Suffering Complaints


Are you suffering under a burden that threatens to drive you to the dust?  Has your heart become calloused, so that you will not call out to God for the sake of the things that oppress you?  Have you allowed yourself to blame the One who made you?  Have you come to believe that you are righteous in blaming God for your trouble?

Jesus did no such thing!  Faultless, blameless, and full of love for his Father, the Lord was beaten beyond recognition.  Yet he did not blaspheme the will of God.

He endured his Holy Father’s will, because he knew his God can do no wrong.  And he considered even the greatest of torment as if it should not be compared to the Glory that awaited him.  How is it that we cannot even sustain the sufferings of the common cold without complaint?

The Holy Bible uses a very curious word to describe the testing of the Holy Lord Jesus, “crushed”.  Have you been so treated?  And that for no apparent cause?  Are you without sin?  Don’t we deserve to be crushed?

10 But the LORD was pleased
            To crush Him, putting Him to grief;
            If He would render Himself as a guilt offering,
            He will see His offspring,
            He will prolong His days,
            And the good pleasure of the LORD will prosper in His hand.” (Isaiah 53)

For our sake, and his love for God, he was sustained through it all.  For the sake of his Father’s love for man, he endured the most vicious possible death.  For your sake Christ was purified of all possible pride.  Stripped of his Glory and Majesty, humbled to the likeness of an animal, Jesus became the sacrifice for our sins.

He did not complain.  He did not beg for mercy.  He did not resist the ungodly hands.  He did not strive to evade the whip.  He offered the tender portion of his hands to the nails.  He forgave sins as he hung toward death!  And all of this with the most resolute heart!

And then horror came to visit him; his Loving Father turned his face, as his son became a curse for hanging on a tree.  As it is written in the law of the Most High God, “for he that is hanged is accursed of God”.

Still he did not all allow sin to encompass him.  He endured the will of his Holy Father.  Shall we do any less? 

Consider the tiny burden we bear.  Even if we suffered as Christ Jesus, we deserve the beating. 

As we consider these things, so we become more like him.  As we consider these things, we reach to the victorious one for the strength which sustains. 

Do you want strength to overcome your intolerable need to complain?  You will find that strength in Jesus the Christ of God.

Amen!

By His Grace

The Coming War


Restrained in its place, the enemy of Christ is restrained in its place.  All the while they are allowed to thrive and grow.  Violence covers them as if brilliant red robes of blood.  For now is their day of training.

There will be a war of all wars.  For now they grow as if mighty oaks of men.  For they will face the Mighty Oak of God.

All men will play a part in this war of wars.  No one will stay at home in peace.  And even now the dividing lines are being drawn.

Blood will flow like a torrent.  Horror like a mighty wind.  They will conquer as He allows, when the time is right.  Then the Christ of God will rise to put an end to all violence and rebellion.

Did you think that things would continue as they are?  Did you think you would live in peace forever in this wicked and adulterous place?  Such thoughts have filled you with ignorance.

You thought because your ears could not hear the Living God’s commands, that he did not perceive your wickedness: that judgment was not being readied.  You thought because your eyes did not perceive his Blazing Glory, that he was not ruler of all.  Such blindness has kept you in a false sense of secure peace.  See how the players of this coming war are restrained in their proper place.

Best to rise up now my friend.  Best to humble yourself before the Christ of the Living God.  For the lines of demarcation are being drawn even as you read these words.  Beyond your hearing, beyond your sight, the preparation of war is in full swing.

Those who belong to Christ have already been redeemed, as if peacemakers on the bloody battlefield.  Splattered with the blood of Christ they stand ready to be caught up.  Splattered with the blood of men they fear nothing.  Join them or die a useless death.

By His Grace

The Resilient Church


The persecution of the Christian Church does not work.  It’s been proven through the generations, that the more you beat Christians, the more Christians there are.  There’s a very logical reason for this.

It’s like a man who was brought before the judge for social disobedience.  When he refused to mend his ways, he was sentenced to 30 lashes.  When the lashing was completed he was sent with his bloody back to sit in a jail cell until he healed.

Two months went by.  He was called again before the magistrate.  “Did you love the lashes?”   The prisoner was asked.  The reply was matter of fact, there was no defiance in the man’s tone.  “No sir, I did not love the lashes.”

“That’s a good reply.”  Said the magistrate.  “Are you willing then to return to society and never repeat your wicked behavior?” 

“Sir, with all due respect, I did nothing wrong.  I was speaking the words of the Living God in public.  Many took offense at the words and the disturbance came up.  I was arrested as a social dissident.  But I did nothing wrong.”

“Then you will receive 30 more lashes and spend time in jail to heal.  Perhaps then you will change your mind.”   The judge’s sentence was firm.

“Your honor, I must confess.  I did not love the first lashing.  I will not love the second.  And I will refuse to capitulate with a society that is so corrupt, and hold so highly such unjust laws.”

My friends you cannot stamp out Christianity by violence.  But you have obviously learned your lesson.  You could not make us join your corrupt society.  So you have sent your corrupt society in among the family of God.

These have feigned allegiance to the Christ, long enough for the family of God to love them.  Then with heartbreaking stories they appealed for inclusion.  Willingly denying the call for holiness.

Now the family of God in Christ is bewildered.  They have loved you are corrupt people.  They do not desire to send them back outside.

You are succeeding in corrupting the church where beatings offered no profit.  But I will tell you this.  Christ Jesus is busily planting his crop outside your corrupted churches.

You thought you had finally succeeded in what beatings could not accomplish.  The church had become located in a prominent and conspicuous place.  But the Lord has anticipated and responded to your wicked behavior.

Christianity is on the rise!  You failed once by violence.  You will certainly fail by corruption.  No matter what you do, you will never stamp out the Church of Christ Jesus!

By His Grace

Hear the Proclamation


Before the Holy Lord of Life, I have knelt and understood.  Before the unholy assembly around me I have witnessed unholy and ungodly doings.  I stand in the gap between and am filled with both joy and astonishment at the disparity between.

I remember the words spoken to a man with godly desire for Godly things.  “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?”   Yet I do not assume I am the one to rectify this disparity between eternal life and eternal death.  But how can I remain silent?  What right might I contrive to keep these things to myself?

Hear the proclamation:

14 It was also about these that Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied, saying, “Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of his holy ones, 15 to execute judgment on all and to convict all the ungodly of all their deeds of ungodliness that they have committed in such an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things that ungodly sinners have spoken against him.” 16 These are grumblers, malcontents, following their own sinful desires; they are loud-mouthed boasters, showing favoritism to gain advantage.  (Jude)

Will you remain as a fortified city against the Holy Lord?  Will you exalt what is unholy with joy?  Will you continue to revel in the things that God abhors?

Then prepare yourselves for a “Deciding”.  There is a line between what is unholy and what is Holy.  It has been drawn from eternity, and will never be moved.  Bare naked of all resources, every man will stand at that line.  God will raise up His Holy hand and pronounce the decision for life or destruction.  All that is unholy will never see life.

Will you still embrace your unholy ways?  So be it.  Will you turn and embrace His Mercy?  So be it.  Make your choice NOW!

Toward Easter


Much to my surprise, evidently there is conflict over which day of the week Jesus was crucified.  Ok fine.  But the day does not matter as much as what God has done.

Those who should have known him.  Those who should have been able to embrace him.  These became the instrument of His glory.

It is not ours to hold it against them.  I have often been reminded that men will do what they do.

But as it was true and Joseph’s words, so it is true in Christ.  It was meant for evil, but God has used it for good.

By His Grace

Corrective and Punitive Action


Dear world:

Will you be patient and righteous for a moment?  Will you let a prisoner speak to you? 

You have placed me in chains, I can do you no harm.  But will you entertain the words of this man you have accused and imprisoned?   I ask you no more than that.

By the necessity of survival, you have made laws against such men as I.  And it doesn’t matter if your laws are just.  They are your laws and you enforce them just the same.

So I have been accused and condemned, before the Society of men, as one who does not play well with others.  For the sake of propriety I speak softly among you.  But propriety is the steel you have forged to enclose me in my cell.  But if I must speak to you for the sake of understanding, I must speak to you in the language of propriety.

Propriety is a shifting mechanism; it changes according to the fashion of men in every generation.  And so men like me are forever jailed by your own laws.  You do not seek to rehabilitate me.  Your accusations, condemnation, and imprisonment are sufficient to please you.  The horrors of your prisoners never enter your mind as you celebrate at your feasts.

I do not hold this against you.  You will not change, and it does no good to accuse you.  But I must begin this message with what is true.

You have tattooed my forehead with the word “MEAN“.  And you were not wrong to wield the branding iron.  At first when you accused me I was angry.  And I gathered what truth I could and slung it back at you.  So your accusation was confirmed among you.  And you rightly confined me.  And this according to your own laws.

But in my confinement your accusation has become unfounded.  For since you would not let me be a one with you, in my confinement I searched for what is true.  And I have found Him!

Your own laws of confinement speak of corrective action.  But this is the purpose which you ignore.  For if one who is confined by your laws turns away from violent behavior, you do not accept his change.  You do not offer corrective action!  You simply seek to rid yourselves of what you do not approve.  Anyone who is not profitable to the ways of men is cast away forever.

By this foolish standard you are the ones who are jailed.  And the brand you have placed on my forehead has become my glory.  So I am right in releasing you from any accusation concerning me.  You have meant it for evil, but God has used it for good.

The One I have found, while imprisoned in your social standard, is the pure standard you think your yourselves to be.  He is not limited by death, as are we.  He is not limited by a tidal wave of lies.  He is the absolute truth.  And he teaches all his people to be bold among you.  Thus I have written this message.

He is the standard by which every man will be judged.  For he has walked among us with perfection.  And God the Father has placed Him eternally as FIRST.

While I have been imprisoned, he has come to set me free.  Even while your bars of social standard are placed squarely between you and I.  I range freely in the open space of forgiveness and love.  And from this place I warn you.  Your ways which you hold in such high esteem are wrong.

Were I to gather a crowd of a million people, and speak these things to your face, you would no longer desire to jail me from your celebrations.  You would, in fact, desire to kill me.  Even as the men of a generation, which saw the Christ walk among them, murdered the Holy One of God.

You would see a man who is just like you.  And this man would proclaim that you are wicked and worthless, as one.  I do not make the proclamation on my own.  I speak only what the Living God has said.

Yes I am a man like you.  Yes I was trained in the volume of your lies.  Yes I was violent toward you, both in word and in deed.  For you yourselves trained me!

But the Christ has come to set us free!  And any who believe this message, can have this freedom.  We need not be chained in the volume of teaching that is a lie, any longer. 

I stand boldly and tell you, “Man can become holy”.  I stand boldly and proclaim that we need no longer to live as liars.  God is willing to teach us what is true and faultless.  And his teaching is full of power to overcome the lies of this place.

Most of you will balk at this message.  For you love the volume of lies more than you love the volume of truth.  And you will not put up with one who calls your ways wicked.  But I will call your ways wicked just the same.

I was mean when I did your will.  Now you count me mean when I do His will.  You see how your corrective action is at fault.

But I have not written this for the sake of meanness.  And I have not straightened my back before you as an act of defiance.  I have appeared before you as one who is not ashamed or afraid any longer.  And it is love that straightens my spine.

Love makes me turn around.  I had been kneeling before the One who is love.  With awareness of what he has done for me, I have remembered the people from which I came.  I have returned without fear to give you this message of truth.  God will see, how many of you respond.

These words belong to God.  They are only mine, in that he has given them to me.  Yet they are not mine, for I give them to you.  I have come as a messenger and nothing more.

By His Grace