Abhor Evil, Hold Fast to What is Good

These are the two strongest emotions a person can feel, hatred and love. You may be tempted to say that anger tops hatred, but wouldn’t anger stem from hatred? 

If something abhors you then my guess is it will trigger anger inside of you.  And if that something is something that Jesus abhors, then that anger is a righteous anger and can be used for good.

Romans 12:11 says to use these two emotions and use them well.  Inside each of us is the ability to hate and love.  Hate is such a strong word that, at times, I am tempted to say that I shouldn’t hate anything.  But God has given me and you this feeling, this emotion of hatred for a reason.  Hatred gives me that umph to push away from the world, from evil, and to cling to Jesus.  Without hatred I would never be able to separate myself from a world that is constantly telling me it has something better to offer me than Jesus does.  Without hatred, I would never be able to grab a hold on to Jesus because my loyalties would be split between this world and Jesus.  Hatred gives me the needed force to remove myself from evil, resist the devil, and draw near to God.

We have taken these two raw emotions and have watered them down by applying them to words like broccoli, “I hate broccoli” or “I love broccoli”. (Although, the first example is more real in my world).  We lose the spiritual value of these emotions when we apply them to things that have no eternal value.

God says, abhor what is evil.  Abhor is not just a mere dislike, rather it means to resent, despise, have nothing to do with evil.  On the other hand, God says hold fast to what is good.  This means much more than liking what is good, rather it means to associate, hire, be a part of, what is good.

James 1:17 says every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights…

Anything that is good, anything that we are to hold fast to comes from the Father and has culminated in the Son.   Sometimes, in a word filled with lies, it is hard to know what to hold fast to, what is good, but one thing is for sure, if you hold fast to Jesus, then you are holding fast to good.  If you resist the evil one and draw near to Jesus, then Jesus will draw near to you.

Let me close 1 Thessalonians 5:21-22, “but test everything; hold fast what is good. ²² Abstain from every form of evil.”

Counting the Cost

How much are you willing to pay to see one soul enter into eternity?

I love the hymn, “Jesus Paid it All”.  I believe we will never understand the weight of a statement like that.  He paid it all?  What does all encompass?  His life?  His glory?  What else did he pay in order to save you from the punishment your sin justly deserves?

This week has been a crazy week as we hopped from doctor visit to the ER back to the doctor, back to the hospital for x-rays, trying to diagnose my daughter’s illness.

For a brief moment I contemplated on how we were driving across town, sometimes three times a day this week and how we were going to blow our gas budget because of my daughter being sick.  You know what I did after that thought? That’s right!  I kept driving to the next appointment and then the next appointment because the cost of gas doesn’t compare to the health of my daughter.  I will pay whatever it would take to make my daughter well.  

Then, in the midst of my thought about how good of a dad I was because I wasn’t putting my gas budget before the needs of my daughter, I had one of those “God” moments. “Greg”, God said in his oh so quiet convincing voice, “If that’s how much you are willing to pay to save the physical well being of another human, then how much are you willing to pay to save the souls of many more?”

Sheesh!  Why, God?  You really need to bring that up now.  Do you have to bring that point up in the moment of life where it is going to be most compelling!  Because the truth is, I am not willing to pay it all, and I am probably not willing to pay as much as I would on my daughter’s health to see people come to know Jesus Christ.

How much would you pay, how much would you invest to see one soul enter into the glory of God?  How far out of your comfort zone would you travel?  How much of your budget would you blow?  How deep would you travel into the realms of faith in order to see just one person come to know Christ and be saved from the grips of God’s eternal wrath?

I don’t know about you, but that’s one I have to sit on for awhile.  I don’t have an answer today.  I know what I would want my answer to be, and that is, I am willing to pay it all, but I know when push comes to shove, I’m not, but I want to be willing to.  Are you?

“Jesus paid it all, all to him I owe.  Sin has left a crimson stain; he washed it white as snow.”  Thank You Jesus!

Bros

It was 15 against 3.  Standing beside me were my two brothers, across from us, 12 girls and 3 boys, all of us in the elementary school, and we were about to brawl.  But before I get there let me take you to Romans.

Paul gives a simple reminder for the church in Romans 12:10; “Love one another with brotherly love.”

Just moments before he said, “Let your love be genuine.”  These are two very different types of love.

In the second reminder I gave, that love is at the core of who you are.  It is the type of love that defines you and was exhibited by Christ fully at the cross.

The first love, brotherly love is a love that bonds a family.  This love is necessary in the family of God, in the church.  For this is the type of love that overlooks faults and says, “I got your back brother, sister, no matter the circumstance.”

A church that goes through a split is a church that lacks brotherly love, because this love is designed to bond a family together even in the fiercest storms.

I grew up with four brothers, so I am well aware of what it means to have brotherly love.  We have had our punches at each other, we have had our moments of headlocks and noogies, but at the end of the day, we are still brothers and united, because we are bound by this brotherly love.

Even to this day, when I hear that one of my brothers gets into a fight, my heart instantly prods me and says, “you should have been there to help.” (not that I would have been much of a help)  Regardless of if my brother is right or wrong, I have a gut urge to back my brothers up.  It doesn’t matter if we have spoken in two years or two days, when there is danger involved, I want to help because they are my brothers.

I will always remember one of my first fights (what an understatement).  I was in third grade.  Things were heating up between my two oldest brothers and a couple of other boys at school. It culminated after school one day when one of my brothers said that Trevor and his boys would be waiting for us at the stop sign.  I would ride my bike home every day with my two older brothers, and today I was pumped as we were to rendezvous at a certain stop sign on the way home in order to settle this score. 

I saw them in the distance, and pedaled up to them and did a little skid maneuver with my back wheel to show them who was boss.  My oldest brother pulled up next to me, and the words starting flying.  Before long, one of them grabbed his back pack and tossed it into the middle of the road.  With as much force as my pre pubertal voice could muster I commanded them to go pick up his back pack.  They didn’t (no surprise).

Soon after the words were exchanged, a van pulled up and the door opened and out ran about a dozen girls who surrounded us. 

Now being out number 5 to 1, we were determined to not lose.  That lasted about 5 seconds, as every girl literally jumped on top of me and my view instantly became a sea of skin as I laid on the sidewalk wondering what just happened.  I can still remember how I laughed as I was being scratched and gouged.  For some reason I thought it was fun.

Then, through the bodies of girls, I saw my oldest brother literally ripping them off of me; he was determined to set me free.  It was only the three of us, but we gave it our best shot. We most definitely walked away the losers, but it didn’t matter, we had each other.

That is brotherly love.  To this day, I have no idea what we fought about, I just knew my brothers were being hassled and I was ready to get their back, and in return, they had mine.

Now, imagine the strength of the church to withstand persecution if we were to love each other like that.  Imagine the force in which we could stand the blows of the enemy if we were ready to back each other up.

Let me encourage you, if you have a beef with a brother or sister in Christ,  resolve it so it doesn’t affect the love you are to have for them.  Forgive them or seek forgiveness by them, but let us not turn against each other, rather let us protect each other.  There will be punches thrown in the church, but at the end of the day, I pray that you and I don’t get hung up on those punches, but we move on from them in forgiveness and reconciliation.

Humbly but Boldly

Queen Esther had some guts.  There she was, in the outer courts, trembling as she bowed before the king, hoping and praying that he would reach out his golden scepter, accepting her in his presence.  If he didn’t accept her, she would die.

Not all women were as fortunate as Esther.  Some boldly approached the King, and in doing so, received death.  Esther 4:11 shows us the risk Esther faced if she was to come into the King’s presence, “there is but one law—to be put to death, except the one to whom the king holds out the golden scepter so that he may live.”  If the King did not accept the person who walked boldly into his courts by extending his golden scepter, they would die.

Esther knew this all too well as she walked into the outer courts.  But she had to.  Her nation, the Jews, were facing extinction, and the only way to save them was for her to put her life on the line and pray that she could plead her case before the King.

She had not seen the King in 30 days.  As a woman, she was probably facing insecurities, doubt, fear, and anxiety.  But, none the less, she still chose to boldly approach the King.

My guess is she approached with as much humility and reverence she could find, knowing her King deserved her respect and honor.  She was well aware that this was the right attitude to have as she approached the presence of the King, if she wanted to save her life.

As she walked in, she probably bowed on the ground, not in worship but in respect, showing the King that he deserved her approbation.  She revealed, through her actions that she was subject to the King, and she would take death if that is what the King decided to do. 

The King responded favorably, as he knew she truly respected him. 

Now imagine you have a case to plead in front of the President of the United States.  Let’s say you are able to meet him in the Oval Office and re given one chance to state your case.  How would you shake his hand?  What would you say?  How would you show him respect?  Now imagine if the President didn’t like what you had to say and he had the legal authority to kill you simply because you agitated him.  How would you respond then?

It bothers me today to see some Christians (including myself) approach the throne of God without the reverence, honor, and fear he deserves.  If we had the chance, some of us would talk to the President with more respect and honor than we do with God.  We jump in and out of prayer with no regard to the King we are attempting to commune with.  We go to church to stimulate our desire to be entertained with good music and a funny message, without ever preparing our hearts to worship our King.  We take his grace, and we run with it, without a care in the world.  Often times our prayers are filled with no admiration but rather our to-do list for God and how he can meet our latest needs for comfort.

I wonder if we had the view of God that Moses had up on Mount Sinai, would we pray differently?  Would we tremble at the sight of God?  I bet you we would. 

I can hear some people saying right now, “Greg, Hebrews 4 says, Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”  Excellent point.  We are to draw near to the throne of grace just as Esther drew near the King’s throne confidently to ask for help.  But notice that word the author uses, “confidence”.  Why do we have to approach with confidence?” 

That word in Greek is parresia and literally means to have boldness in public.  Why would we need boldness when coming to God?  For starters, two verses before, Jesus is called the Great High Priest.  We have boldness because we understand who we are approaching, someone much greater than us.  Also, we approach with boldness because we know Jesus can do something about our situation because he s the King of Kings.

My question to you is do you humbly approach the throne of God in prayer with boldness? Does your prayer life even require boldness, or do you walk in and out of the presence of God as a drunken family friend who walks in and out of your house in his stupor, with no respect to you?  Approach the Lord with your needs, by all means, but do it humbly, in prayer, as you recognize that you are talking to the King of Kings.

The Courier

I remember the courier job I once had in Mississippi. I was not your typical courier.  I delivered proofs and products for a printing press.  I started off doing it on my motorcycle in order to save gas.  That lasted a couple of months before I upgraded to my Acura Vigor. 

This car was cool at first, but then turned into a courier’s worst nightmare.  It started when I was at one of my deliveries and my door wouldn’t open.  No matter what I did, I could not open my door to get out of my car.  So I went to plan B, I climbed over into my passenger seat and got out.  As a college student, I did not have the money to repair my door, so I used my passenger door to get in and out of my car for these deliveries.  It definitely wasn’t professional, but it got the job done.   Well at least a lot better than what happened next.

As I was driving through the parking lot on my way to a delivery, I was side swiped by another car on my passenger side.  The damage wasn’t bad, so we parted ways and took care of the insurance stuff later.

I got to my delivery, and would you believe it, my passenger door now wouldn’t open!  So, I opened my sun roof and began using that for deliveries.  All that mattered was that it got the job done.  I know it was not professional, seeing your delivery boy climb onto the hood of his car, and shimmy in to it through the roof, kicking and flailing his legs as he tried to maneuver his way into the driver seat, but I got them their package.

My job was to deliver packages, and I could do it however I needed to, but it needed to get done.  The customers did not care about the look of the car or how I got into it, they cared about the product I was delivering.

This incident reminds me of Mark 16:15, “And he said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation.”  We have a message to carry to the world.  The thing is, Jesus is not concerned about how it gets there, rather he concerned that it gets done. 

Perhaps you are not a good orator, maybe you stutter when you speak, or you don’t necessarily have all the facts straight about the Bible.  Maybe you are scared to death to say anything because of what someone might say back to you.  Those are all valid concerns. But Jesus Christ lives in you and will enable you to say what you need to say, do what you need to do, and ultimately equip you for the gospel message that you are to carry in your world. 

Maybe you look like a fool climbing in and out of your car delivering the gospel message, who cares!  I don’t and Jesus doesn’t, but he is pleased with the faith that you have that enables you to overcome your fears in order to get the job done.

When God Calls

How do you know if God is talking to you?  How do you distinguish between the voice of God and the rumblings of the refried beans you ate the night before?  Seriously, with all of the advice we get day after day, how do you pick out God’s voice from worldly counsel?

It reminds me of a phone call I got recently.  I wrote a letter to Jim Cymbala, Pastor and founder of the Brooklyn Tabernacle in Brooklyn New York.  After I read his book Fresh Wind Fresh Fire I realized much of my story is like his.  So I wrote him a letter in a moment of discouragement hoping for a response, but not expecting one (he has a church of 20,000 people).

About a week later, I started receiving phone calls from a number I didn’t recognize.  I will often times get sales calls on my cell phone, so I don’t typically answer these calls.  After the third phone call in three days I started to get perturbed at this person’s persistence, so I answered it, but disguised my voice in my best Mexican accent I could muster (why do I do these things?).  It was Jim Cymbala.

I felt like a fool.  Here is a man who has tried to call me several times in order to physically respond to my letter.  Being taken back at the voice I was hearing on the other end, I told Jim I was busy at the moment and asked him if I could call him back (I was busy with a church that was .035% of his church.)

How do we know when God is calling us?  How do we learn to recognize God’s voice when He is speaking?

Unfortunately I do not have a scientific method to enable you to know the divine voice from other voices.  But I can at least point you in the right direction.

First, we do know that the Bible is God’s voice.  Start there.  Do not search the web, or turn on the radio when you are looking for God to speak to you.  Open the Bible and begin reading it.  The more you hide the Scriptures in your heart, the easier it will be for you to recognize God’s voice and guidance when it comes.  Because, if the guidance you are receiving contradicts the Word of God, then it isn’t from God.

Second, learning to hear from God takes some practice.  When God called Samuel for the first time in 1 Samuel 3, it took Samuel three tries to recognize it was God.  He had to receive some guidance from an elderly friend who was close to God for him to learn to recognize God’s voice.  But eventually he got it. 

Because we are in this fallen world, we can easily mistaken God’s voice for another voice or miss it when God does call.  Get wise counsel from mature believers.  Ask them if what you are thinking is of God or not.  Then once you have been given the counsel, act on it.  Samuel had to act on Eli’s counsel, and respond back to God. 

The bottom line is found in John 10:3, “…The sheep hear his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.”

We do have a God who leads his children.  His voice is not always audible, but it is known by his children.  In return, we need to know our shepherd.  We need to learn to recognize his voice among the many voices of today’s post modern world.  And we need the strength of his son, Jesus Christ, to act upon what we hear.

Last point, when you do answer him, or speak to him, go ahead and talk like a Mexican, or a northerner, or any other accent you want to use, because he is not offended with you being in your raw form. In fact, he invites it.

A Reflection of Christ

Take a deep breath.  Ok, now take another one.  One more.  Now you are ready to read this section of Scripture.  Romans 12:9-21

 Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good. ¹⁰ Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor. ¹¹ Do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord. ¹² Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer. ¹³ Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.

¹⁴ Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. ¹⁵ Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. ¹⁶ Live in harmony with one another. Do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly. Never be wise in your own sight. ¹⁷ Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all. ¹⁸ If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. ¹⁹ Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” ²⁰ To the contrary, “if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals on his head.” ²¹ Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

Breathe again.  That was thirty imperatives in twelve sentences.  That is a lot!  How in the world does a child of God read something like that and still live by and grow by grace?

Well, there are a couple of ways.  First, in Romans 15, Paul tells us that he spoke to us in several areas as a way of reminder.  These exhortations are not commands but a reminder from a guy who is also learning what it means to be a Christian.  He is not commanding us, he is reminding us who we are in Christ. 

Secondly, and maybe more importantly is this; there is no way I can perfectly do all of these reminders.  But there is someone who can and who has, Jesus.

When I read this, I see Jesus Christ manifested in the page.  I see a well rounded perspective of who Jesus was and what he was like.  I see Jesus as he related to his disciples, how to he treated evil, how he glorified his Father.  

Let me take a few of these reminders as an example:

Let love be genuine; There was not a morsel of fake love in Jesus. 

Outdo one another in showing honor; He gave his life for us, placing us as more important than himself, need I say more?  I will.  He stripped to his under garments to wash his disciples’ feet to show them what it means to serve and show honor.

Be patient in tribulation; Patience is what kept him on that cross.

Bless those that persecute you; Offering those who are crucifying you eternal life if they repent of their ways seems like a wonderful blessing.

How do we live by the grace that we were saved by and grow by day by day?  Well, we have to see Jesus’ 

immeasurable love for us first by seeing that he has perfectly upheld all of these exhortations.  Then we realize that it is Jesus who lives in us and through us (Galatians 2:20), which enables us to do any of these things.