War Up! ( the Law of Christ)


Okay.  I’m going to do a little war hoopin here.  But you likely haven’t heard this for a while, so you might think I’m being kind of mean.  But on the other side of “takin it right” is all the peace and stability you can handle.

From the day of God’s blessing to Abraham until today, Israel has been in a state of war.  Whatever tiny moments of peace they found in that time, were short lived.  And the ensuing battles became worse and worse.  (I’m including the Holocaust in this.)

In the meantime God sent his only Son, and the battle did nothing more than get really personal.

Today’s church knows virtually nothing about this as a whole.  And this ignorance has given rise to a great influx of Tares. 

Well if you’re willing to listen, there’s a fix for this.  If not, may the will of the Living God be done in the advent of the end.

Look at what Jesus said here.  He came to take away the “National” concept (not that it was ever God’s intention).  But he distinctly replaced it with a personal burden. 

34 “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. 35 For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. 36 And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household. 37 Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. 38 And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. 39 Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.” (Matthew 10) 

I have found this to be blazingly true!  If you love the Lord you will be hated.  And this to the extent that I will push the envelope a little farther:  if you are not hated you might want to do a little pocket check to see if you love the Lord.

See how the war was intended to come home.  But he hasn’t left any one as an orphan.  Not only has he sent the Holy Spirit to help and to guide every individual,  but the law of Moses remains among us as strong as it ever was.  What was spoken in Moses’s day is not removed from anyone. 

Not that we should be legalistic in our approach to God, but the fire of his words ought to live in every one of his people as a great raging holy fire.

One small portion of that entire law is one of the greatest encouragements to man ever to be spoken.  It may ring out rather often from the pulpit.  But it is rarely taken home.  If it was obeyed, we would see an entirely different church.

4 “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. 5 You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. 6 And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. 7 You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. 8 You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. 9 You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.” (Deuteronomy 6)

Since the war has become a personal issue, by a straightforward challenge from the Living God’s Holy Son, each individual has become his own house. 

Binding God’s laws on your hands does not necessarily mean a bracelet, but that everything our hands find to do should have the marks of our God on it.  Obedience leaves a distinct holy mark.

And if we have the words of the Living God in us, our entire perception will be as if we wore a little case between our eyes which is filled with holy and good words.

As many as we can rally to understand these things, to that extent the church is transformed. 

And I will add this:  If you start to speak with every member of your church as if these things were alive and true, with all expectation that they agreed with you, the tares would not think it a gentle place to live any longer.  The Christian social club would have to disband.  And O the war would come home!

By His Grace

Even Me


Reflection from today’s Bible reading:

Yes, even the one who writes this.  Even he will be brought low.  The evil that is in Him will be purged; a consuming fire will burn it away, from the present and from eternity.

Pride will be crushed.  There will be no foothold for it to climb the Holy Mountain of God.  The narrow mindedness of unholy desire will be set on fire.  And what remains will undergo refinement.

Even the one who writes this, will succumb to the Glory of the Sovereign God.  For God’s judgment is against all wickedness in all men.  And he will bring Man’s state of affairs to an abrupt end.

There will be no further place where the Word of God is wedged between brothers for the sake of gain.  For even now many use the word of God to subject their brothers to shame.  Secretly in their hearts they keep count of their victims.  Trophies of battle, line the shelves of their halls.  They have converted what is Holy to what is obscene.  And the Most High God is witness to it all.

Divide, divide, cutaway at one another.  There is a place of judgment.  And even the one who writes this will be purified.  God is no respecter of man.

The pride of life enters into a man’s things, like fine dust in an unkempt house.  Who is he that is diligent to clean?  Who is he who opens the drapes that the light of Righteousness might expose his filth?  Who is he who cleans his house so that the consuming fire will have less to consume?  For everyone will be bathed in the Holy Fire of God’s righteous judgment.

No religion will shield you.  For not one man does the Holy laws he holds up for others to see.  Woe to all men for the sake of their pride.  Blessings and peace belong exclusively to those who do the will of God in Christ Jesus, His holy and Righteous Son.  Yet every man will be cleansed in regard to what remains.

The motivation of the heart will be exposed.  The secret desires spilled out.  It will come upon the righteous.  It will envelop the most wicked.  And all those in between will be dealt with in truth and righteousness.  Yes, even upon the one who writes this.

By His Grace

The End


Come all you birds of the air.  Gather in one place where peace and food are plentiful.  Your wings are tired, your bellies are hungry.  Come, rest and eat.

In the open field the bounty awaits.  No man will drive you away.  With their greedy violence spent, they have no strength to bury their dead.  Come, you birds of the air, and taste the forbidden fruit.

As it is in the open field, so it is in the houses and buildings of society.  The rebellion against God has come to completion.  They murdered His Holy Son.  Now they murder one another. 

A feast for the birds, a bounty for the rodents!  The pride of man is decimated.  No longer will he sin in freedom!  As he lived to destroy, now he is forced to present himself for judgment.

Rest peacefully, Oh beautiful creation.  Rest peacefully until the Lord covers you with a holy fire.  The ones who have taken from you, have taken from themselves.  Your loss will be avenged.

By His Grace

Respite not Despite


I have a dear friend who has gone on a cruise today.  She gets tan while I get cold.  But I am very happy for her.

She carries a lot of weight on her shoulders, in her normal routine.  There seems to be no respite from the burden.  But she carries on despite the great troubles.

But when she is offered this few days of respite from the war, she comes back an entirely different person.

In Christ, when we are offered forgiveness, is it sure, and given by the one who is able to give.  He gives this forgiveness of sins for the sake of comfort and increased faith. 

Before it comes (This powerful expression of his love) we hold to our faith, but we are in the midst of a war.  When it comes there is joy.

But here the forgiveness of sins is like the cruise to my friend.  If she went on the cruise and did not enjoy herself, rather worried about the time when she returns, her respite from trouble would be worthless.

Is the forgiveness of Christ worthless in our trouble?

It is meant to build us up and to give us health and joy.  But many, including myself, have reserved their joy for heaven.  They have carried on serving Christ Jesus despite their gloom.  This is not the intent of our Lord.

When you get a warm day in winter, rejoice.  When you get a cool day in summer, likewise rejoice.  When forgiveness comes, with power, rejoice!

Among men it is truly better to give than to receive.  Before Christ we are the receivers only.  Humility breeds joy.

By His Grace

The True War


It is not against The Righteousness of God that a man finds himself at war.  The war finds itself in the battlefield of willingness.

 

The Righteousness of God is established forever.  It wars against no one.

 

But let a man perceive the truth of life’s singular and constant war.  It is waged without weapons or blood.

 

God stands firm in His Glorious Righteous ways.  It is the man who finds his own limit.

 

What then?  Where will a man stand on that Great and Horrible day?

 

His willingness alone dictates his position among the great throng.

 

Was he willing to lay down selfish desire?  To what extent that appeared, the man will find his place before Him.

 

The Righteousness of God is as the battlefield itself.  But the vicious war is attended to by the man and his willingness.

How convenient


You made fairy tales for the children to believe.  Fairy tales.  They are fairy tales, sir. Lies, if you will.

You convince them of the beauty of riches, elegance, princes and princesses, and happily ever afters.

Then when the crop of children grows old enough to harvest, that is to say when they can get money from their parents, you entice them to give you the money by offering them toys from the fairy tales.

How utterly convenient.  Who’s bright entrepreneurial idea was this? 

Is there some way to justify this?  Is there some preventive means to avoid accusation?  Have you retained a lawyer in heaven to litigate for you before the Most High God?

“Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them for of such is the kingdom of heaven.”  And, “If anyone causes one of these little ones–those who believe in me–to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea.”

You teach them about Santa Claus.  But you reject the living God in Christ Jesus.  You teach them about witches but you never mention the Holy Spirit.  You teach them about war but you do not teach them about the peace of God.

I bring this subject to the table.  But I am not able  or willing to condemn you.  You taught me well when I was a child.  And so I taught my children.

But God will defend that which is his.  Woe to those to make a profit on innocence.

By His Grace