Category: Thoughts and Meditations

“But Caleb quieted the people before Moses and said, ‘Let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it.’” – Numbers 13:30

We get so easily distracted and discouraged by the things in the world that seem so much bigger than us! Pandemics…war…chaos…division…. These things are truly terrible, but we can’t let them distract us from the work prepared for us by God.

The people of Israel were given a task – follow God into the promised land. However, when their spies reported all the obstacles that were bigger than them – the cities…the fortifications…the people… – that report froze the people of God in their tracks. Given a task and the promise that God would accomplish it, the people refused to move. They were distracted and defeated by the difficulties that loomed so large.

However, they forgot how much bigger God is than any earthly obstacle! They failed to understand that no matter how strong the fortifications or how fierce the resistance, God would make His people succeed in His work. Out of all the leaders who’d seen the distractions and dangers with their own eyes, only Caleb and Joshua had the faith to trust and follow God in the task He’d given them. For this, they were blessed and the rest of the nation cursed.

We too have a task. Make disciples of Jesus Christ by going, baptizing, and teaching (Matthew 28:18-20). Yes, there are difficulties, dangers, and distractions that can easily paralyze us in these Turbulent ‘20s. Yes, they’re bigger than anything we can handle ourselves. However, we don’t go alone and we don’t face them in our own strength. Jesus Christ, Who has all authority in heaven and on earth is with us always! Don’t get distracted by the news – just do the work God’s called you to do!

“Who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.” – Romans 4:25

Our justification – our right standing before Holy God – is thoroughly grounded in the resurrection of Jesus. If Jesus had remained dead after sacrificing Himself for our sins, then we’d still be dead in our sins. Thankfully, Jesus is alive! He is gloriously, wondrously alive, currently ruling and reigning over the universe from heaven!

Jesus rose from the dead – physically resurrected. He visited His disciples on many occasions. They touched Him. He ate with them. He appeared to His skeptical brothers. He appeared to hundreds of witnesses who could have denied the experience. Instead, they devoted the rest of their lives to telling people that Jesus was alive. They chose to live lives filled with long hardship, constant opposition, great suffering, and untimely death. Why?

Because Jesus is alive! Because He’s alive, we know that His sacrifice for our trespasses was accepted by God. Christ’s work on the cross is utterly sufficient to pay the penalty for all our sins past, present, and future. Because Jesus was resurrected, when we believe in Him, we are justified by faith in Christ as a gift from our gracious and loving Father in Heaven. Rejoice!

“For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.” – Romans 3:28

To be justified means to be declared legally “Not Guilty” by a judge, in this case, God. We will never, ever be “not guilty” by virtue of doing good things and following countless rules. God knows everything, sees everything, and hears everything. God knows we aren’t perfect, can’t be perfect, and therefore can’t ever be “not guilty” by our own best efforts. Rule following, good behavior, self-discipline, and philanthropy will never be enough to make someone who is imperfect perfect.

However, God in His grace and mercy allowed someone else to pay the penalty for our imperfection, rebellion, and sin. Jesus Christ, God’s eternal Son, was and is perfect. He gave His life as a sacrifice for us, so that God’s justice could be satisfied. Jesus was perfect so we don’t have to be. Instead, we must simply believe in Him. When we believe in Christ’s atoning death and resurrection and confess His Lordship over our life, then God does declare us “not guilty”. In Christ, the perfect judge has declared you to be “not guilty”. If Christ is your Savior, you no longer carry guilt in God’s eyes.

We are justified by faith in Christ Jesus. He’s perfect so we don’t have to be. It’s only on this basis that God can justly declare us “not guilty” though He knows we’re guilty. It’s on this basis that we’re made new through the death and resurrection of Jesus. It’s on this basis that Christ unites Himself with us and God’s Spirit lives within us, empowering us to pursue the perfection of Christ throughout our lives.

“And those servants went out into the roads and gathered all whom they found, both bad and good. So the wedding hall was filled with guests. But when the king came in to look at the guests, he saw there a man who had no wedding garment.” – Matthew 22:10-11

In this parable, Jesus presents a bad news – good news – bad news scenario that can only be resolved by Good News! The bad news is that many who were the first to be invited to God’s glorious wedding feast, the celebration of Messiah, would reject Him. The religious leaders and scholars most familiar Scripture and convinced of their own righteousness would utterly reject Jesus, betray Him, and kill Him. They chose not to enter into God’s messianic banquet.

The good news is that God opened His glorious feast to all people, regardless of ethnicity, race, or citizenship. All are invited: high and low, educated and uneducated, rich and poor! God welcomes all who come to His feast.

The bad news is that only those who are dressed for the party will get to enjoy it. Those who try to come in, putting on a show of belonging, but aren’t actually dressed for God’s party will be thrown out into eternal damnation. We definitely don’t want that to happen!

So, how do we dress for God’s party? That’s where the Good News comes in! We can’t dress ourselves for God’s party! There’s nothing we own that is fine enough for this party. All our best efforts to clean ourselves up and make ourselves look good in our own eyes are but filthy rags in God’s eyes. God is perfect and holy and we aren’t and never will be. We can’t ever make ourselves belong at God’s party. Thankfully, God gave His Son Jesus to live the life of perfection we can’t and to die on a cross as a sacrifice to pay for our sins. Jesus rose from the dead so that all who believe in Him are dressed in His righteousness.

When we believe in Jesus, putting on Christ by God’s grace through faith in Jesus, then we’re dressed for God’s party! It’s really that simple. God provides the wedding clothes required to enjoy the feast for His Son. All we must do is put on Christ. Have you?

“For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.” – Romans 1:18

There’s a seldom-considered and incredibly vital truth contained in the final part of this verse: our unrighteousness suppresses the truth. Not objectively, of course, but in our minds and our spheres of influence. This is an incredibly important dynamic that explains so much of what goes wrong in our own lives and in the wider world!

When humans indulge in any pattern of activity, words, or thoughts contrary to God’s design, we not only sin, we suppress the truth about that sin. We argue whether it’s really sin, we question it’s seriousness, we redefine reality to avoid acknowledging our sin. The more we embrace unrighteousness, the more we suppress God’s truth – in our minds, hearts, words, and actions.

Sin isn’t just denial of God’s authority, it represents a distortion of the truth. Such distortion helps us cope with the evil we’re practicing against God, but it does far more than that! It creates a downward spiral of sin and deception. Suppressing the truth makes it easier to practice more unrighteousness, which suppresses the truth further, which makes it still easier to practice yet more unrighteousness, which suppresses the truth even more…

This dynamic is why we so easily become dis-oriented to the things and will of God. This is how we arrive at a season in which we individually and culturally can declare evil to be good and good to be evil, truth to lies, and lies to be “our truth”. We are already very deep in a feedback loop of truth suppression and unrighteousness!

There are only two ways out of such a downward spiral: repentance or wrath. Either we recognize the truth about the unrighteousness of our ways, repent, and pray for God’s truth to fill and change us in Christ, or we will endure God’s righteous wrath forever apart from Him!