respectively, the Greek word in both places is the same-hades [G86]).

But what about consequences, I can hear some asking.  We make our own choices and God doesn’t spare us the consequences of our actions.  We suffer from our own choices and we suffer because of the choices of others.  I don’t disagree.  I do disagree-utterly-with the idea that the choices we or anyone else make somehow thwarts God.  For a beautiful story of what God can do when others mean evil toward us and our sufferings do not stem from anything we did, read the story of Joseph related in Genesis Chapters 37-48.  But, what about situations like mine where, while it was an accident, I can’t deny I made my own choices. I have already shared how I did not put myself in a situation where not even God could help me, but there have been life changing consequences from this accident. What can I now hope for? I find reassurance in a story from Paul’s life in Chapters 20-23 of the Book of Acts.

I do wonder if this story doesn’t start in Chapter 18.  The end of verse 18 says, “He had his hair cut off at Cenchrea, for he had taken a vow.”  I’ve read various commentaries on just what this vow was and whether the cutting of the hair meant completion of the vow as such a completion usually meant the necessity of a sacrifice in Jerusalem.  I cannot say one way or another but this vow is something I can’t help but keep in mind as I read Chapters 20-23.  Paul is determined to get to Jerusalem for the Day of Pentecost (Acts 20:16) and nothing, not even the Holy Spirit Himself, is going to stop him. 

Paul states, “And see now I go bound in the spirit to Jerusalem, not knowing the things that will happen to me there, except that the Holy Spirit testifies in every city, saying that chains and tribulations await me.  But none of these things move me; nor do I count my life dear to myself…” 

The Holy Spirit spoke to Paul through another as well.  Chapter 21 relates how a prophet named Agabus comes down from Judea, takes Paul’s belt, binds his own hands and feet and says, “Thus says the Holy Spirit, so shall the Jews at Jerusalem bind the man who owns this belt and deliver him into the hands of the Gentiles” (verses 10-11).  Those with Paul plead with him to change his mind but he will not be persuaded.  I have to laugh a little when I read verse 14: “So when he would not be persuaded, we ceased, saying, “The will of the Lord be done.”  I do wonder just what they meant by that…

Paul goes to Jerusalem and everything happens exactly the way the Holy Spirit warned it would.  You can read the details of his time in Jerusalem and arrest through the rest of Chapter 21 and into Chapter 23.  And so…wouldn’t you think that disregarding warnings from THE HOLY SPIRIT would be a terrible sin?  Wouldn’t you think God would have no choice but to wash His hands of Paul and find someone else, someone more willing to be obedient?  Wouldn’t you think Paul’s choices had put him in a place where not even God could help him?

God doesn’t abandon him.  Verse 11 of Chapter 23 starts with “But”.  I always pay attention to the ‘buts’ I find in scripture and focus what came before.  Verse 10 says, “Now when there arose a great dissension, the commander, fearing lest Paul might be pulled to pieces by them, commanded the soldiers to go down and take him by force from among them, and bring him into the barracks.”  And then verse 11: “But…”

I spent some time between verses 10 and 11, imagining what Paul might be thinking and feeling.  He knew what to expect.  The Holy Spirit made clear what was going to happen if he chose to come to Jerusalem.  I wonder if Paul felt like a failure. I wonder if he was sure God would have to use someone else, someone less stubborn, more malleable.  I wonder if he had any hope of being used to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ ever again.  I wonder if he was overwhelmed with thoughts of “what if” and “if only”. I wonder all of this and then read verse 11: “BUT the following night the Lord stood by him and said, “Be of good cheer, Paul; for as you have testified for Me in Jerusalem, so you must also bear witness in Rome.”

What would Paul have been if he had heeded the warnings of the Holy Spirit and bypassed Jerusalem?  I think the question is worth asking but the answer really is “it doesn’t matter.”  The wonderful lesson I glean from this story is our choices cannot thwart the plan of God.  God was with Paul through his imprisonments and the things that happened to him as he was transferred from one place of incarceration to another.  And we have his letters, some written during these times of imprisonment, like the Epistle to the Philippians which bubbles over with the Joy of The Lord.

There’s a phrase, “You made your bed: now lie in it.”  What breaks my heart is when I hear the disdain in this phrase echoed in the words of Believers.  We ought to know better because we see Jesus.  If God, who is love, could possibly have in His heart the idea of “you made your bed: now lie in it”, He never would have given the promises of the One to come throughout the entire Old Testament and would have never given Jesus.  This is what I know.  I know He loves me and I know there is nothing I can ever do to stop Him loving me.  I know there is no mistake I can make He cannot redeem.  I know He is with me in this mess I have made of my life and that He is making it all work for good and for His purposes.  I know because Jesus lives, and lives in me through His Spirit, I can face whatever this life might hold.

Because He lives, I can face tomorrow

Because He lives, all fear is gone

Because I know, He holds the future,

And life is worth the living just because He lives. 

All scriptures are quoted from:

The New King James Version of The Holy Bible, Thomas Nelson, Inc., Nashville, Tennessee, 1982