Listening to the Word

Romans 5-8 “For if you live according to the sinful nature, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live, because those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, ‘ Abba , Father’.” Romans 8:13-15 We require the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit to put to death the “misdeeds of the body”. Resisting temptation in our own strength is not sufficient. Being led by the Spirit means we listen and obey in the direction of mission, but also, away from temptation. Sin’s effect on us is slavery, bondage to addictions, and habits which shape our character and destiny. The Spirit’s effect on us is sanctification, freedom to follow God’s ways and truth. Living for sin means fear rules us, fear of others and fear of the ultimate penalty for our rebellion. Living for the Spirit means intimacy with God our Father as he...

Romans 1-4   “I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed, a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: ‘The righteous will live by faith.’” Romans 1:16, 17 The power of God for salvation and the transformation of our lives is not found in self-help books, the latest exercise or diet craze, or financial plan. The power of God to save us from ourselves and every addiction prevalent today is found in the gospel of Jesus Christ. We experience that power of God as we understand, experience conviction of our need, and by faith respond to the gospel. The gospel begins with God’s good command to “be fruitful and multiply”. Sin has blocked our ability to live into that command. The gospel is more than sin-management. It is God’s way to restored relationship with him and with others so we can be fruitful...

1 Timothy 4-5; 2 Thessalonians 1-3 “Therefore, among God’s churches we boast about your perseverance and faith in all the persecutions and trials you are enduring. All this is evidence that God’s judgment is right, and as a result you will be counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which you are suffering.” 2 Thessalonians 1:4, 5 Rather than avoiding or escaping suffering and persecution for the gospel, Paul encouraged the Thessalonian Church that God was using this persecution to prove them worthy of the kingdom of God. The early church believed persecution for the sake of Christ was a high honor because that was the same path Jesus Christ walked (Acts 5:41). Our salvation is by grace alone and it is only the righteousness of Christ given to us which makes us worthy; however, we are then given the honor of testifying to Christ’s presence in our lives by following Christ in his mission. Suffering for the gospel should be normal, honored, and evidence that we, too, are worthy of Chris...

Matthew 28; 1 Thessalonians 1-3   “So, the women hurried away from the tomb, afraid yet filled with joy, and ran to tell his disciples…then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. Then Jesus came to them and said…” Mathew 28:8, 16, 17 This mixture of fear and joy, worship and doubt were present in Christ’s disciples and these same responses are present in the church today. It is okay to acknowledge our fears and doubts even as we seek to follow Jesus. The vulnerability of this little band of disciples in the face of Jewish religious leaders and Roman military might made their joy and worship following the resurrection all the more precious. In the face of persecution and martyrdom, Christ-followers in least reached contexts today are still choosing to follow Jesus through joy, fear, worship, and doubt. Jesus can handle the mixture of our emotions and responses to him as we are ho...

Psalms 125; Matthew 26-27   “When Judas, who had betrayed him, saw that Jesus was condemned, he was seized with remorse and returned the thirty silver coins to the chief priests and the elders. ‘I have sinned,’ he said, ‘for I have betrayed innocent blood.’ ‘What is that to us?’ they replied. ‘That’s your responsibility.’…When Pilot saw that he was getting nowhere…. he took water and washed his hands in front of the crowd. ‘I am innocent of this man’s blood,’ he said. ‘It is your responsibility!’” Matthew 27:3, 4, 24 Both the chief priests and Pilot were quick to assign responsibility for Christ’s betrayal and execution to others.   As we consider the deceptive nature of sin in our lives, are we too quick to assign responsibility for our actions on either others, or circumstances beyond our control? David’s clear response to the rebuke of Nathan was, “I have sinned.” This simple statement is rare. The politics of institutions and leadership often make avoiding responsibility a...

  Matthew 23-25   “’Because of the increase of wickedness the love of most will grow cold, but he who stands firm to the end will be saved.”…You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things…”…The king will reply, “I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.”’” Matthew 24:12, 13; 25:21, 40 Jesus’ stories of the kingdom of God, and our status in this kingdom, focus less on what we believe and more on how we act/behave. Our doctrinal faith-statements must be theologically sound; however, if we think giving mental assent to these statements will save us, we, too, must re-read Christ’s stories of kingdom-judgment. Jesus calls us to stand firm to the end, to be faithful with a little, and to practically serve and love the stranger, the hungry, the sick, and the prisoner. It is how we behave, not just what we believe, that determines our standing before the King.   What is the King inviti...

Matthew 20-22   “’…There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, “Son, go and work today in the vineyard.” “I will not,” he answered, but later he changed his mind and went. Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, “I will, sir,” but he did not go. Which of the two did what the father wanted? “The first,” they answered.’” Matthew 21:28-31 Salvation faith is not just mental agreement with theological truths, but rather, it is agreement with the gospel, resulting in repentance and the surrender of our will to Christ, followed by obedience to Christ as his follower. Jesus’ point in the parable of two sons is that words are empty if they are not followed by obedience. Jesus repeatedly reminds us it   is what we do that our Father is evaluating. When the most despised sinners in society demonstrate the fruit of repentance, and the most pious resist repentance, Jesus makes it clear which “son” has found the way, or path, of right...

  Matthew 17-19 “’…everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother of children or fields for my sake will receive a hundred times as much and will inherit eternal life. But many who are first will be last, and many who are last will be first.’” Matthew 19:29, 30 Jesus didn’t avoid the topic of sacrifice or reward in his kingdom. When Jesus calls us to leave our possessions and surrender our family for the greater priority of following him, it is both incredibly costly and very rewarding. Jesus said the rewards for sacrifice come both in this life and in the life to come. There is no price tag on eternal life. Our full surrender of both our sin and our will to Christ will be rewarded. The one hundred times reward-factor reminds us that sacrificial obedience to Jesus is totally worth it. Holding on to our life and our stuff will be costly beyond our imagination. This is the upside-down value of Christ’s kingdom. What price tags need to change and what sacrific...

Matthew 14-16   “…’Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by man, but by my Father in heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven…’” Matthew 16:17-19 When we, too, confess Jesus as Christ and Lord, we, too, receive a new name and identity in God’s family as sons and daughters of our Father in heaven. Peter’s new name included both the clarity of call and the authority to complete that mission call. Like Peter’s, our name will help us understand our best contributions in God’s kingdom. Many today are trying to make a name for themselves, seeking the affirmation of their father and those around them. Our Father in heaven loves us enough to send his Son to save us from sin and death. How much more will he give us; - a new identity, purpose, and calling in his kingdom? When our identity comes from our Father in heaven, we ...

  Matthew 11-13   “’Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.’” Mathew 11:28-30 Rest for our souls is not found in the absence of activity or the pursuit of balance in our lives. Rest for our souls is a gift we receive from Jesus when we willingly surrender our stubborn self-will and take his yoke of obedience and discipleship. Yoked with Christ, we grow in gentleness and humility as we release and surrender areas of our life to Christ that we have been trying to manage and control. As we surrender our time, our talents, and our treasure to Jesus, we find freedom and love we never knew were possible. Our inner space becomes less cluttered as Jesus becomes our central focus. Are we interested in this path to rest? Lord Jesus, you are my rest, for your glory.”

Matthew 8-10 “When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, ‘The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.’” Matthew 9:36-38 Our motive for praying our workers into the harvest can be need for personnel; but Jesus’ heart was moved by compassion for people. The harvest metaphor focuses our attention on the urgency of the task. Jesus was moved by a love for people. As we ask the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into his harvest field, the Lord will be looking for workers who share his heart of compassion. Even the task-oriented, goal-directed personalities can be daily filled with the love of Christ. When we are filled with Christ’s love, we see crowds and the individuals in those crowds for who they are, people created in the image of God, seeking the life only their Creator can provide...

  Matthew 5-7   “’This, then, is how you should pray: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven…” Matthew 6:9, 10 Reorienting our focus in prayer around our Father in heaven, his kingdom-coming here on earth, and his will being done here as it is in heaven, completely changes how we typically pray. Our prayers are often focused on how we are doing, what we need, and our struggles. Can we discipline our prayers as Christ taught us, with the focus on our Father? Our needs for daily bread and deliverance from evil follow, but don’t lead. Praying “kingdom prayers” lifts us to another perspective and focuses our prayers on the priorities of the Father’s kingdom-mission to reach and transform people and nations. What adjustments is Jesus inviting us to make in how we pray today? “Lord Jesus, teach me to pray, for your glory.”

Matthew 1-4   “…the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor…’Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near.’ Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom, and healing every disease and sickness among the people.” Matthew 4:8, 17, 23 If our vision is not captured by the kingdom of heaven, we will be vulnerable to the seduction of this world’s kingdoms - even building our own. The gospel, or good news, of the kingdom is different than the gospel of sin-management or self-improvement. The gospel of the kingdom teaches us that God created us to be fruitful and multiply. We were created to experience his life in all its fullness. Adam’s and Eve’s rebellion against God broke relationship with God and gave sin/death authority on earth. Christ’s life, death, and resurrection purchased our freedom from sin and all its destructive influences. The good news is that we can be resto...

Psalms 124; 2 Corinthians 11-13   “If someone comes to you and preaches Jesus other than the Jesus we preached, or if you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it easily enough.” 2 Corinthians 11:4 There is only one genuine Lord Jesus Christ, one Holy Spirit, and one gospel; yet Paul was concerned that the church he planted was being deceived by a counterfeit gospel with a false Jesus and religious spirits. He was concerned that the Corinthian church lacked discernment and spiritual maturity. What about us? What about our self-improvement gospel which ignores the surrender of our will and the self-life to Christ? What about the way we ignore Christ’s call to love and forgive our enemies? We need Jesus for his blood, but ignore his authority in our lives and the life of the Church. In our experience-driven culture we run after fresh experiences of spiritual renewal without discerning the spirit we are e...

2 Corinthians 7-10   “For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.” 2 Corinthians 10:3-5 Are we aware of our spiritual weapons and how to use them? Are we aware of the spiritual warfare we find ourselves in as those following Jesus in his mission? Paul described Satan’s deception as coming as an “angel of light” (2 Corinthians 11:14) with servants masquerading as “servants of righteousness” (2 Corinthians 11:15), but who serve Satan. Has this level of spiritual warfare against the Church ceased, or are we naïve? However, the primary battlefront is in the mind as we identify and resist thoughts and thought- constructs which oppose the truth of Christ. Our authority is in Christ t...

  2 Corinthians 3-6   “Since then, we know what it is to fear the Lord, we try to persuade men…For Christ’s love compels us…We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us...” 2 Corinthians 5:11, 14, 20 Paul’s encounter with the resurrected Lord Jesus Christ totally transformed his life. Jesus called and commissioned Paul to live and share his gospel to the nations, regardless of the cost. Paul fell to the ground, blinded by the glory of Christ. His fear of the Lord was not theological, it was visceral! In the subsequent vision Paul received, he experienced the grace and mercy of Christ through the infilling love of the Holy Spirit. This mixture of the fear of the Lord and an awareness that everyone would one day stand before Christ’s throne and be accountable for how they responded to his gospel, combined with the compelling love of Christ for all people, motivated Paul to live as Christ’s ambassador. What motivates us in life? What moti...

Job 41-42; 2 Corinthians 1-2   “But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumphal procession in Christ and through us spreads everywhere the fragrance of the knowledge of him. For we are to God the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. To the one we are the smell of death; to the other, the fragrance of life…” 2 Corinthians 2:14-16 The presence of Jesus in our lives gives off a distinctive odor to all those around us. To some, the fragrance of Christ smells like life; to others, it smells like death. If there is no reaction to our lives, it begs the question: Are we carrying Christ, or just living for ourselves?   Do people smell Christ, or just us? To those who are perishing without Christ, Jesus smells like death, both our humiliating death-to-self, and their future destiny apart from Christ. Paul later said that outwardly “We are wasting away”. In a success-driven world, the price of knowing and following Jesus is too high. Death ...

Psalms 149; 1 Corinthians 15-16   “Now, brothers, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you...For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive…We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed - in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will all be changed.” 1 Corinthians 15:1, 21, 22, 51, 52 At the heart of the gospel is the resurrection of the dead and the restoration of Adam’s experience of communing with God, spirit to Spirit. At our salvation, we experience this resurrection-power and new life in Christ through the infilling of the Holy Spirit. This deposit of the Spirit in our lives is a seal, or mark, of our salvation. The full expression of this resurrection-power will be experienced at the sound of the last trumpet when Christ returns. This living hope of resurrection cha...

  Job 39-40; 1 Corinthians 13-14   “Follow the way of love and eagerly desire spiritual gifts, especially prophecy…everyone who prophesies speaks to men [people] for their strengthening, encouragement and comfort…I would like every one of you to speak in tongues, but I would rather have you prophesy…” 1 Corinthians 14:1, 3, 5 With love motivating all expressions of spiritual gifts, how does that influence the way prophecy is expressed? Paul gave us three outcomes of prophecy that guide our nurture and discernment of the use of this spiritual gift. Prophecy is meant to build up the Body of Christ through strengthening, encouragement, and comfort. When we discern the Word of the Lord as those “looking through a glass darkly”, these three potential outcomes of prophecy guide us. Are we asking the Lord and eagerly desiring spiritual gifts? Are we discerning the appropriate use of prophetic expressions of the Spirit of God? Are we growing in the love which is the sign of maturity i...

Job 37-38; 1 Corinthians 12   “Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good…But God has combined the members of the body and has given greater honor to the parts that lacked it, so that there should be no division in the body, but that it’s parts should have equal concern for each other…Now you are the body of Christ…” 1 Corinthians 12:7, 24, 25, 27 The unity of the Body of Christ is a higher priority than the fullest utilization of the parts/gifts of the Body. This simple message is repeated by Paul in many different ways in his letter to the Church in Corinth.   If Paul were to address the thousands of denominations around the world today, what would he say? Our unique gifts, revelations, and theological reforms have resulted in so many expressions of the Body of Christ that we’ve lost the central plot. We are one Body, and our unity, love, and concern for one another is our strongest witness to the world of the gospel’s power to transform liv...

  Psalms 122; 1 Corinthians 9-11 “Therefore, I do not run like a man running aimlessly; I do not fight like a man beating the air. No, I beat my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize.” 1 Corinthians 9:26, 27 Our greatest fight is not against spiritual forces opposing the gospel, or even against other Christ-followers who view issues or strategy, or theology differently than we do. No, our greatest fight is against our own sinful nature which has been crucified with Christ, but still resists the grace of God in our lives. Paul beat his body to make it his slave because he knew the potential for temptation and habits to find agreement with his sinful nature. In our pre-salvation state, we “gratify the cravings of our sinful nature (Ephesians)” without restraint. However, once receiving the grace of Christ we have been set free from the power of these cravings as long as we refuse to feed them. Feeding sin an...

Job 35, 36; 1 Corinthians 7-8 “’Be assured that my words are not false; one perfect in knowledge is with you.’” Job 36:4 “…Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. The man who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he ought to know. But the man who loves God is known by God.” 1 Corinthians 8:1-3 Adam and Eve were driven out of the garden because they disobeyed God and ate from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Mankind has set themselves up as their own moral authority ever since justifying sinful behaviors that God hates. When we claim to know better than God, we stumble in pride. Elihu claimed 20/20 insight into Job’s circumstances; yet he quickly discovered how inadequate his perspective was as God thundered, “Who is this that darkens my counsel with words without knowledge?” (Job 38:2) Our response to discerning sin must come from our love for God and others, and before knowledge. Where is God inviting us to grow in love? “Lord Jesus, thank you for your model of sacrifi...

  Job 34; 1 Corinthians 4-6   “But he who unites himself with the Lord is one with him in spirit…Do you not know your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore, honor God with your body.” 1 Corinthians 6:17, 19, 20 Just as the corporate Body of Christ is indwelt by the Holy Spirit when we come together, so our individual bodies are indwelt by the Holy Spirit as we offer our lives to him. When we understand salvation is much more than a sin-exchange and entrance to heaven, but rather, a covenant between two people who now become one, the seal of our salvation is the indwelling Holy Spirit! This is why sin is more than breaking God’s moral code; it is grieving another Person who lives within us. We cannot live as if our bodies were our own to abuse, fill with junk, and ignore when we understand that our bodies become God’s temple at salvation. This is the most intimate picture o...

Job 33; 1 Corinthians 1-3   “When I came to you, brothers, I did not come with eloquence or superior wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God…My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on men’s wisdom, but on God’s power.” 1 Corinthians 2:1, 4, 5 The vast majority of pastoral training programs today focus on teaching theology with a foundation on original languages to equip the preacher to accurately communicate the original text of the Bible in its context. We believe superior wisdom will transform lives.   Eloquence and superior wisdom will fill buildings with listeners, but will these listeners have a foundation of faith in God’s power to transform lives and culture?   We have a church of spectators or consumers in exactly the way Paul is exposing in this letter to the church in Corinth. Apollos, as a trained orator, would be a mega church pastor tod...