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Published on 1 Comment on II Timothy 1:7 Fearless

Some of you don’t like confrontation. Rather than stand up to someone and tell them that you disagree with them, or that they are overstepping their boundaries, you allow other people to have their way, and sometimes to step all over you. I know because I’ve been there too. There is a delicate balance here. How do you maintain reasonable boundaries, or stand up for what you believe in without becoming argumentative or stirring up unnecessary discord?

The Apostle Paul was an example of someone who stood up for what he believed and was willing to speak his mind. And he encouraged others to do the same, including through correspondence to his young friend Timothy, part of which is found in II Timothy 1. Timothy was timid and quite possibly discouraged by all the opposition that both he and Paul were facing, but if he was going to assist Paul in sharing the gospel he would need to learn to speak up with confidence. That doesn’t mean that he needed to be loud and obnoxious and to shout down anyone who disagreed with him as, sadly, some today are in the habit of doing. He needed not only to set aside his spirit of fear, but also to take on the spirit of love and a sound mind—self-control. (II Timothy 1:7) We are all called to love our neighbour, (Galatians 5:14, Mark 12:31, Matthew 19:19) and to be ambassadors of Christ’s love, (II Corinthians 5:19-20) even with people that we find unpleasant, or wrong.

God has a unique purpose for each of us, but all of us have the responsibility to glorify God in everything that we do, and to share His love and gift of salvation with others. There will undoubtedly be times when we will encounter people who will disagree with us, sometimes vehemently. When this happens, I suggest to you as Paul did to Timothy, (II Timothy 1:6) to rekindle the gifts given to you through the Spirit. You can do this through prayer, Bible reading and study, and by finding some mentors who are strong in their faith to encourage you. Don’t be wishy-washy about what you believe in, but make sure that God’s love is evident in you when you share it.

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Published on 5 Comments on Daniel 9:3 Pancakes and Ashes

How many of you had pancakes for supper yesterday? According to Facebook status updates, a lot of my friends did. They all seemed to enjoy eating the pancakes, and the annual societal permission to have breakfast for supper, but I’m not sure that all of them really understand the reason for Pancake Tuesday, nor the significance of Ash Wednesday which is today.

Neither Pancake Tuesday nor Ash Wednesday is mentioned in the Bible. Ash Wednesday begins the period of Lent, which is the 40 days (not including Sundays) leading up to Easter. Lent was originally a time of fasting for the purpose prayer, self-examination and repentance. It is representative of the 40 days that Jesus spent in the wilderness. (Luke 4:1-13) Pancake Tuesday started for practical reasons. If parishioners had to give up certain things for 40 days including, butter, milk and eggs, they would see to it that they didn’t go to waste. The making of pancakes would use those things up. Somehow something is lost these days when you make your pancakes by adding water to the powder from a box.

On Ash Wednesday, penitents in some faiths have a cross drawn with ash placed on their foreheads by the priest. The ashes are created by burning the palms from Palm Sunday of the previous year. All very symbolic, and based on the way that people expressed repentance and grief in the Bible. (II Samuel 13:19, Esther 4:1, Job 42:5-6, Matthew 11:21) But like a lot of traditions, sometimes the symbolism stays even though the reasons for it have been lost.

The true spirit of humility that is supposed to be represented by fasting in sackcloth and ashes is well demonstrated by Daniel. (Daniel 9:3) Daniel prayed on behalf of Jerusalem for forgiveness of sins he did not commit, and for mercy from God towards the city. (Daniel 9:4-19) Daniel knew that the restoration of the city of Jerusalem depended solely on God’s grace and mercy, and not on anything that the people could do. Putting ashes on your forehead on Ash Wednesday also symbolizes this humility, but it means nothing if that humility is not truly in your heart.

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Published on 2 Comments on Ephesians 3:16-19 A Family Prayer

When I was in my first year of university, I had the very good fortune to meet a friend who encouraged me to memorize scripture.  We would choose a passage, and then one week later recite it to each other.  One of the first passages we chose was Ephesians 3:14-19.  It is a prayer that the Apostle Paul prayed for the Ephesians, but that we could, and should, pray for our Christian brothers and sisters.

Paul begins this passage with the words, “For this reason”.  He has returned to what he started to say in Ephesians 3:1, after a lengthy parenthetical discourse in which he elaborated on the point he had made in Ephesians 2:11-22.  That is, that Gentiles were also welcome into God’s family, and that they, together with the Jews, were being built into a dwelling place for God’s Spirit.  On that basis, Paul begins his prayer for all believers in Ephesians 3:16-19.

Paul prays for three things, but they are not material things, and they are not separate and distinct.  Each request builds upon the one that preceded it.  First he prays that, according to the wealth of God’s glory, not according to our merit or what we have to offer, but according to what God has to offer, that we may be strengthened in our inner being, that we may become mature and more like Christ.  Second, Paul prays that Christ may dwell in our hearts.  The word translated dwell does not simply mean that Christ has entered our hearts.  He has done that through the Holy Spirit the moment that we accept the gift of His sacrifice for us.  Paul was speaking to those who had already taken that step.  What the word dwell more accurately means is that Christ will feel at home in our hearts, that there would be nothing within us, no thought, or word or deed, that would make Christ feel uncomfortable, disheartened or grieved. Third, because we have been rooted and grounded in the love of God—it is our anchor and our foundation—Paul prays that, although it is beyond what we could truly understand, we might still grasp how great God’s love is, that we would know God’s love, and that we may be filled with it until it overflows from us.

What Paul has prayed for is more than our minds can truly conceive, and certainly beyond what we have the capability to accomplish in our own strength.  Paul turns from petition to praise in Ephesians 3:20-21.  It is God’s power working within us that will accomplish this, and He is able to do far beyond anything that we could ever ask or imagine.  May God be glorified and praised through all generations.

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Published on 4 Comments on Thoughts on Ephesians 6
  • We are not asked to obey our parents simply to make our lives more challenging or less fun, but so that we may have a long, good life.  This is the first commandment with a promise.  (Ephesians 6:1-3)
  • Parents, don't just try to make your kids go crazy with rules, but bring them up to be like Jesus.  (Ephesians 6:4)
  • Work as though you were working for Christ.  Do your best no matter who is watching because God always is.  God will reward those who do the right thing, even if the circumstances are less than ideal.  (Ephesians 6:5-8)
  • Masters, employers, need to keep the same principle in mind and treat their slaves, employees, the way Christ would.  (Ephesians 6:9)
  • We live in a world that is a battlefield between good and evil.  God has provided resources for us to fight this battle, if we are willing to make use of them.  (Ephesians 6:10-17)
  • Pray.  All the time.  About everything.  (Ephesians 6:18-20)

Please share your thoughts on Ephesians 6 in the comment section.

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Published on 6 Comments on Thoughts on Ephesians 3
  • Until the time of Christ, Israel was known as God's chosen people.  Others were essentially left out of the plan.  Samaritans for example, were regarded even less than that.  Now, Paul is saying that Christ came for everyone, and that we can all share in the blessings of God. (Ephesians 3:2-6)
  • Paul understood God's grace and power, because he had lived it firsthand.  He realized that he wasn't worthy of the position, but knew that he had a job to do to share the "mystery of Christ". (Ephesians 3:7-9)
  • Because of Christ, we may now approach God with freedom and confidence.  !!! (Ephesians 3:12)
  • Paul prays for the Ephesians, and his prayer applies to us too.  Take a minute to read it again, slowly.   (Ephesians 3:14-19)
  • Paul had complete confidence that God was able to do more than he asked in that prayer, and more than we could ever ask or imagine.  It is God who deserves the glory. (Ephesians 3:20-21)

Please share your thoughts on Ephesians 3 in the comment section.

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Just a week ago, we were sharing New Year’s blessings with all our friends and family.  I was wishing them happiness, peace, prosperity and good health.  “May this be your best year ever,” I would say.  “I wish you all the best.”  I was optimistic for good things to happen, but the truth of the matter is that nothing much changes just because we turn over a new page on the calendar.  We still face the same rebellious children, the health scares, the unhappy marriages, the financial difficulties, the unexpected tragedies.  It’s just that now we are facing them when we had our expectations set for something so much higher, just because the year got a new number.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for being optimistic, but saying “Happy New Year” doesn’t take all our troubles away.

Many years ago, when I was in my first year of university, I learned a new song, well new to me anyway.  One of the verses said, “Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on Thee.”  This comes from the King James Version of Isaiah 26:3 which in its entirety says, “Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee, because he trusteth in thee.”  In more contemporary English that might be, “You will give perfect peace to those who stay focused on you because they trust in you.”  What a great promise that is!

This verse doesn’t mean that we will be exempt from all trials or heartaches, for we know that in this world we will have trouble. (John 16:33)  The Apostle Paul knew what it was like to have trouble, (II Corinthians 11:23-27) but based on Isaiah 26:3, he wrote the very practical advice found in Philippians 4:6-7.  Pray and give thanks.  We will face situations that seem unbearable to us, but if we focus on God, bring all our cares to Him in prayer and thank Him for His many blessings to us, He will grant us a peace that defies explanation, peace that is not like the world gives (John 14:27), peace that will protect our hearts and minds.

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Published on 1 Comment on Acts 12 Faithless Prayer

Today's post was written by Tim Challies, an author and pastor. You can visit his website here.
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Acts 12 contains one of my favorite stories of the early church. It is a great little bit of writing—a short story in three acts. I was reflecting on that story recently and just had to tell you about it.

The chapter begins with a description of Herod’s persecution against the church. In order to please his Jewish subjects Herod has James arrested and killed. This makes his subjects so happy that he then goes after Peter, throwing him in prison as well. Knowing the popularity of these upstart Christians, Herod puts Peter under the care of four whole squads of soldiers. The first act ends with these words: “So Peter was kept in prison, but earnest prayer for him was made to God by the church.” This earnest prayer is no incidental detail; it is a little fact, some narrative tension, that the author offers to foreshadow what will come.

The second act tells how Peter is delivered by God through one his angels. Peter, half asleep, sees his chains fall off and quickly passes all the guards before waking up and realizing what is happening. He hurries quickly to the church, to the gathering of people who just happen to be praying for him at that very moment. There is a delightful bit of comedy injected into the text when Rhoda, the servant girl, so excited to hear Peter at the door, runs to tell everyone that he has arrived. But she forgets to let him in; he is left standing on the street, pounding at the door. With the prayer meeting coming to a prompt end, the people belittle Rhoda, refusing to believe that Peter has actually arrived. And yet, because of Peter’s persistent knocking, they soon come to realize that he really has been rescued. Peter quickly tells his story and then disappears, presumably opting to lay low for a little while.

In the third act we return to Herod. Herod has ordered the execution of the soldiers who allowed Peter to escape. And then we find him accepting worship as a god. His Creator is most displeased and strikes him down so “he was eaten by worms and breathed his last.” Herod bookends this story, appearing as a cruel tyrant at the beginning and as a pathetic worm-eaten corpse at the end. He has gone from holding the power of life and death in his hand to being struck down by the Lord himself. It’s a pathetic end to a pathetic ruler.

Acts 12 contains a great little story, a little vignette of life in the early church. Despite the miraculous (Peter being rescued, Herod being struck down) there is such a human element to it. We see the church in prayer, undoubtedly begging God for the life of their friend and pastor. Yet when God answers their earnest prayers, they refuse to believe it. “You are out of your mind,” they tell Rhoda when she insists that God has answered them. Two thousand years later we laugh at them, wondering why they would bother to pray if they didn’t believe that God might actually answer. And then we realize that we do little better; we realize how much effort we put into pleading for God to act and how little effort we put into seeking answers to those prayers. I trust the lesson was not lost on the early church. I trust they learned from it that God’s miraculous rescue of Peter was not in any way separate from their prayers. Those prayers, even though they were offered with little expectation of an answer, were instrumental in God rescuing Peter from his imprisonment. God answers prayer, even when we ask with little faith.

It is also worth noticing that as soon as Peter arrived he was sure to share all that God had done. Peter, the object of all those prayers, wanted to ensure that the church knew that it was God who had acted with such power and in such an unusual way. “He described to them how the Lord had brought him out of the prison. And he said, ‘Tell these things to James and to the brothers.’” He wanted this great act of God to encourage all of the believers.

The chapter closes with these familiar words: “the word of God increased and multiplied.” Have you ever noticed how often these words, or ones just like them, appear in Acts? Just a brief overview of the first chapters shows them in chapters 2, 4, 6, 8, 9, 11 and 12. In every case, Luke wants us to know that God continued to build his church. In times of joy and pain, times of peace and persecution, God built his church. All that God did was for his own glory and served his ultimate purpose of drawing a people to himself.

And this God, who acted so faithfully, so consistently, so powerfully, is the same God we serve today.

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Published on 1 Comment on Philippians 4:6-7 Gratitude

Stress. There are so many circumstances in life to cause us worry or anxiety, from everyday annoyances, like getting the kids to school on time or not burning dinner, to huge tragedies. The earthquake and tsunami in Japan come to mind. So does the Chretien family. (Missing – Al and Rita Chretien) Is there really a way to be stress-free? The Apostle Paul tells us how.

In Philippians 4:6-7, Paul echoes Jesus' words (Matthew 6:25-34) when he tells us not to be anxious about anything. Nothing. But then he tells us what to do instead: In every situation, through prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, tell your requests to God. One simple sentence is the cure to all our anxiety; let’s look at it closely.

(a) In every situation. Every situation. That means the small, everyday annoyances as well as the devastating tragedies; God cares about every single detail of your life. (Luke 12:6-7) There is nothing too big or too small to bring to God, for He desires that we trust Him and rely on Him for everything. Nothing will catch Him by surprise, and He invites us to come to Him boldly with any request we have. (Hebrews 4:14-16)

(b) Through prayer and petition. Some versions translate this as “by prayer and supplication”. What are the differences between these three terms? I believe that prayer is a more general term and encompasses all of our conversations with God. As followers of Jesus, we should have an attitude of prayer, or some would say live in an atmosphere of prayer, such that we feel God’s presence with us constantly and we are always in communion with Him. When we petition or supplicate, we are asking more earnestly for our needs to be met. Supplication gives more of a sense of pleading, but both terms include the idea of humility. When we are told not to be anxious, it is not that God expects us to stop caring about the situations in our lives. What He wants is for us to bring our cares to Him, and especially to lay at His feet the responsibility of all those things that are out of our control.

(c) With thanksgiving. I think when we have a lot going on that concerns us, we sometimes forget to be thankful. We focus on what we don’t have instead of what we do have. God has given us so many blessings, and many of them we take for granted. In I Timothy 6:8, Paul said that he would be content just to have food and shelter. I’m sure that if you are reading this on a computer, you have so much more than that. We need to take time to thank God for our blessings, but we also need to thank Him for all the things we see as hardship as well. Ann Voskamp, author of one thousand gifts, has said, “If I can take everything in my life and see it as grace, a good gift from God’s hand, and give thanks for it, there is joy in this. That joy really is a function of gratitude. And gratitude is a function of perspective. Can I see the things to be grateful for? If I can see the things to be grateful for, I can find joy.”

So, can we be stress-free? Yes. In fact we are commanded to be stress-free, but it is a command with a promise. If we will take all of our cares to God, and if we will be thankful, we will have peace that is beyond our comprehension, peace that comes from knowing that God loves us and has all things in His control. A peace unlike any earthly peace. (John 14:27) This peace will protect our hearts and minds the same way that a sentinel stands on guard to protect the garrison—a way that will keep us free from anxiety.

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Today is Thanksgiving Day in Canada. I will be spending it with family, and probably eating far too much of a meal that I don't have to cook. I have so much to be thankful for, and I pray that you will all be similarly blessed.

To honour the occasion I am sharing with you Linus' Thanksgiving Prayer.

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Sometimes Christians use terms that aren’t easily understood by people who didn’t grow up going to church. These days, it is often referred to as “Christianese”, but it is not a new concept at all. Nicodemus had the same problem when he spoke to Jesus in John 3:1-7.

After Jesus had spent the day with crowds of people at the temple, Nicodemus went to see him at night. Nicodemus wanted to ask Jesus some questions, apparently while there weren’t a lot of other people around to interrupt or make judgements. He wasn’t defensive or argumentative about what Jesus had to say, refusing to accept it because it was something he hadn’t heard before. Rather, he realized that Jesus was from God, and he wanted to understand and to do what was right.

Jesus knew what Nicodemus’ questions were before he asked them, so He got straight to the point. “Unless a person is born from above, He cannot see the kingdom of God.” That means that if you want to see the kingdom of God, this is how to do it, so we, like Nicodemus, had better understand what it means. In the King James and several other versions, “born from above” is translated as “born again”, and that is the Christianese term that has confused a lot of people, Nicodemus included.

So what does it mean to be born from above? Human beings are more than just bodies. We are made of flesh, and we are made of spirit. When we realize that our spirit needs to be connected to God’s Spirit, that we belong to the One who created us, and accept the fact that Jesus has provided for our salvation, we can be born from above. All it takes is to acknowledge that God sent his son Jesus to be a sacrifice for us, so that we wouldn’t have to pay the price for our own sins. We need to acknowledge that we do sin, and that we need God.

If you want to be born again, from above, pray this simple prayer.

Dear God, I realize that I need You. I believe that Jesus came to pay the penalty for my sins, so that I could have a relationship with You. I want that relationship, and I want to live in a way that pleases You. Please help me to understand what that really means and help me to do it. Amen.

If you aren’t ready yet, but you would really like to understand, you can pray for that too. God promises that if we look for Him, we will find Him. (Jeremiah 29:13, Deuteronomy 4:29, Proverbs 8:17) You can pray something as simple as:

Dear God, I really want to know the truth. Please help me to understand. Amen.

Then, be open for the answer. Be willing to read the Bible, and pray for understanding as you do. Be willing to talk to a pastor or someone you trust who has already walked down this path. If you really want to know the truth, you will pray that prayer, or a similar one, more than once. God will make Himself known to you if you seek Him with all your heart.