Archive for the ‘Exposing The Real God’ Category

God The Truth

Wednesday, October 6th, 2010

True worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. John 4:23

When we come to Jesus, we submit our will and understanding to God, revealed in his word. The God revealed as the truth. What he says is the truth, because he is truth.
1. This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God (John 17:3)
2.  Jesus said to him, I am the way, and the truth, and the life . . . (John 14:6 NASB).
3. But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth  (John 16:13 NASB).
4.  . . . Your word is truth (John 17:17 NASB).

These four verses along with a myriad other biblical passages that express precisely the same meaning, led the Westminster Divines to conclude in the Westminster Confession of Faith that God “is truth itself (WCF 1:4).

When we reject God and reject God’s truth about God, as creator and us and the world as creation, and subject to God, we lose our way and the results are devastating.

Rom 1:25 They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator.

We are either living in and embracing the truth or we are living in and embracing a lie.

And this is where the Christian faith runs headlong into our postmodern culture which says truth is relative not objective. That we find our own truth from within.

But this runs counter to what Jesus said. I am the truth
All truth emanates from God, revealed in his son Jesus and the Holy Written Word.
If it does not emanate from God it is not true. And if it is not true it is a lie. It is not another truth.
And Jesus said in John 8:44 that all lies emanate from one source, Satan, the Father of lies.
There is a source of all truth and there is a source of all lies.

The foundation of the lie has never changed since it was first floated in the Garden of Eden. Although its shape and expression has changed.  It basically says:
You don’t need God, you are God, you can become God, You are the source of your life’s identity and meaning, take control of your own life and destiny, you have the power within, you can transform yourself. Sound familiar?
Substance of Satan’s lies to Eve in Genesis 3

But what about this?
Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn’t serve the world. There’s nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we’re liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

From Marianne Williiamson’s Book A return to love and is not what the Bible calls truth.
Also the main voice behind a book called A course in Miracles and appears on Oprah.

  • The world is only in the mind of its maker. Do not believe it is outside of yourself. (p. 207)
  • To know yourself is the salvation of the world. (p. 237)
  • God is but love, and therefore so am I. (p. 324)
  • There is nothing outside you. (p. 358)
  • Man’s only sin is not remembering his own sinless divine nature. The only devil is our illusion that we separate from and not a part of God. The lack you need to correct is the sense of separation from God.

Oprah’s other favourite Eckhart Tolle: In 2008, an article in the New York Times referred to him as “the most popular spiritual author in the nation”
Sold 8 million copies total of 2 books

  • “Being spiritual has nothing to do with what you believe and everything to do with your state of consciousness.”
  • “Death is a stripping away of all that is not you. The secret of life is to “die before you die” — and find that there is no death.”
  • “You do not become good by trying to be good, but by finding the goodness that is already within you, and allowing that goodness to emerge.
  • “Always say “yes” to the present moment. What could be more futile, more insane, than to create inner resistance to what already is? what could be more insane than to oppose life itself, which is now and always now? Surrender to what is. Say “yes” to life — and see how life suddenly starts working for you rather than against you.”
  • “Through the present moment, you have access to the power of life itself, that which has traditionally been called “God.” As soon as you turn away from it, God ceases to be a reality in your life, and all you are left with is the mental concept of God, which some people believe in and others deny. Even belief in God is only a poor substitute for the living reality of God manifesting every moment of your life.”

The answer,he says, is not to look outward to God for identity, meaning, insight, and salvation. Rather, the answer is to look inward to self for identity, meaning, insight, and personal liberation.

Worship for the christian, is discovering the God of the Bible for who he is and worshipping him through that revelation and understanding. Worshipping him in the truth.

We don’t pick and choose what we want to believe. What we feel is true or not true. The truth is That there is one true God and your not him.

  • The Bible teaches us that God is God, He is the truth and that everything he says is true.
  • That God and creation are seperate. He is creator and made creation and creation is subject to him.

This truth is what Peter Jones, Author of Capturing the Pagan Mind: calls two-ism.
Two-ism is the biblical doctrine that the Creator and creation are separate and that creation is subject to the Creator.
Visually, you can think of this in terms of two circles with one being God the creator and the other containing all of his creation.

The lie is what Peter Jones calls one-ism.
One-ism is the belief that there is no distinction between creator and creation, or a denial that there is a Creator. The popular word for this notion is monism or paganism.(Latin paganus of the earth).

So everything is in the circle.
Romans 1:23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.

Practically, one-ism is the eradication of boundaries and differences. Everything is one.
According to spiritual one-ism, the universe is a living organism with a spiritual force present within everything. Thus, everything is interconnected by the life force or the world soul. And it is a lie.

We see it in movies.

  • Star wars Obi won- The Force is what gives a Jedi his power. It’s an energy field created by all living things. It surrounds us and penetrates us. It binds the galaxy together.
  • The Lion King Mufasa’s ghost says to Simba You have forgotten who you are and so have forgotten me. Look inside yourself, Simba. You are more than what you have become. You must take your place in the Circle of Life.
  • Avatar- Eywa is like mother earth and the whole of the planet is one living entity.

As a worldview, one-ism is antithetical to Christian two-ism because it seeks to place everything in the one circle.

1) There is no distinction between God the creator and creation. This results is pantheism,
that the Cosmos is an all-encompassing unity and the sacredness of Nature. This is the basis for most eastern and oriental beliefs. Was also the main belief in pre- Christian Greece and Rome. They had no belief in a creator God. When Pauls goes to Athens in Acts 17 (v16, 22-28)
2) There is no distinction between God and mankind. This results in a spirituality that does not look humbly out to God for salvation, but rather arrogantly looks in to self for enlightenment.
3) There is no distinction between good and evil. This results in the claim that all we have are perspectives, opinions, and culturally embedded “values”; there are no timeless moral truths that apply to all peoples, times, and places because all that is left is situational ethics.
When there are no distinctions between good and evil who says what is right and wrong.
We despise paedophilia. But in ancient Greece sex with kids was acceptable. it was a normal part of life. Only if you were of the upper class.
Alexander the great, and his father philip, both groomed young boys for their sexual pleasure. It was the culture.
4) There is no distinction between mankind and animals. This results in radical animal rights activism, people referring to their pet as their “baby,” and, in some cities, a disdain for children but a love for animals expressed as doggie spas, doggie day cares, and legislation to allow animals to eat in restaurants with their owners. People leaving their money to their dog or cat. Not called pet owners any more but pet carers.
The rise of radical vegetarianism where it’s wrong to kill any living thing for food, because they have just as much right to life as you do.
5) There is no distinction between mankind and creation. This is also true of humanism. Oliver Wendall Holmes, Professor of Law at the Harvard Law School, Supreme Court of the United States from 1902 to 1932.. said, “I see no reason for attributing to man a significance different in kind from that which belongs to a baboon or a grain of sand”.
This results in radical environmentalism where a tree has as much a right to exist as a person. This moves beyond stewarding creation, to deifying creation.
6) There is no distinction between men and women; gender is reduced to asexual androgyny. This results in anything goes and all is good. lesbianism, transgenderism, homosexuality, cross-dressing, and the like, which Romans 1 says is the logical conclusion of removing God from his rightful place.
Rom 1:28-31 Since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless.
7) There is no distinction between religions. The result is a vague pagan spirituality that believes the answers to all the world’s problems are religious and spiritual in nature and can only be overcome by all religions worshiping together as one.

Subsequently, a Christian who makes distinctions (such as between God and man, Jesus and Satan, angels and demons, heaven and hell, man and animals, holiness and sin, the Bible and other texts, male and female, heterosexuality and homosexuality, truth and error, good and evil) is considered a fundamental threat to the utopian world of peace, love, and oneness.

78 times in the gospels Jesus said, I tell you the truth.
Jesus said I am the way, the truth and the life.

Westminster Confession Of Faith
There is but one only, living, and true God, who is infinite in being and perfection, a most pure spirit,  invisible,  without body, parts, or passions; immutable, immense,  eternal, incomprehensible, almighty, most wise, most holy, most free, most absolute; working all things according to the counsel of His own immutable and most righteous will, for His own glory; most loving, gracious, merciful, long-suffering, abundant in goodness and truth,

Posted in Exposing The Real God | 112 Comments »

God The Holy

Tuesday, September 28th, 2010

Why did Jesus come into the world?  To save from sins, redeem us, heal us. All true. However Jesus says in John 17:3 “Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent”.

Blaise Pascal, the famous physicist and theologian said: God made us in his image and we returned the compliment.

And our God becomes as bound up, limited, impotent and untrustworthy as we are. Oh that we would see God as he is.

We are fallen people, living in a fallen, fractured, tainted world. Our brightest and whitest are a dingy grey compared with our original design and creation. Everything we know and see is tainted. Creation, in it’s magnificence, is tainted and a shadow of its former beauty. So we become accustomed and comfortable with imperfection.

  • So we don’t expect all knowledge from our teachers. We  know they can make mistakes.
  • we don’t expect complete honesty from our politicians. We know they lie. Spin dioctors. quickly forgive and vote again
  • don’t expect complete truthfulness from advertising. We are always looking for the catch, the trick, the con.
  • We don’t expect complete trustworthiness from anybody.

And then we come to God. The God who is revealed as Holy. Wherever God has revealed himself to man, he has revealed himself as holy.

We use underline, italics, parenthasis to show importance or stand out. Jews used repetition. Truly, truly  or Peter, Peter.

Only one attriubute of God that is taken to the superlative level. not just repeated, tripled. Not God is love, love love, mercy mercy mercy or grace, grace, grace, but,
Holy, Holy Holy

  1. Isaiah 6:3 And they were calling to one another: “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory.”
  2. Revelation 4:8 Each of the four living creatures had six wings and was covered with eyes all around, even under his wings. Day and night they never stop saying: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, who was, and is, and is to come.”
What does it mean when it says God is Holy?
1. Majestic
Is your God majestic?  Majestic means august, splendid, magnificent, regal, royal, kingly, imperial.
majesty means supreme greatness or authority; sovereignty

Isaiah 6:4 In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted, and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him were seraphs, each with six wings: With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. And they were calling to one another: “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory.”

Uzziah was a king who had trusted in God, but in his success became proud and self confident.
But when King Uzziah died, Isaiah saw the Lord.

If you want to see God for who he is, King U-Ziah has to die and the Holy, majestic God will be revealed in your life.

Is your God majestic? Or are you the supreme authority in your life?
If he is not majesty, then your God is a God of your own making, fashioned and fabricated how you want him.

2. To be set apart.
He is not of this world. His holiness is that characteristic that sets him apart from his creation. That sets him apart from us.
Holiness is that which makes God.

AW Tozer said, God’s holiness is not simply the best we know infinitely bettered. We know nothing like the divine holiness. It stands apart, unique, unapproachable, incomprehensible and unattainable.

Great that God is your friend. What a friend we have in Jesus
But don’t reduce him to less than he is, because sometimes you will be in a place, in a challenge, in an impossible situation, and your not looking for a friend, your looking for a God

3. Holy means utterly and totally perfect in purity.
He is absolutely holy with an infinite, incomprehensible fullness of purity that is incapable of being other than it is.

And he expects perfection. He says Be holy, as I am holy.

But we are not able to meet that standard nor live that kind of life. What hope do we have? What chance have we got?
  • Nothing we can do is good enough to be called holy, to meet that standard.
  • Nothing we can give can buy this holiness, its not for sale.

Nothing but the blood of Jesus, the holy one, who gave his holy, perfect, majestic, set apart life as a sacrifice, as an offering, shed his blood, for our imperfections, for our sin, for our impurity, for our wrong doing, for our mistakes, for our regrets. So that we maybe holy in his sight

Ephesians 1:4-7 For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love, he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will— to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace.

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God The Humble

Tuesday, September 21st, 2010
We don’t associate authority and power with humility.

When it comes to success and achievement, the world thinks in terms of strength, self assurance and aggressiveness.
That’s the world’s idea of conquest and possession.
The more you assert yourself and express yourself, the more you organise and manifest your powers and ability, the more likely you are to succeed.

Have you ever heard of a humble dictator?

1. Hugo Chávez- venezuela
2. Fidel Castro- Cuba
3. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei- Iran
4. Kim Jung-eel – North Korea
5. Vladimir putin- Russia

We see and experience abuses of power almost on a daily basis. Whether through media or workplaces. And yet the God we discover in the Bible, the one with absolute omnipotence, is a God of humility and his message runs completely contrary to that of the world. It is a clear indicator that the Christian, the one born again of another spirit and into another kingdom is all together different from the Spirit of this world.

God came and said a startling statement about the kingdom:
Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth

This must have come as a tremendous shock to the Jews. Who saw God through the OT stories and their own political and carnal motivations simply as a conqueror who smites his enemies. Yet there is much in the OT that displays the humility of God and the nature of his kingdom.

Jesus comes in the flesh and reveals the true nature of God. Powerful, yes, sovereign yes, but meek.

Matt 11:29  Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

Dictionary.com one definition Meek = Easily imposed on; submissive.

  • The word meek has come to mean dispossessed, weak, insipid and spineless.
  • Some of Microsoft Word’s synonyms for meek are: timid, submissive, docile, compliant.

Gentle Jesus meek and mild……. As if he was some kind of effeminate door mat at the mercy and whim of other peoples agendas. But my Bible tells me about a Jesus who laid hands on the sick, cast out devils, who confronted evil and religious heresy, who raised the dead back to life. Who walked on water, spoke to wind and waves……

So when God speaks of Meekness what does it mean, and how is it lived out?

What it is not
Not weak
Not nice all time
Not spirit of compromise, peace at any cost.
not always agreeable
Not something merely instinct or physical or natural.

It is clear that this is not a natural quality,

Characteristics
1. The meek person does not glory in themselves.
Western culture has been greatly influenced, often unconsciously, by the philosophy of Friedrick Nietzsche.” His hero was the tough, brash and overbearing superman, who would become a “lord of the earth.”

But if the ideal of Nietzsche was the superman, the ideal of Jesus was the servant.
What…….. a servant.

This humble servant approach runs counter to conventional wisdom,
which insists that to succeed we must exalt ourselves, whereas if we humble ourselves, if we trust in another, we will fail.

But Jesus calls us to a radical re-evaluation.
He maintains if we live by the values and principals of his kingdom we will see those principals and values bearing great results in our lives.
He has no problem with the desire to be great.
Has no problem with great exploits. But he hates pride and arrogance.

2. Does not make demands because of his position, his privileges, his status in life.

Phil 2: 5-8 Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:
Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death— even death on a cross!

Talking serious humility. Do you know what God’s city in heaven is like? What Jesus left to come to earth? Not like the secret millionaire where they slum it for a couple of weeks

Rev 21: 15-21 The city was laid out like a square, as long as it was wide. He measured the city with the rod and found it to be 12,000 stadia in length (2,200 km), and as wide and high as it is long.  He measured its wall and it was 144 cubits thick (65 Metres), by man’s measurement, which the angel was using. The wall was made of jasper, and the city of pure gold, as pure as glass. The foundations of the city walls were decorated with every kind of precious stone. The first foundation was jasper, the second sapphire, the third chalcedony, the fourth emerald, the fifth sardonyx, the sixth carnelian, the seventh chrysolite, the eighth beryl, the ninth topaz, the tenth chrysoprase, the eleventh jacinth, and the twelfth amethyst. The twelve gates were twelve pearls, each gate made of a single pearl. The great street of the city was of pure gold, like transparent glass.
That is a serious crib!

3. To be meek means we don’t have to be constantly protecting our reputation.
Our tendency is to defend ourselves against every attack and find some way to protect our image.
Jesus was openly and bitterly criticised for the words he spoke, for the company he kept, the things he did, the claims he made. Yet he never once tried to justify himself or prove himself.
Our natural inclination is to retaliate with interest. We do not need to defend ourselves by retaliation.
Workplace, School, uni,

Rom 12: 17-19 Don’t hit back; discover beauty in everyone. If you’ve got it in you, get along with everybody. Don’t insist on getting even; that’s not for you to do. “I’ll do the judging,” says God. “I’ll take care of it.”
Our Scriptures tell us that if you see your enemy hungry, go buy that person lunch, or if he’s thirsty, get him a drink. Your generosity will surprise him with goodness. Don’t let evil get the best of you; get the best of evil by doing good.


4. Meekness commits it’s cause into God’s hands
Important to understand bible writers didn’t make up words. So we can look at how that word was used in its day. One use was of a domesticated animal who would respond to its master’s voice.

Jesus greatest demonstration of meekness was putting his desires aside and embracing the purpose of God for his life. The garden of Gethsemane is not the picture of a weak and impotent man falling apart at the seams. It is the picture of a man wrestling with his will and God’s will for his life.

Anyone who tells you God’s purpose for you life will always be easy, if it’s hard then it’s not God, has not read the bible.

King David demonstrated great meekness when confronted with an opportunity to bring about God’s purpose by his own means.
He knew he was going to be the next king. The prophet had come and prophesied and anointed him. He had been on the run for years, pursued by a maniac, paranoid and insecure king. In 1 Samuel 26 David snuck into the enemy camp right up to Saul. Refused the exact self motivated revenge.

When Adoniram Judson began his missionary work in Burma, he was captured by natives, beaten and thrown into a makeshift prison. They said and now what of your plans to win Burma for Christ. He replied, my future is as bright as the promises of God.

Apostle Paul sees vision and follows vision to Philippi where he and Silas are beaten whipped and throne in prison. What is your response when you believe God has given you a direction and then you find yourself in a hell hole? Acts 16:23-25

True Christianity, true faith, changes us from the inside out. The nature of God, displayed in Jesus, is becoming our nature, through the Holy Spirit.

Posted in Exposing The Real God | 83 Comments »

God The Communicator

Tuesday, September 14th, 2010

Estimated you watched approximately 52,500 ads on TV alone each year. (@ average 30sec 437 hours of advertising or 18 days 24/7).

So in this deluge of information and advertising, where so many people are clamouring for our attention to buy something or do something, to go somewhere.

1. How do we know God is trying to say something?
2. If he is, Is it important to hear what he is saying?
3. and if so, how do we hear his voice in all that noise?

1. Because God is The Communicator and we are made in his image.
The fact we love to communicate indicates that God is a communicator. Facebook, twitter, phone,
The story of the Bible is the story of God’s constant and continual communication with mankind.

Hebrews 1:1-2 begins: Long ago God spoke many times and in many ways to our ancestors through the prophets.  And now in these final days, he has spoken to us through his Son.

God is continually seeking man out to talk with him.

So as Martin Luther said, you are created for dialogue:
A phone is created for communication not as a calculator, though it can do that also. So are you created for communication.

2. It is important to hear what he is saying?
Have you ever lost your mobile phone? How did you feel?
What if someone is trying to get hold of me? What if something important has happened? What if I have been left a important message? A client is ringing me?

But what about God? Is it important to hear what God is saying?

  • Only if you want to get to know your real father, for he is constantly leaving you messages
  • Only if you want to understand what he thinks about you
  • Only if you want to know why your here and what you were designed and shaped for.

God, your creator, designer, the one who said I shaped you in your mother womb, there is a race marked out for you. Why you’re here and what are you supposed to be doing.

Christianity is called a revealed religion. The revelation refers to God’s self disclosure to men and women. A revealing of who he is, who you are, what he has done and what we can do to live our best life.

  • Supernatural
  • Jesus incarnation
  • The Word (read and spoken)
  • Holy Spirit

Jesus is the word and to reach all men and women of all ages, God had written the word of God, the Bible. It is as perfect and true as Jesus himself.

3. How do we hear his voice in all that noise?
To hear God we have to make a decision we want to hear what he has to say.
The main way God speaks is through the Bible.

  • The Bible is not so much a collection of facts about God, but a collection of letters from God to you.
  • A collection of facebook posts to you revealing God’s heart, desire and purpose for you.
  • It is his twitter update to you about your life and future.

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God The Father

Tuesday, September 14th, 2010

One of the questions my kids asked when they’re young and I’m sure yours, When you talk to them about God is what does he look like? A good question and one that had been asked down through the ages. what is God like?

When Jesus came, he came to reveal to us just what God is like.

John 1:18  No one has ever seen God. But the unique One, who is himself God, is near to the Father’s heart. He has revealed God to us.

Jesus most revealing descriptor of God is as God the loving and caring Father.

Have you ever wondered why God chose to have us enter the world as helpless babies?
Could have had as born some way as young adults, physically complete like Adam and Eve.

Just maybe his purpose was that in growing and developing in the context of family, we would grow up experiencing a setting in which his love would be modelled. That we would get a glimpse of the love of God through the love and commitment of our mother and father.
That each child would grow up feeling unconditional love, be understood and accepted in a secure and encouraging environment environment.

No wonder Satan is so bent on destroying the image of the father and the family. The more it is distorted, The more it alienates people from the reality of a loving and caring heavenly father.

In a 1997 the U.S. Center for Mental Health Services provided national demographic data on children enrolled in state schools. They found that “on the whole, children living in single-parent families are more likely to experience poverty than children living in two-parent homes.” Further, “of those children living in poverty, 73 percent were living in families maintained by mothers, as compared to 22 percent of those children living with both parents, and 5 percent living with their fathers.”

In a study on the developmental roots of rape (in Criminal Justice & Behavior, Volume 14, 1987) undertaken for the American Association for Correctional and Forensic Psychology, researchers found that 80 percent of those rapists motivated by displaced anger came from fatherless homes. Those with other motivations also had a high incidence of fatherlessness.

Study Into Hispanic Youth Culture- 1997

“Gang kids predominantly come from broken homes where the father is absent. They generally fail to develop a self-identity. The gang becomes a substitute family, and gang affiliation becomes a substitute identity. Young Hispanic gang members develop a group identity where their identification with the gang and its ethos replaces the core of their self-identity. It amounts to an anti-identity, in that it is predominantly built on negative dysfunctional traits such as toughness and crime.”
1. Studies on a father’s influence on his child’s pro-social behavior reveals that:  Even in high-crime, inner-city neighborhoods, well over 90 percent of children from safe, stable, two-parent homes do not become delinquents.

The care and security of a loving home, with a mum and a dad was intended by God to prepare you for his love.
But because it is a fallen world, many people don’t grow up in a family environment reflecting God’s love, but have suffered hurt and rejection. These experiences can effect us to know God as he truly is and hinder us from trusting him.

  • A father who wasn’t there
  • Feelings of neglect
  • Or broken promises

3 misconceptions about God the father that Jesus exposes

1. Authority
The abuse of authority in our past taints our view of God. We can see him as a punisher, school master, as abuser. But Jesus reveals him as the loving father. The tender nurturer. He even encourages us to pray Our Father in heaven. Even use the word Abba Father.

Matt 19:13 One day some parents brought their children to Jesus so he could lay his hands on them and pray for them. But the disciples scolded the parents for bothering him. But Jesus said, “Let the children come to me. Don’t stop them! For the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to those who are like these children.”  And he placed his hands on their heads and blessed them before he left.

If your father failed to clearly display God’s loving authority  and no dad is perfect and we all make mistakes, you need to recognise that fact, forgive him, and go on to receive The Father’s love. He waits even now, with outstretched arms.

  • When Ben comes running in to the house covered in mud. I will take him outside and washoff the mud. I reject the mud, but not my Son.
  • When Ben excitedly brings home artwork from pre-school, I always stick it on the fridge. Why because it’s great art? Or because it is an expression of the heart of the son I love.

Yes we have sinned, yes we have broken God’s heart, but we are still the centre of his desire.

2. Trust
Charles Blondin was a 19th century French acrobat, famous for his tightrope act 160 feet above Niagra Falls on a rope which was over a thousand feet long.

In 1860 a Royal party from Britain saw Blondin cross the tightrope on stilts, and again blindfolded. After that he stopped halfway and cooked and ate an omelette. Next he wheeled a wheelbarrow from one side to the other, and returned with a sack of potatoes in it.

Then Blondin approached the Royal party. He asked the Duke of Newcastle, “do you believe I could take a man across the tightrope in this wheelbarrow?”
“Yes, I do” , said the Duke.
“Hop in, then” , replied Blondin.

If we have had our trust abused, by someone who we should be able to trust, then we can find it very difficult to trust God no matter how safe he appears in scripture.
Or maybe we grew up with religion and religious practises, but no God. So we have assumed managerial responsibility for our life.

Only love restores trust. And the more we experience God’s unconditional love in our lives the more willing we become to risk everything on Jesus. To walk into the dark only holding his hand.
Prov 3:5-6 Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding;  in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight

And just like a child can never paint a bad finger painting, you can never pray a bad prayer. Whenever you express your heart to God he hears you.

3. Forgiveness

The parable of prodigal son reveals a father desperate for relationship and union with those who are away from him. When the younger son returned home, expecting punishment he received grace and forgiveness.

A rumour began to spread that a certain catholic woman was seeing visions of Jesus. The report reached the Arch bishop. He decided to check her out. There is a fine line between an authentic mystic and the lunatic fringe.
Is it true Jesus is appearing to you in visions and answering your questions?
Yes Sir?
I don’t believe you. Next time he appears, I want you to ask him to tell you the last sins I confessed.

10 days later she sent someone to tell him to come. She had had a vision.
He came, and said, did you do as I asked. Yes Bishop, Just as you asked. He lean’t forward toward her and his eyes narrowed, and what did he say?

She gazed into his eyes and she said. These were his exact words” I cant remember”.

No Matter what you have done, God, the loving father, will forgive you. Not only that, he will come into your life and empower you to live in way that you were purposed and designed

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God The Gracious

Tuesday, August 31st, 2010
As we read the life of Jesus we see and understand what God is like. Jesus said If you have seen me, you have seen the father John 12:45

We do a lot to ourselves to make ourselves attractive. Some of us have to do more than others. And we do the same thing when we come to God. We make sure we put our best foot forward.
Presenting our good deeds and niceness. hiding and covering the less attractive parts. And we do it because we don’t really know God. And we dont really comprehend his love and grace.

We can relate to a movie where a hero will lay down his life for his love, like in Titanic. We admire the redeeming actions of a guy like Walt Kawolski in Gran Torino. Even Arnie in Terminator 2 when he puts himself into the molten metal so every part of the robot attack on humans would be detroyed. But when it comes to the love of God expressed in the broken and bloodied body of Jesus, we get uncomfortable and shift in our seats. Why so gruesome? So savage?

You may not completely understand the grace of God, but when you experience it, you simple respond with wonder and amazement. I read a lot. I’ve read a lot of Christian books, but we should never let the authority of books, writers, podcast presenters or even leaders replace the authority of knowing Jesus Christ personally. They are all vital, but you don’t discover grace, peace, forgiveness, nor love, in a book about God.

I don’t think The woman who poured the expensive oil on Jesus Luke 7 had done a theology degree. Simon, the Pharisee  could recite much of the Old Testament. But without  the tangible encounter our reading can deceive us into thinking we’re getting to know God and we find ourselves like the travel agents talking to people about the beauty of a destination we’ve never been.

When was the last time you were impacted by God’s amazing grace in a tangible way?

The cross reveals the absolute depth of the Fathers love for you. And it cries out for a response. It cries out for a conversion. Not just from sinner to saint, but from mistrust to trust. The tendency of legalistic religion is the mistrust of God’s grace.

Do you really believe that the father of the Lord Jesus Christ is gracious and that he cares about you?
Do you really believe that scripture that says God is love?  1 John 4:18 says  Such love has no fear, because perfect love expels all fear. If we are afraid, it is for fear of punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced his perfect love.

Do you think of God as the judge, the disciplinarian, the punisher? If you do, you are wrong. Jesus shows us that.

We think God’s aproval and love are demonstrated in the miracles and visions, so always looking for God just in the supernatural events.  The supernatural is very real and God’s power is manifest in victory over the devil- healing, answered prayer. When the disciples came back from preaching said, even the demons are subject to us. Jesus said Luke 10: 20 do not rejoice that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.
What is he saying? Don’t rejoice so much in the power you have been given, as in the grace you have received
When we are always looking for miracles and visions we miss out on the everyday beauty of intimacy with God in the commonplace, mundane experiences of life.

Brennan Manning, the writer of  The Ragamuffin Gospel, who influenced this message said- “Grace abounds and walks around the edges of our every day life”

Yesterday was working in a cafe, ordered some eggs on toast. I like my eggs hard. Eggs came, cafe was busy. I looked at the eggs, they were as runny as Haile Gebrselassie in the Berlin Marathon. I sat for a minute and thought. Then I ate the runny eggs and decided to enjoyed them. Why?

Becuse when I forget about God’s grace toward me, I begin to believe life owes me hard eggs. I deserve hard eggs. I take for granted that I can even afford to buy eggs in a nice cafe. If im taking eggs for granted, what else? your wife, your kids, your job, the roof over your head, your talents?

Why did Jesus say blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven? Word poor in the original Greek = reduced to beggary, begging, destitute of wealth, influence, position, honour

Because when you are really really poor, everything you get is a gift. It’s a cause for thanksgiving and celebration. God owes you nothing.

The more we grow in the spirit of Jesus, the more aware we become of our own poverty without him.

The more we realize that everything in life is a gift.

Are you regularly aware of God’s grace in your everyday? If not, we should be :-)

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God The Pursuer

Tuesday, August 24th, 2010

Exposing God

John 4
As we look into the life of Jesus we see and understand what God is like. The Bible says he is the [Now] He is the exact likeness of the unseen God [the visible representation of the invisible]; Colossians 1:15

This story reveals God as the The Seeker and initiator of our relationship with him. Did you know God is pursuing you. He is committed to seeing you be everything he planned and destined you to be.

Jesus was going to Galilee from Judea. V4 says he had to pass through Samaria. So he came to a town called Sychar.

The town of Sychar was not a famous town like Jerusalem. It was just on the road to somewhere else. Or the road to nowhere. Have you ever felt your on the road to nowhere? Just existing. Just living. No real rhyme or reason/ No real direction or purpose? Living, but feeling like your missing something? Then you will relate to the woman in this story.

See, there was a woman living in this place. Ever day she woke up hoping something would change. She woke up wishing things could be different, but didn’t know how to change them. She woke up this morning and had no idea her whole life was about to change. God was going to intersect her day and show her a new way.

She wasn’t close to God. She was a Samaritan. History tells us they were enemies of the Jews. They hated each other. Back in the days of the rebuilding of the walls , Ezra and Nehemiah, they had tried to stop them re-establishing themselves in their homeland. But something happened this particular day.

1. Jesus walks into her world.
Humphrey Bogart quote from Casablanca: “Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine.” I love this about Jesus and His love for me. Of all the people in all the towns in all the world, Jesus walked into mine.

She goes to the well where she goes every day to get water, but this particular day is different. Jesus is there waiting. Jesus, and therefore God takes the initiative in our relationship. When Jesus was describing God’s heart toward people he used a parable and said, If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them wanders away, what will he do? Won’t he leave the ninety-nine others on the hills and go out to search for the one that is lost? (Matt 12:18).

When I think back over my past, I am amazed at God’s pursuit of me and his divine protection of my life and it’s direction.

  • Interesting that Jesus waits at the place where thirsty people will go.

Maybe thirsty for meaning, for understanding, healing, for change, for purpose, reason to live.

  • He doesn’t wait for us to get our act together, or our life right or living right. He comes to where we are.

Sometimes we think we have to have it all together before we come to God or before we can do anything for God, and the reality is you don’t.

Jesus was reaching out to this woman and she did not have her life together. This woman was getting water at the sixth hour. That’s the middle of the day in the hot oriental sun. No one went for water then. They all went in the cool of the late afternoon or early morning.

So why now? Why? We do some unusual things sometimes because of how we feel about ourself.

  • We wont go to the beach because of how we look.
  • Wont go to certain places because we might see someone from our past.
  • Will avoid certain people or places because of history with them and how they make us feel.

We find out later this lady was living with a weight of regret and a deep sense of hopelessness. She had a history, a past, and it was affecting how she lived her life. Hence her coming to get water in the middle of the day. She didn’t want to run into anyone. To meet anyone. To be seen by anyone. She just wanted to be left alone in her pain. But as she approached the well this day. Someone was there. Someone was waiting for her. She didn’t recognise him. She didn’t know him. But he knew her.

2. Jesus shows her- herself
God knows you. Everything about you. The good, the bad and the ugly. Yet he still loves you. He wants you. Every part of you.

A. First he gets her to acknowledge her thirst.
Until your ready to admit to yourself where you are at, you can never change.
John 4:13 Jesus said, “Everyone who drinks this water will get thirsty again and again. Anyone who drinks the water I give will never thirst—not ever. The water I give will be an artesian spring within, gushing fountains of endless life.”

John 4:15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”
B. He gets her to acknowledge her pattern, thus revealing her pain
John 4:16-18 He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.”
“I have no husband,” she replied. Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.”
She says, I can see that you are a prophet. She is saying. You know exactly where I am at. She had been married 5 times. Lived with numerous other men and was currently in a defacto relationship. She was desperate for something. Something that would fill the void, cover the pain, bring healing. A sense of value. To be loved. To be wanted. What she was desperate to find what she was needed in a relationship, in a man, But she still hadn’t found what she was looking for.

She was despised and ridiculed by the other women of the town. She may have slept with some of their husbands, or sons.

3. Jesus Reveals to her- Himself
John 4:25 The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”

She saying I know there is an answer out there. I know someone can help me. Someone will explain all this mess to us. Help me sort it out.

John 4:26 Then Jesus declared, “I who speak to you am he.”

Isa 12:3 With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation.

God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him” (John 3:17).

4. Her transformation led to the transformation of many others

As Jesus heals us, our life should become a conduit for others to find him also.

John 4:39-42 Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I ever did.” 40So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. And because of his words many more became believers.

42They said to the woman, “We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world.”

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