A Psalm of Sarah Tiu

Note: This Psalm is rumored to have been written while this daughter of God was in her living room with her two-year-old, being relentlessly pursued by the affections of Father, Son and Spirit.

To be accompanied by the harp, lyre, trumpet (and any other instrument with the exception of the organ) and many dancing children, ages ranging from babyhood to elderhood.

His heart became wax, melting upon the whole earth

Forever destroying the chasm of shame

His love couldn't resist invading the realm of hoplessness,

Even descending to the very depths of hell

The King staked his claim on the land of the rebels,

Not by force, nor by might, but through an offering of peace,

Sealed in his own blood

His light pursues even the blackest darkness till not a shadow remains

He's not repulsed by man's problems, questions, history or doubts

He embraced our problem in his very own body, bringing its cause to the grave of defeat

He answered our burning questions on Golgotha's hill with an earth shattering "Yes!"**

He became our history - The Lamb slain before the foundation of the world

He assumed our doubts as he hung humiliated on a cursed tree,

Experiencing humanity's horror at feeling alone in the universe,

Overcome by evil, forsaken by God

...only he wasn't alone...

...he wasn't overcome...

...he wasn't forsaken...

...and neither were we...

He burst forth from the tomb, filling death with life!

Exposing the lie, he introduced us to the true, inexhaustible, inescapable love of our Father

He longs to captivate and overwhelm us until we trust him

Until we cease striving and know that he is Love

Until we release ourselves to enjoy the flow of his river's perfect current,

Gently wafting us throughout the City of God - the city of unspeakable mysteries revealed

We join him in his glad song to the nation's,

"Behold! The old is gone and the new has come!"

Joy and laughter ensue.

_____________________________________

**("Do you love me?" "Is there a purpose to my existence?" "Am I of worth?" YES, YES & YES!!!)

Freedom! (Another guest post by Luke Beling)

"It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery."

Galatians 5:1

If I could choose one thought that has caused the greatest transformation in my life, it would be, “God has no desire to change you.” 

The bedrock of my Christian journey was established by ideas such as ‘transforming from glory to glory’ and ‘learning to become the likeness of Jesus’. These ideas made me the hunter of an illusive prey: I’d chase then find it, then lose it, then chase and find it again, only to realize I’d never catch it and be hungry for the rest of my life. 

Now, I’d always heard that God would love me just the same no matter if I changed or not. This is wonderful news. But the invisible clause, either suggested or mentioned, accompanying the news about God’s love, would strike me like brass knuckles to bruise any hope I’d found. “God’s love for you will never change, but it certainly will change you.” Now this sounds very nice, but when condemnation chases you like a pack of wolves, a statement like this makes God sound like a conman.

And God is no conman. The con is this: we have formed a theology based on our experience of daily life instead of the truth of the Bible and the Holy Spirit alive within us. 

Let me give you an example of this:

I’m driving on the interstate and somebody cuts in front of me, almost hitting my car. I react in anger, delivering some choice words with a choice bird. Then, once my emotions have settled, I feel guilty. “Oh God, I’m not like Jesus, help me to be more like Jesus. I still have anger. Help me grow into the likeness of Jesus so I don’t have to react in anger. Amen.” 

Now here is the problem. I look at my reaction of anger and form an entire theology around it. I reason that because I acted in this way, it must mean that I have more growing and transforming to do. Well, let me ask you this: If I use my tennis racket to play racket ball, is my tennis racket still a tennis racket or did it change into a racket ball racket because I used it in this way? 

I’m here to tell you that you’re perfect in every way. You’re not on your way to perfection or perfect in the eyes of God because he only sees the blood of Jesus. No. You’re Adam and Eve perfect because of the sacrifice that Jesus made at the cross. There is absolutely nothing wrong with you and nothing about you has to change, save one thing: the eyes of your understanding. 

At this point, Bible scholars would demand proof. I’m no Bible scholar, but I do have proof for this ridiculously good and wonderful news. 

“Sin is no longer your master, for you no longer live under the requirements of the law.” (Rom 6:14)

Let me start by saying that the law is essentially a method of doing in order to become. Why was the law given? It was given so that God’s people would know what to do so that they might be or become the people He made them to be. The law says do x, y, z and you will be God’s man/woman. The law is God’s standard and requirement for correct living for human lives. 

God’s plan for humanity has never changed. He has always had righteousness, purity, love and sin-free living in mind for us: in both the Old and New Testaments. These are His desires for our lives. That we walk like Him in perfection.  

If God’s desire for our lives is nothing short of righteousness, purity, and love, why did he make us a people free from the law? If we are gradually becoming like God then we need the law so that we can measure our progress and see what needs improving. But if we are already like Him then we need no law. The verbs attached to the law are ‘do’ and ‘don’t’. ‘Do this, don’t do that.’ When the law is taken away, so are the do’s and don’ts. But the requirements of the law remain in tact. God still has righteousness and sin-free living in mind for us. But He has completely removed the ‘do’s’ and the ‘don’t’s’. So if He requires sin-free living but He’s taken away the do’s and don’ts there can only be one logical conclusion. Jesus didn’t have to do anything to be perfect. Jesus was and is perfect by simply being Himself. This is the same plan God has for our lives. We no longer have to do and not do to be or become perfect. We simply have to be ourselves and by being ourselves we meet the requirements of the law. The idea of law communicates a life of gradual change, only to end once that high standard is reached perfectly. People who live with no law are people who need no change. Before the fall, Adam and Eve had no law because they needed no change. 

To further evidence this point, let us look at some other things that exist with no law.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Against such things there is no law. (Gal 5:22-23)

The reason why the fruits of the Spirit have no law is because they meet God’s standard. All they have to do is simply ‘be’, and by only ‘being’ they meet His requirements. They don’t have to transform or change. They just have to be. 

The Spirit, Father, and Son are one. Jesus is the fruit of the Spirit. Because of His death, resurrection, and ascension, we have become one with Christ. (Eph 2 & 5) Therefore our truest identities and names are the same as the fruit of the Spirit. I can confidently say that you are love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Against you there is no law. There is no law because you are perfect, whole and holy, right now. I don’t base this truth on your sin-record or your struggles with this or that. If we were to interpret the Bible through our human experience then we’d have a lot of problems. Rather we speak the truth to our experience. 

The only transformation we need is to have our eyes renewed with the light of God: to see as He sees. And the beauty of this transformation is that we cannot see something that doesn’t already exist. You are perfect, whole, and completely transformed into the very likeness of Jesus and because of this your life exists in freedom and without law. 

A Drink For Some Thirsty Words - "Worship"

"Because your love is better than life, my lips will glorify you. I will praise you as long as I live, and in your name I will lift up my hands. I will be fully satisfied as with the richest of foods; with singing lips my mouth will praise you. On my bed I remember you; I think of you through the watches of the night. Because you are my help, I sing in the shadow of your wings. I cling to you; your right hand upholds me."

Psalm 63:3-8

There are some churchy words that have grown very dry and withered to me after years of hearing them uttered over and over again, while remaining at a shallow understanding as to what they actually mean. They are good words. Really good words. But they need to be doused in the River of Life and shone in the heavenly brilliance from which they derive their true definitions if I'm ever going to have a chance of understanding them the way that I long to.

There are a great many of these words, but the ones that I want to bring attention to over the next few weeks (unless I get bored of this and wish to write on something else) are: worship, repentance, obedience, reverence, fear, holiness, sanctification, power and glory. Do you see what I mean now? Does anyone feel like they just entered into a cold, dark, medieval cathedral that smells a little like a cave? No? Maybe it's just me that feels like those words carry such abstract meanings that sometimes when they're mentioned, the first picture to come into my mind is one of a stern-looking god who appears almost identical to Gandalf the Wizard or old Father Time. Thank you Jesus for revealing the true identity of our Father as one who is completely relatable, who sees no distance between us and Him and who is full of joy and love and warmth toward us. And it's in light of that truth that we can make some sense of these words. Also, just so you know what you're about to read, I'm not going to get into etymology (as if I'm even qualified to do that) or the original greek and hebrew (except for a little bit on some points). I'm mostly basing my definitions on my own experience and thought processes and some beautiful teachings that I've heard from others that the Holy Spirit has borne witness to in my spirit, and on the belief that love, as defined in 1 Corinthians 13 and displayed on the cross, is the truest, deepest expression of God - Father, Son and Spirit.

So, for today, let's begin with "worship". My earliest recollections and associations with the word "worship" come from the traditional baptist church where I spent the first 18 years of my life. Seriously. I was there for Sunday morning service, Sunday evening service, Tuesday morning prayer breakfast, Wednesday evening youth group and choir, and usually another evening or two during the week if there was a special event taking place. But I was one of those weird kids who absolutely LOVED it, even through high school. I loved the people, I loved the churchy way of life, the pot lucks and playing sports out on the lawn, and I even loved the buzz of the loud organ and the musty smell of the old, country building (before we moved into a new building).

But the thing that I didn't particularly like was this thing called worship. My understanding of worship was the order it was listed in the Sunday morning bulletin: Call to Worship, Announcements, Offertory Hymn, Offertory Prayer, Prayer Requests, Responsive Reading, Hymn of Praise and Thanksgiving, Special Music, Sermon, Invitation, Benediction. And that there was the "worship service". This was apparently the thing that we would forever be doing in Heaven...

Then why did I find myself crossing each thing off the list as it was completed and anticipating the lunch with good friends and family that would take place afterward? Or eagerly dreaming about coming back in the evening to play football and basketball with the youth group? I don't believe it had anything to do with immaturity, because how many grown men were in that room with me keeping an ever watchful eye on the clock as they looked forward to getting out of their suits and into their sweats and settling down for a long afternoon of NFL with their families? And how many of the women were thinking about the delicious meal that they were going to lovingly prepare for friends and family?

No, it wasn't immaturity, but the innate desire for joy and enjoyment that we inherit from the Father in whose image we were created. The joy that we craved was lacking from this event that we called worship and it was unnatural. I'm not bashing any church that uses that particular kind of order and structure. I only have my own experience to offer and I certainly don't represent every human being on the planet. Maybe there are many who experience incredibly elating joy in the Lord in a more rigid atmosphere. For myself though, it made me feel like God was in a land really far away. We were singing and talking about someone who was up in the sky needing to be appeased rather than someone who is already delighted, holds every cell of my body together and lovingly made His dwelling in my heart long before I even thought of asking Him to do so. He felt cold and distant instead of warm and near.

Over the years I discovered new forms and styles of "acceptable" worship that I liked better, but I still couldn't imagine any of them being something that I would enjoy doing for all eternity or even for an hour everyday. I could enjoy it for longer than the rigid style, but I couldn't sustain that joy for longer than an hour or two, once a week. In high school I had one of those funny Christian t-shirts that said "24/7 worshipper", but I didn't own it for very long and eventually gave it away out of guilt because I was convinced that wasn't my identity.

So if worship isn't something we do to appease God (because He lacks nothing and therefore needs nothing), and if He already delights in us (when He revealed His soul's delight in Jesus, He was revealing His soul's delight in us, because we're in Jesus), and if the worship God desires from us is not to come from obligation or ritual or payment of our respects to Him, and if worship is something more than singing four fun songs on Sunday, then what the heck is it?

If you're ready, here's the Sarah Tiu definition: Absolutely effortless joy and enjoyment in being overwhelmed and astonished by the sheer goodness of God.

And if that's what worship is, then it's impossible to fake it or work it up or force it. Rather it is a fruit of hearing the Gospel and a fruit of hearing the marvelous things that the Spirit teaches us. It is a most natural response to the kisses of our Father. It is the gasp that takes our breath away when we've just been shown something too beautiful for words. We do not worship to try and get His presence to come, we worship because His presence is already with us and so we just can't help but to respond with praises and dancing and shouts. Worship is not something that we will have to do for all eternity, but is something that we can't resist doing now and forever because the adoration of our God who is Love gushes forth like a river from our bellies that we couldn't stop if we wanted to! Worship is a celebration. And it isn't something that is confined to a space or a time. The more that we hear and understand the goodness and love of God toward us and for us, the more this kind of worship becomes a constant force in our lives throughout each moment and event. It happens when I see my kid dancing or when my husband kisses me or when I'm with close friends enjoying good conversation and a bottle of wine. Everything, in fact, begins to remind us of the goodness of God. We see His face in our bosses and co-workers, in strangers and in creation itself. We begin to recognize the splash of His love in everyone and everything and worship becomes the most natural part of our existence. It becomes the enjoyment of life and love as sons and daughters of God, the very purpose for which we were created.

And it arouses all types of responses, from song and dance to laughter and tears. From loud celebratory shouts, to quiet contemplation. From bubbling poetry and art in all of its creative forms to awe-struck silence. From jumping and bouncing to lying flat on the ground as though dead. And many times, for me, it manifests in pure contentment with the occasional uncontrollable burst of bliss.

This really is what I think Jesus meant when he spoke with the woman at the well. She asks him about worship regulations and where is the proper place to "go" to worship. He responds in John 4:23 like this: "A time will come, however, indeed it is already here, when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth; for the Father is seeking just such people as these as His worshippers." To worship the Father in spirit is to worship Him with the Spirit's understanding, not mere human understanding. In verse 22, Jesus tells her that the Samaritans have been worshipping what they do not know or comprehend. But a day is coming, and now is, that they will understand and that understanding will cause them to worship. Check out 1 Corinthians 2:10-12, "Yet to us God has unveiled and revealed them (His mysteries) by and through His Spirit, for the Spirit searches diligently, exploring and examining everything, even sounding the profound and bottomless things of God. For what person perceives what passes through a man's thoughts except the man's own spirit within him? Just so, no one discerns the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have not received the spirit that belongs to the world, but the Holy Spirit Who is from God, given to us that we might realize and comprehend and appreciate the gifts of divine favor and blessing so freely and lavishly bestowed on us by God."

So enjoying understanding the astounding things that the Spirit makes known to us is worshipping in spirit. And worshipping in truth? Well Jesus said that he himself is the truth. He is the complete embodiment and character of truth. Understanding that Jesus is the full revelation of the Father, the truest possible revelation of the Father and His character and nature, means that we finally have a grasp on who it is that we are worshipping. And knowing Him causes us to truly marvel. How many times in the gospels is it recorded that Jesus was teaching and the people were "astounded" or "marveled" at the things that He said? Already, they were beginning to worship in spirit and in truth without even trying!

We cannot be guilted or manipulated into this kind of worship, rather we are drawn into it every time we are aware of the love of the Father, Son and Spirit. So if we want to see this worship arising in the midst of our churches and in the midst of our own lives, then we must speak of this great love and nothing else. It's what we crave.

If worship has become a dry word for you, the way it had for me, I hope that this helps to broaden your perspective of what it means, to simply allow yourself to be astounded at His goodness and to enjoy it. I have the privilege of leading Sunday morning worship at my church on occasion, and my prayer on those mornings is that I would just enjoy the party of Papa God's love and that I would bring the party to the people. Because that's the simplicity of the Gospel. It's a declaration and celebration of what is done and of what is true. It is a revelation that the wedding supper of the lamb has begun and an invitation to start enjoying the party. It isn't mourning over sin or the worthlessness of humanity and rarely, if ever, is it serious. A former pastor of mine always liked to remind us that "serious" isn't a fruit of the Spirit, but joy is. So if we worship in spirit, we definitely don't have to be serious. Let the crazies come out!

The Touchy-Feely, Candy-Coated Gospel

"We are blissfully out of our minds with pleasure before our Maker; he delights in our ecstasy. Our insane mode is between us and God; we promise to behave ourselves sane and sober before you! The love of Christ resonates within us and leaves us with only one conclusion: Jesus died humanity's death; therefore, in God's logic every individual simultaneously died."

2 Corinthians 5:13-14 Mirror Translation

Boy oh boy. I just can't hear enough of the Good News. It is the most beautiful melody that has ever been sung. We are sons and daughters of the Most High and He takes the purest delight in our existence! Christ is being revealed in every human being, all of His beloved children, as we each become persuaded of His, oh so patient, love for us. The lies blow away and the truth stands strong like a lighthouse beckoning us toward safety and blessed assurance that we've arrived at home.

As I was deciding what to write on this week, I was feeling a little overwhelmed. I was putting pressure on myself to write with the intention of changing people's minds to the goodness of God and it started to feel like a heavy burden. That's when I heard Papa's voice saying, "Sarah, just enjoy this. The message is going forth no matter what you do, so just enjoy being a part of it and say the things that make you smile. It makes me smile too."

So, the thing that makes me smile is knowing the unlimited love of the Father, Son and Spirit. They've embraced humanity with a love that does not fail even one person. 

A few days ago, I was recalling a time in my life when I would regularly hear messages from preachers that warned listeners of this thing they called "The Touchy-Feely, Candy-Coated Gospel". I was usually sitting on a hard church pew amongst people with emotionless faces as we listened to a fear-filled sermon from a scared, self-condemned speaker. And most of us bought it. We drank the kool-aid of sin-consiousness, fearful "reverence", and punishment and reward. All the while, Father, Son and Spirit were dancing and celebrating in our midst, trying to get us to shake off the chains of our seriousness and join them in the enjoyment of our burdenless freedom! As one of my favorite C.S. Lewis quotes says: "Joy is the serious business of Heaven."

Is there anything about pure good news that is not touchy-feely? Think about it. If a husband and wife have been trying to have a baby for a while and are told that they are unable to conceive, but a few months later a doctor comes in to announce to them the good news that they're pregnant. The response that this wonderful proclamation arouses in them is not a simple mental acknowledgement or belief in this truth. No, joy springs forth from their innermost being and touches their hearts, their emotions, their minds, and the depths of their souls. Their bodies may even tremble with excitement! Why? Because there is nothing bad about this good news. It's exactly what they've been hoping for and now their dream has come true. The doctor does not have to remind them of how pitiful their state was before or how unlikely their chances for pregnancy were because that has absolutely NOTHING to do with what is now true about them. Their entire reality from this point forward is centered around the fact that they are now parents, even though they haven't seen their baby yet. How ridiculous would it be if they continued to live life as though they were still barren?

So what happens to us when we're delivered the Good News that we've been co-crucified with Christ and no longer live, but Christ lives in us? And that God did this without a single inkling of obedience from us? But that Jesus was THE obedient one and we were in him? My goodness! Why would we continue living as though we were pitiful little sinners? Why would we try to invent new methods for "fixing" ourselves or disciplining our old, sinful man...if that man is dead??? The Good News does not need the assistance of Bad News in order to make it sound better. So my conclusion is that if the Gospel does not touch your feeling emotions, it has probably been watered down with crap about how sinful we still are and that we must do something about it.

God loves to engage our emotions. He loves to see us happy and laughing and smiling the way that any good father feels toward his children. Read these two verses that I came across recently that reveal his romantic heart yearning to delight every part of us.

Hosea 2:19-20 says, "I will betroth you to Me forever; Yes, I will betroth you to Me in righteousness and in justice, In lovingkindness and in compassion, And I will betroth you to Me in faithfulness. Then you will know the Lord."

Hosea 3:5 says, "and they will come trembling to the Lord and to His GOODNESS in the last days."

The apostle Paul, who is the Gospel guru, says in 2 Corinthians 5:13-14 "For if we are beside ourselves, it is for God; if we are of sound mind, it is for you. For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that one died for all, therefore all died." So basically, he was going crazy and acting out of his mind because of the goodness of the Gospel! This great love COMPELLED him because of the simple conclusion that EVERYONE died with Christ!

This is an incredibly touchy-feely message. As John Crowder likes to say, "The Good News we carry is not only candy-coated, it's filled with bubble gum in the center!" Now, I know one question that might come to mind: What about Paul's warning to Timothy about men that will gather around teachers that say what their "itching ears" want to hear? Wasn't he warning him about this touchy-feely type of Gospel?

NO! I say that with absolute confidence. Earlier in the same letter to Timothy, Paul writes, "So do not be ashamed to testify about our Lord, or ashamed of me his prisoner. But join with me in suffering for the gospel, by the power of God, who has saved us and called us to a holy life-NOT BECAUSE OF ANYTHING WE HAVE DONE but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time, but it has now been revealed through the appearing of our Savior, Christ Jesus, who has destroyed death and has brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. And of THIS gospel I was appointed a herald and an apostle and a teacher." 

You see, this was Paul's gospel. He was warning Timothy about the itching ears that longed to hear about what laws we must still follow in order to be considered worthy or the demands that greek mythical gods placed upon the people to climb the hierarchy into divinity. Self-righteous people do not want to hear that everything needed for the destruction of sin and everything needed to live a holy and righteous life has been accomplished apart from anything we ourselves have done. It is all by the grace of Jesus from start to finish. Paul did not suffer for his gospel because he was going around telling people that they were sinners in need of a Savior or that they were sinners that needed to do something to be forgiven or made holy. He suffered at the hands of the religious elite because he was going around telling sinners that their holiness and salvation were completely apart from anything they'd done and that grace had freely bestowed righteousness upon them and brought about their full justification. His good news was not that "all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God", his good news came in the verse following immediately after those words so that altogether it said, "for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, (and still speaking about the "all" that have sinned he continues) being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus." Then he made the appeal to them to change their minds and believe this good news so that they could begin experiencing this reality. This made the religious folks about as mad as it makes us now.

So don't be afraid of the goodness of God. I know it's not what we're used to believing, but it's the truth that has been revealed in Jesus. And while it doesn't ONLY appeal to the emotions (it appeals to the mind and body and spirit as well), it does bring about wonderful feelings like love and joy and peace and the wide spectrum of the Spirit's yummy fruit. The only gospel that doesn't appeal to our feelings is a false one that lacks the Spirit of truth. Because the Spirit feels...deeply. Jesus said that the Spirit can be grieved. Grief is an emotion, a deep feeling.

All that being said, what do we do when we don't feel it? What do we do when our lives seem to contradict this message? I experienced this last week. I had a few opportunities to show radical love but I was too tired and didn't really feel like it and then old feelings of guilt settled in. This frustrated me to no end. So I began praying about it and the Holy Spirit helped me to understand something. I know that I am fully holy, righteous, sanctified, perfected, forgiven, made new and that everything that is true about Jesus is true about me. I know that the fullness of love that exists in the heart of the Father, Son and Spirit exists in me. None of these things are processes that take a lifetime of discipline to attain. They are gifts from the Father to his children that were given in Jesus. However there is a process of letting go to fully trust in these truths. We begin to experience these realities that are already true and we begin to see transformation in our lives through knowing the Father, Son and Spirit and having a relationship with them that frees us to finally trust them and their truth. And trust is not something that just comes overnight. But that's also not to say that trust is something we ourselves drum up or work towards. No, God is our pursuer. He is the one who persuades us of the truth and He is the one who holds our hands and gently convinces us to come out of our beaten-down corners to trust Him and His goodness. 

In knowing Him, we come to know our true selves in a way that is not merely intellectual, but experiential. And that is an intimacy that our Father enjoys to no end! And it is a process that frees us to be patient with ourselves and to just enter into His enjoyment of us. So when we aren't feeling it, we can keep believing and declaring the truth without getting anxious about when we're finally going to arrive. Because, really, we've already arrived in Christ! And we will see that in our experience the more that He persuades us to trust in his love and goodness. The more we hear the Gospel, the more we will hear His voice telling us that we lack absolutely nothing because He lacks nothing. And we will feel the beauty of this truth as it once again provokes laughter from our innermost being.

I want to speak to one more contradiction that tends to deter people from this "feel good" gospel. It's the contradiction I've seen on countless occasions when I've prayed for healing for someone and they didn't get better or prayed for healing for myself and I didn't see immediate results. I've been a part of two streams of thought regarding this. The first said that when we don't see healing, it's because this is God's will for right now to teach us a lesson. The second said that it's always always God's will to heal. Period. 

The first idea sucks because it gives the idea that God is an abusive father. No earthly father would withhold the healing of cancer from their child, if it were in their power to heal, in the name of teaching their child a lesson! So the Good Father most definitely doesn't do this.

The second idea is better because it assumes the goodness of God, but I always felt that if this was true, then if I pray for healing and don't see results I must be doing something wrong. I must lack something. If it is always God's will to heal, then the problem must lie with me or the person who needs the healing.

So, here are my profound thoughts on the matter: I don't know why the contradiction exists! Haha! However, there are some things that I know absolutely. I know that on the cross, Jesus completely dealt with sin and all of its devastating effects which include sickness, disease and death. Peter quoted Isaiah and said that, "By his (Jesus') stripes we WERE healed." So somehow the entire healing of every human being occurred at the scourging of Jesus! So now when we pray for healing, as crazy as it sounds, we can actually pray from a place of thankfulness that it has already happened. Sometimes (and I think these occurrences are increasing as we realize the authority we carry because of Jesus) when we lay hands on a person and pray for their healing, we get to participate in the manifestation of that healing actually taking place in that moment. But when it doesn't, we do not have to doubt God's promises, nor do we have to believe that we're not doing something right. We can simply trust that it's done and leave the mystery at that (and yes, that kind of trust takes time). Everyone's healing eventually manifests...even if it's not until the life after. That doesn't mean that we don't pray with great expectation that it will manifest immediately at our hands and words. It just means that if it doesn't, we can still stand victorious and joyful while still identifying with and carrying the burdens of the person who didn't seem to get healed.

To sum up. Yes, this is a very touchy-feely gospel. Jesus reaches the deepest emotions of our existence and brings them out to fill the world with the most gleeful race of humans to ever walk the planet! He is the light of the world after all...and we're just like him. So let's keep bringing the party to the people! If some get mad about it, it's okay. One day they'll be the biggest party animal at the feast!

The Gospel For Newbies

"Come and see what God has done, his awesome deeds for humankind!"

Psalm 66:5

I've recently realized that since the internet is a fairly big space, there may be people who find their way to this page who are not church, religion, Christian or faith veterans. This post is for you! If you've never stepped foot in a church before, or if you have no idea what you believe, or if you're a curious atheist, or if you're bored, or if you're someone who feels totally lost, crushed, confused and are in search of love, or if you're all of the above or none of the above...I'm talking to you.

Every word written in my previous posts applies to you also, but just in case some of the things I've discussed don't make sense, I hope that this post can clear up any confusion and just paint a solid picture of this thing we call "The Gospel". Having said that, I've got to find a good place to start...

Oh wait, but first, should you stop reading too soon, let me say before you go that you have a Father in Heaven who loves you with an infinite and unchangeable kind of love. Jesus, who was the exact representation of the Father came to earth to prove the Father's love for you. And their Holy Spirit who comes from your Father and was poured out by Jesus is actually resting on you right now convincing you that this love is true! So just listen and allow yourself to hope. I'm not going to prove what I'm presenting to you scientifically, historically or intellectually. I'm not even going to give you tons of "proof texts" from the Bible (but if there is something I say that you'd like to check out for yourself, leave a comment and I'll show you scriptures that reveal its truth). The appeal that this message, this Good News, carries is for your heart and the deepest part of your being that yearns for the truth to be love.

The very reason that you desire to be loved and to love, to be known and to know is because that is the very substance, the very relationship, that you were created from and the very purpose for which you were born to enjoy! God is love and this love is revealed in Father, Son and Holy Spirit. (So any time I use the word "God", I am referring to Father, Son and Spirit). It is out of their loving relationship, which existed from all eternity, which Christianity has termed "The Trinity", that we hear the most astounding words spoken on the sixth day of creation: "Let US make man in OUR image." And that image was love. The Spirit defines this love as one that is patient, kind, is not self-seeking, does not envy or boast, is not proud or rude, keeps no record of wrongs and does not delight in evil but rejoices in truth. Jesus' definition of love is that it lays its life down for its friends. He demonstrated that love in that while we were steeped in sin and unbelief, He died for us, to make this love known. The Father's definition of love is that it holds absolutely nothing back from the object of its affection, not even withholding its one and only beloved son.
They are wholly in agreement that love lavishes freely on others without any hint of selfish motives.

This was their dream for creation; that we would live in this environment of perfection and paradise and would receive their very life, not as mere creatures, but as sons and daughters! However, there was a hiccup to this plan, it was not unforseen by them, but it was a hiccup that brought unimaginable suffering into their dream. But rather than allowing us to suffer on our own, rather than abandoning us to this pain...they entered into it with us in the person of Jesus.

The book of Genesis paints a beautiful picture of our grand beginning. It portrays this perfection of love as the Garden of God called Eden; paradise. All of humanity was represented in the first created man, Adam. He walked with God in the cool of the day, in unhindered closeness. God gave him animals to rule and admire and delicious fruit for nourishment. He even made a wife for him, Eve, from his very own rib. She was his own likeness and God's own likeness.

There were two specific trees named in the Garden, the tree of Life and the tree of knowledge of good and evil. This second tree was forbidden with the warning that eating of its fruit would bring death. Many have asked why that tree was even placed in the garden if it carried such dire consequences, but you see, one of the biggest elements of God's dream for life and love was freedom and desire. They created with us with a desire for life and not death, freedom and not bondage. And that's exactly what we were given. We were given an invitation to participate rather than being forced to participate. This desire for life and freedom was intended to lead us to partake from the Tree of Life, which would've completed God's dream by revealing to us the mystery of who we were, fully divine, life-sharing sons and daughters. Aaah...but the hiccup.

We had an enemy. We're not told much about the origination or fall of this enemy, but for whatever reason, all we need to know, all that is important about him is that he was against us. Perhaps it was jealousy regarding our destiny for divinity and our adoption from creatures to sons. But this enemy is portrayed as a serpant. He is Satan, the accuser, the adversary, the deceiver, the destroyer, the devil. He used our life and freedom, and our desire for life and freedom, against us. He deceived man into thinking that the reason the tree of knowledge of good and evil was forbidden was not because we would die, but because God did not want us to become like Him, knowing everything. Our enemy persuaded us into thinking that this tree of death would lead to our freedom. We were already free and already like God, but in that moment that we believed the lie, we became slaves...to darkness, ignorant and unbelieving in the good, loving nature of our God.

We traded glory for shame. Rather than walking with God in the cool of the day, we hid from Him, ashamed of ourselves, declaring our independence and separation from God. This was the disease called sin. The word sin means to miss the mark of our intended existence. The image of God was still ours, but since He is life, our attempt to live separate from Him caused sin and death to corrupt that image until we more closely resembled that of a beast. We acted like self-serving, hateful, violent, angry, murderous beasts, driven by the desire called "lust" to compete against each other and become our own gods rather than the desire to share life with one another, enjoying unity.

Some think it's unfair that all of humanity had to suffer the consequences for the disobedience of the one man, Adam. But that's only because we don't understand the nature from which we were created. We were created from oneness and unity for oneness and unity. That means that if one of us hurts, all of us hurt and if one of us rejoices, all of us rejoice. We are an intimately connected body, members of each other and of the Father, Son and Spirit. That is why God took our hurt, our disobedience, as His very own. That's why when tragedies, like the recent shooting in Newtown, occurs, we all feel the pain as if it has happened to us.
So when Adam disobeyed, we were all literally in him. As he went blind, we all went blind. As he forgot what manner of man he was, we all forgot. That time of bliss in Eden became a distant memory and we couldn't figure out how to get back home.

But Father, Son and Spirit had a dream for humanity and, let's face it, God's purposes cannot be thwarted...thank goodness for us! God would find a way to woo the hearts of His lost ones, even if He now had to use our brokenness, which was all we had left, to bring our redemption about. The stage was now set for the Father, Son and Spirit to make their journey into the far country of sin and death to bring us all home...to life.

In their journey to come dwell with us, they began calling men out of the world whom the Spirit would move and enable to hear the voice of God. One of these men was named Abraham. He was chosen to be the father of the nation of Israel. Israel was the nation God chose to reveal Himself to, not at the exclusion of all the other nations, but so they could be the light of truth to the nations; the beacon that would lead us all home.

Without going into a great amount of detail, let me just say that they failed in their purpose. But again, this was not unforseen by God. As a master architect, He is brilliant at bringing success out of failure. And while He most certainly doesn't need or cause human failure in order to accomplish His purposes, it also cannot thwart or hinder His purposes. He causes all things to work together for the good of those who love Him AND who are called according to His purpose (His purpose being redemption and sharing life with sons and daughters).

Israel has a most amazing history with God in the Old Testament. He miraculously delivered them out of slavery, provided for their daily needs as they wandered for forty years in the desert in disobedience, He brought them into the land that He'd promised to give them. Then He constantly warned them of things that would cause the surrounding nations to overcome them if they did not change what they were doing. He tried again and again through prophet after prophet to convince them that He was FOR them, not against them. But they just didn't get it because of a fallen, suspicious mindset and they were eventually exiled from the Promised Land. It was the fall from Eden all over again.

Between the Old and New Testament there was a 400 year prophetic silence where the Israelites waited and hoped for the prophecies of their coming Savior, who would rescue them and restore their kingdom, to be fulfilled. What they didn't realize was that this coming Savior, "Messiah", was not just coming to rescue them, but the whole human race. And this rescue was going to come, not in the form of mighty destruction and condemnation of bad, disobedient people, but in the same form from which we were created...life-giving, humble love.

When the times were finally right, God chose a poor, virgin, Israelite woman named Mary and, with her consent, He made her the mother through which our Savior, Jesus Christ ("Christ" means "anointed one"), would be born. The Holy Spirit moved into her womb to bring God Himself into humanity. Jesus, the one through whom all things were created, entered into his own creation, taking on our own fallen existence so that he could meet us right where we were and deliver us from our ignorance. Jesus brought the Tree of Life to us, in his own body, that we may partake of it and enjoy our existence, no longer as lost children, blind to the truth, but as fully mature sons and daughters who dwell in the light of an existence that is even more glorious than Eden!

How did he accomplish this? Well...he kind of...killed us. Okay, more accurately, he saved us by killing the disease of sin that had corrupted our entire being. When he entered our world, humanity did not recognize him as God. Even the Jews, whom he had been conversing with for hundreds of years, did not know him or believe that he was the God that was revealed to them in the Old Testament. Their perspective of him had been so veiled since the fall that they couldn't believe such undiluted grace was possible.

He lived on the earth for 30 years as a simple carpenter and he actually chose, in becoming human just like us, to grow in the wisdom and knowledge of who He was. Somewhere around age 30, the Spirit had been preparing a prophet, who was called John the Baptist, to rise up and announce to the people the soon arrival of their long awaited Savior. Jesus came onto the scene and had John baptize him. When he came out of the water, a voice called out from Heaven, it was the Father, and He announced, "This is my beloved Son in whom my soul delights." In that moment, something incredible was beginning to be revealed. Something that provokes unspeakable joy. God called Jesus His beloved son and in another place He calls him His only Son. Jesus said that God is the one Father and He is the Father of all. Do you see where this is going? If God is the Father of ALL and Jesus is His ONLY Son, then we must all be IN Jesus!! Jesus revealed the truth about who we are! He's our truest identity! The only reference that the Father has of any of us is what is true about Jesus! So it greatly behooves us to know what is true about Jesus.

For the next three years of his life, he performed beautiful miracles, healed diseases of many, cast out demons and raised the dead. He took on twelve, simple, uneducated men to be his disciples and to witness all he was doing. He frequently kept company with those who were considered the scum of the religious town: Prostitutes, thieves, demoniacs, adulterers, etc. He constantly rebuked the religious elite groups, known as Pharisees and Sadducees, because they prided themselves for knowing the scriptures so well and for keeping all of the religious rituals to a T, but they had no compassion or humility and, therefore did not know God at all.

Jesus kept redefining our understanding of our Father and we fought him all the way. The Good News was too good. So Jesus was eventually labeled a blasphemer. One of his own twelve betrayed him and the rest deserted him. On Good Friday, he was crucified. He did not fight or resist the authorities and he didn't defend himself when the false charges were brought against him. He knew that laying down his life was the only way to free us from the lies that bound us. Because if he died, and we were in him in an even more eternal way than we were in Adam, then we would die with him. He experienced the very depths of hell on the cross as he felt all of the hatred of the world in his body and understood our experience in feeling as though we're separated from our Father. Then, after declaring, "It is finished", he gave up his spirit and voluntarily tasted death for us. What was finished? The fallen race of Adam that had been created in him. Death, sickness, and sin were finished.

...But He was God. He was very life itself. Death is just no match for the Eternal One. So three days later, the dawn of a whole new creation began as Jesus walked out of his tomb in a new body, with all of us kept safely in his bosom. For forty days he revealed himself to those who would eventually go and spread the Good News. Then he finally ascended into Heaven to the right hand of the Father, and us with him. And he poured the Spirit out on all flesh so that upon hearing this truth, we would remember and believe this declaration of who we are! And, so that hearing this truth we would awaken from all the nightmarish lies to finally cry the words that God has longed to hear from us from the moment this eternal dream was dreamt, "Abba!", which is the Aramaic term Jesus used for "Father" or "Papa".

This is the Gospel, which means Good News, in as much as my language knows how to express it. But my words are only pointing to the truth. They do not encapsulate its fullness. No words ever can. Not even the Bible. Words can only attempt to describe it, but it will always be much better than our descriptions. But simply put, the Gospel is that Father, Son and Spirit have reconciled humanity to them, not counting our sins against us, that our hearts may turn back and melt in their love.

You may be thinking, "This is great! But what do I do now?" First let me say, there is nothing required of you to make this true. It's already true that there is absolutely no distance between you and the Father, Son and Spirit. But, your Father desires a very real relationship with you. He longs to be included in your life and for you to participate in His. The Spirit is urging you to respond to His kiss by kissing back. You probably already know what to do. It might just start with a smile and a simple prayer of "Thank you" as you allow your mind, soul, body and Spirit to be baptized in the warmth of this great light. As you begin to trust in His utter goodness, you may say one of the most brilliant prayers ever prayed, "Lord, I believe. Help my unbelief!" You may wish to seek out a group of fellow believers that you can celebrate the goodness with. You may want to share this Good News with someone who hasn't heard it yet. You may want to dance or sing.

Whatever you do, stay armed with this truth as your highest, most real reference to reality. In the world we still see and experience sin, sickness and death, even though Jesus has promised us that He has overcome it. Faith sees the unseen reality, no matter the contradiction. Do not be deceived into thinking there is something you lack or that God is holding something back. He's given everything and all things. All. Things. Everything that is true of Jesus is true of us! So feel free to pray and ask Him for good, big things! All the while realizing that they're already done, in some mysterious way, even if you don't see immediate results. Trust what He says. It's the only way to live a life of abundance in every single circumstance. Walk in His grace. Delight in His joy. Rest in His peace. Rejoice in His love.

After all...this is only the beginning!

Father, Son and Spirit' s Romance With Humanity

"For God so loved the world that He gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him." 

                                                                       John 3:16-17

In the years that Jesus was born, walked the earth and was finally crucified, he revealed something so incredible about who our God (Father, Son and Spirit) is: The lover, father, brother and friend of Man. The fact that Jesus was the Son of Man revealed something incredible about us: We are perfect because our Father is perfect. We are beloved and pleasurable to Him; holy, blameless, spotless and without defect. The only thing "wrong" with us was that we became deceived about our own identities and deceived into an unbelief that said that God wasn't truly good, but that He held something back from His creatures, the creatures that fully expressed His own image and likeness. Never forcing Himself upon us, He gave us over to the depravity of our minds but, being Love itself, He would not be satisfied with such a devastating end to the ones that He'd predestined to be sons! (Sidenote: whenever I mention "sons" or "man" I'm including females. It's easier in my writing and my thinking if I refer to all of us as sons, both male and female).

He would woo back His human race even if it took thousands of years and cost Him unimaginable suffering and His very own life. (He is not slow as some perceive slowness. With him a day is like a thousand years and a thousand years is like a day). Father, Son and Spirit had their plan of redemption for man in place before the foundation of the world and it took effect immediately. Read the genealogy in Luke. Jesus' fleshly ancestry is traced all the way back to Adam! We were found in Christ before we were ever lost in Adam.
(A lot of what I've said above, in fact much of what I will say in this post, are thoughts taken from the revelation of four of my favorite teachers: Andre Rabe, C. Baxter Kruger, John Crowder and St. Athanasius. Check them out if you're tired of guilt, condemnation and demands).

Unfortunately, this amazing romance isn't the story that many of us were brought up hearing. I always assumed that pretty much everything Jesus did in his incarnation was to fulfill legal demands. He did this or that to fulfill the law. He said this or that to fulfill a prophecy. His death on the cross was the legal demand of his father, the Judge.
It is difficult to have any kind of real relationship or to even be remotely endeared to someone that you view in that light. There's no spontaneity, adventure or excitement to be had in communing with such a being. But, out of the fear of hell, I tried. If the choice is between eternal torment or streets of gold, my pick is obvious. Things got worse when I began to understand that the proof of this relationship and faith that would grant me entrance into the pearly gates is that I obey his commands...suddenly, Christianity became the exact same religion as every other religion on the planet! It was the ascent of an exhaustingly long stairway with no end in sight. I was eventually ready to jump off.

But I made my good decision (insert pat on the back here) and said the "Sinner' s Prayer" that completed "my part" of the legal, atoning blood agreement. I was in. Thus begun a life of proving just how in I was. My tone may sound snarky, but I'm just trying to expose the lie, because lies keep people bound in fear, while the truth sets people free in joy! I want to make it easy for us to begin to discern the ridiculousness of the deception. And you have to know that in spite of all of this, Papa was incredibly gracious. When I said that prayer, He was with me, loving me, making Himself known. When I worked to earn something I already had, He was with me, loving me, making Himself known. Sometimes, glimpses of truth broke through and other times the lies crowded it out, but He was with me, loving me, making Himself known.

I'd like to paint for you the picture that my blindness created of God, of the Trinity, to show you why it's a bad idea to try to paint in the dark. It's likely that you'll miss the canvas altogether.

Myth #1: The Father
He existed first of the three. He's the creator. He's the head honcho. He is the unbending judge. He's angry, distant and cannot forgive sin without a blood payment. He demands that someone must take the punishment to appease His anger and wrath and bloodlust/revenge. He is too holy to look upon sin.

Myth #2: The Son
He is the nice one. Jesus hangs out with sinners and really likes people, or at least feels sorry for them. He steps up to take our punishment from the Father - the divine spanking - as John Crowder jokingly refers to it. He forgives us and convinces the Father to like us. His role as mediator looks like that of one who is forever standing between us and the Father. When we sin and mess up and the Father gets mad, Jesus shows Him his scars to keep His wrath from smiting us. The Father is too holy to look on sin, but Jesus is free to dine and feast with sinners.

Myth #3: The Holy Spirit
He is the Great Conscience. He constantly reminds me of my sin so that I don't get too proud. When I do sin, he "convicts" me with guilt and shame. Before my conversion, he leads me to pray the Sinner's Prayer. He is the one who, with the right amount of faith, will heal me, knock me off my feet in prayer, and give me the giggles or the sobs and lots of other crazy manifestations of expression. (That last sentence is actually true if you remove the "drumming up of faith" part and add to it the fact that the Father and Son are in on the fun too).

The diseased frame of mind creates three different gods who aren't in agreement. Jesus was always my favorite because I could relate to him and he'd stand by me if his dad ever came into the room. Can you see why these lies are so toxic? The Trinity is the most beautiful relationship in the universe, but I  turned it into three, divided, shallow, greek gods. They are most certainly three distinct persons, but they are holy, whole, complete, one and perfectly in agreement. They are God. God is Love.

I'll get back to debunking the myths in a bit, but before I continue, let me give you some delicious scripture references that begin to shed light on just how much in agreement our triune God is:

Matthew 10:40 - "Anyone who welcomes you welcomes me, and anyone who welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me." Jesus

John 12:44-45 - But later, Jesus cried aloud: "Every man who believes in me is believing in the one who sent me: and every man who sees me is seeing the one who sent me. I have come into the world as light, so that no one who believes in me need remain in the dark."

John 14:7, 10 - "If you had known who I am, you would have known my Father. From now on, you do know him and have seen him...The man who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, 'Show us the Father'? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me?" Jesus

John 14:20 - "On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you." Jesus

John 15:26 - "When the Advocate comes, whom I will send to you from the Father-the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father-he will testify about me." Jesus

Romans 8:15-16 - The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, "Abba, Father." The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's children.

Colossians 1:15, 19-20 - The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation....For God was pleased to have all His fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.

Hebrews 1:3 - The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven.

1 John 5:6-7 - This is the one who came by water and blood-Jesus Christ. He did not come by water only, but water and blood. And it is the Spirit who testified, because the Spirit is truth. For there are three that testify: The Spirit, the water and the blood; and these three are in agreement.

The truth about the Trinity: They have been in relationship from all eternity. There was no single, alone, pre-existent being. This cannot be denied if we believe that God is love. Love cannot exist alone because its focus is always on someone else, not itself. If there was a lone being, then his reason for creating would be self-centered and he could not be love. But if the Father, Son and Spirit were always together, ever loving each other, in need of nothing more, then their reason for creating came completely out of Love and a desire to share their pleasure and express their love, their image, in a race called Man. They are in total agreement, total oneness in love for each other and love for Man. Andre Rabe says that it's much like a marriage: while the two become one, they remain distinct persons. Likewise with the trinity, the three are one, though they remain distinct persons.

The truth about Abba Father: He has always loved us. His heart, His desires, His character and nature were FULLY expressed in Jesus. It pleased Him to offer his son, not because He needed appeasement for sin that He could not otherwise forgive, but because He was in His son reconciling the world to Himself. He was making peace with US. We were the ones who needed to be convinced and convicted of his love for us. Jesus was not changing his father's mind about us, he was changing our minds about his father!!!! This is huge!!! Does this not completely endear you to our great Abba?? I mean, what a lover! And as for this idea of him being too holy to look upon sin, if this is true, then Jesus must not not have been holy, which means he must not be God...kind of a dangerous path to venture down, don't ya think? Jesus feasted with sinners BEFORE he even died to make them holy or worthy to stand in his presence.

The truth about Jesus: He has always loved us. He knew that he would become a man before the creation of the world. He did not just feel sorry for us, he knew the truth about who we were! He knew that we were predestined to adoption as sons and that we were created to share and enjoy the same free relationship with his father that He did. It pleased Him to experience our brokenness, our fallenness so that he could heal us. He brought love into our deepest darkness, our scariest hell and our worst confusion to rescue us from the lies that bound us. It pleased Him to offer his life, because in him all of us existed, so in his crucifixion, he ended the diseased, sinful adamic race! In his resurrection, He raised up sons, born from above, begotten of His Father. He began a new race of whom he was the firstborn of many brothers.

The truth about the Holy Spirit: He has always loved us. He has always been for us. From the first verses of Genesis to the last verses of Revelation, the Spirit is constantly moving, working and revealing Jesus who reveals the Father. He persuades us of the truth. He convicts (which just means to show convincing evidence) the world of sin, not through condemnation, but by revealing the goodness of the Father, which in turn exposes our unbelief! Not unbelief in his existence, but unbelief in his loving, kind, merciful nature, which then persuades us to believe. He also convinces us of our righteousness by showing us that Jesus has gone to the Father and now sits at his right hand, proving that our righteousness is secure. And he convinces us that the prince of this world (satan) has already been judged.

Now, before you ask, I know one of the burning questions that many have: "What about the scary god of the Old Testament? If you're saying the Father, Son and Spirit are all expressed in the loving person of Jesus, then how am I to make sense of the other god?"

Here's the thing. I believe that every word of the Old Testament is true and is written and inspired by the same Spirit that compiled and inspired the New Testament. The difference is that in the Old Testament, the Spirit is showing us a completely veiled, human perspective of who God is. It is all in the context of broken, fallen relationship. Jesus was the full revelation of God. He even cleared up for us the difference between himself and Satan by saying, "The thief comes to steal, kill and destroy, but I come to give life and to give it abundantly." In the Old Testament, the line between the roles of God and Satan, light and dark, is a bit hazy. God did not change from the Old Testament to the New Testament, we did! Jesus tore the veil of our understanding! Jesus even had the audacity to say that NO ONE knows the Father except the son. Adam, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Moses, King David, Isaiah, the scholarly Pharisees who had the Old Testament mostly memorized, none of them knew the Father. How could Jesus say that? Their fallen state had completely blinded them and veiled their perspective of the loving Father. In fact, they were so persuaded that the god depicted in the Old Testament was who God was that they killed Jesus for being too opposite of that depiction! Now if we go back and reread the Old Testament, we can see Jesus hidden all through its stories and pages. We can know him through the Old Testament, but only if we first know the New.

Because of these things, so many misunderstandings can be undone as we see the cohesiveness of God. For example, I can conclusively say that on Jesus' cross, the Father did not pour His wrath on His beloved son to satisfy His own need for revenge- or what is commonly renamed as justice. WE - fallen humanity - poured our fallen, confused, and deceived wrath on God! He offered Himself as our most beautiful scapegoat as we vented our anger, like misguided little children, one painful lash at a time. Isaiah prophesied that we would esteem him stricken by God...oh, how right he was! We didn't know that the Father was in the son reconciling the world to Himself, or that the Holy Spirit was smeared all over and inside of Jesus (Anoint means "to smear"). Yet it pleased Him to yield Himself to our crushing iniquities!!!! Why??? Because He is love and there's no greater love than this! This was the act of love that He put absolute faith in to break the grip that darkness had on us...all of us. Not one person, in their most evil action or most determined unbelief, has the power to change the love that they've been baptised in through Jesus. All anyone can do is try and resist it, deny it and live in contradiction to it. And we do...all of us...until, one at a time, we realize that it's already holding us...tight...and has been all along, so we let go and allow it to sweep us off our feet into the most wonderful intoxication! Whew...it's the liquid love wine.

(Sidenote: I'm not downplaying the devastating effects of resisting His love. Resisting it causes a very real experience of evil in all it's various forms. And knowing that we've all been embraced by him in his death does not cause passivity in sharing the Gospel. It does the exact opposite! It ignites a fire in the heart and an urgency in the feet to run and tell everyone what has happened to them; that they are no longer defined by sin or experiences of the soul realm. They have been heroically rescued! I used to be ashamed of the gospel I thought I had to proclaim, now I want to beg people to believe this Good News so that they may enjoy and participate in the benefits of their dramatic rescue and freedom!).

The fullness of God was there on that day. And, to be sure, there was wrath on His part. But it was the burning wrath of His Father love, His Lover love, His Brother love, His Friend love, that embraced humanity while destroying our sin by dying our death, so that all of fallen creation that exists in the Word made flesh would die too, without being harmed. Then, on the third day, Jesus raised up - and all of us with him. And in his ascension he brought us, brand new, to the right hand of the Father, face-to-face. As proof of our new glorification, he poured out the Spirit on all flesh, that we may all now cry "Abba! Father!" He declares our righteousness and teaches us the truth.

On that Great and Terrible day, there was a divine substitution, but it was nothing to do with a legal, warped form of justice to appease an angry, disappointed, distant father. It was a substitution in which the fullness of God fully accepted and entered into our brokenness. He gathered up the entire burden of our sin and the judgment that we pronounced on him and he baptized us into his own suffering and death, while preserving his own image and likeness that was always in us, though the disease of sin had made it unrecognizable.

I feel like I'm doing a huge disservice by even attempting to delve into this subject because it's just so big! The beauty of what happened to our Lord and what happened to us in him (all of humanity) is something I can only barely try to grasp. But I feel the Spirit pulling me into his river of joy.

Masses of us have given into the temptation to build our theology on the contradiction of experience rather than the truth. We still see sin all around us and its absolutely devastating effects. We experience it in our own lives. So rather than henge our entire faith on what Jesus believes and has told us is true right now regarding the crucifixion of sin, we've pent all of our hope on His elusive "second coming". As if his second coming will be a greater, more significant event than His finished work on the cross! We've made the same mistake as the Pharisees in pushing our Messiah to the future. Jesus is not coming back to establish his kingdom or do away with sin. His faith and utterances on the cross have me convinced that He's done it already. Faith recognizes that it's true and sees beyond the soul realm. I shudder now when I hear people say "He came the first time as a humble servant, but He'll come the second time as a conquering king." NO! A thousand times, NO! He is the same yesterday, today and forever! The fact that he is the humble servant is exactly why he is the conquering king. Notice that Revelation portrays him as the slain lamb. Even when an elder says "See, the Lion of the tribe of Judah has triumphed and is worthy to open the scroll", he comes forth as a lion who is a slain lamb! How scary would it be for us, all of us, if his nature were going to change? He is not overcoming the world at some future date or event, it's a done deal!

Andre Rabe brilliantly says, "The Gospel is the Good News, not the Good Prediction." He also points out that Jesus always pulled the future into the now. "The time is coming and now is!" "As He is...(present tense: glorified, sanctified, righteous, perfect, holy, face-to-face with the Father)...so are we in this world." He does not have to rapture the believers away, out of this world and burn up the rest in order to remove evil and finish what he started. He actually prayed in John 17 that we wouldn't be taken out of this world, but that we would be protected from the evil one! Why? Because He really does believe he has overcome it. And we have the joy of proclaiming it!

I don't understand it all, but I love it. I feel at home in its truth. As I recently heard someone say, "It's the mystery revealed, not the mystery solved." I like that. Father, Son and Spirit are romantic and alive; not cold, systematic and dead. Breathe in the fragrance of their love...it's ours to freely enjoy!

Ode to 2012! The Year of Astonishment.

"There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one God and Father who is over all in all and living through all." 

Ephesians 4:5-6

As this year wraps up and I recall all that has happened, I'm convinced that it has been the most sensational 365 days of my life. If I could give it a name, I'd call it Astonishment. And what a roller coaster Astonishment has been!! The Gospel isn't a stagnant message, but is a crazy ride so full of magnificent sights that it is difficult to breathe normally as each revelation provokes a gasp of disbelief! It's the feeling of living. It has been a year of intense conversations, immense thought, and (to steal a phrase from my pastor) lots of learning, unlearning and then re-learning.

I remember ringing in the New Year 2012 as my husband and I resolved to read through our one-year Bible together. We were desperate to try anything that might stir our hearts to love God and others. Three weeks later, it was obvious that it wasn't working. Around that time, I was listening to a podcast put on by two missionaries in South America that I found somewhat intriguing for a few days. They invited a guest speaker and as I listened to him, I became horrified. His subject was hell and how it was his motivation for evangelism. He would walk the streets of Atlanta daily, while carrying a large wooden cross in order to spark conversations with people about the afterlife and whether or not they wanted to spend it in Heaven or hell.

I got a sick feeling in my stomach and knew I should stop listening, but I didn't. He addressed the audience as his "friends" and continued with a message that reminded me a lot of Jonathan Edwards' famous sermon about sinner's in the hands of an angry God. Then he addressed the "backsliders" of the world - people that had made a commitment to Christianity, only to continue living a worldly life...people that, he claimed, were still in danger of hell. He had a twenty-point checklist that would help a person determine if they were in fact "backslidden". All twenty points described me. No exaggeration. I finally turned the podcast off, feeling beaten to my very core. You have to understand, I had not heard a message that portrayed God in this light since high school. I knew better. I knew that most of my friends who preached the goodness of God would find it ridiculous. The problem was that I had never become fully convinced of the goodness of God myself, and so fear seized me.

I spent the entire day angry and depressed. I had zero patience or enjoyment of my seven-month-old son in those hours. All I wanted to do was sleep or watch a movie so that I could escape "reality". I apologized to God and told Him that I could not love Him if this these things were true; if we were meant to be drawn to Him out of fear rather than His infinite kindness. I begged Him to bring me peace before I'd go to bed that night. When my husband came home from work and we ate dinner, I couldn't even speak to him because I knew I'd crumble into a lump of hopeless tears.

As I lay down to sleep that night, restless, I felt Abba holding me and whispering, "Peace, daughter."
"How am I suppose to feel peace if I'm scared of you, repulsed even?!"
"It's not me you're repulsed by. You are repulsed by the Accuser. He is trying to convince you to worship him by making you think that he is Me. It's the same deception he's always tried." Hope began rising in my heart.
"How do I know? How do I know that this is you speaking to me right now?"
"What are the fruits of my Spirit?"
I recited them from memory, "Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control."
"Yes. Sound doctrine, true doctrine will always cause you to produce those things toward me and toward others. Today you have experienced anger, bitterness, impatience with your son and husband, hatred toward me, and restlessness in your heart. Those are the rotten fruits of fear and death. You will produce them whenever you agree with the Accuser; whenever you agree with a lie."
"This sounds too good to be true."
"That's the point of worship: Astonishment."
I melted and slept in a heavenly kind of peace. And so began the ride.

The next day a friend introduced me to the grace teachings of Joseph Prince and shortly after that I discovered the blog that I mentioned in my introductory post. I had never heard anything that so exalted the beauty of what happened on the cross. It seemed so simple. My husband and I listened to him everyday for the next three months as we became endeared to Jesus. From there, it got even better when we discovered evangelists John Crowder, Andre Rabe, Francois du Toit and Baxter Kruger. I am convinced that their presentation of the Gospel is the purest goodness and truth that has been preached since Paul, John and Peter! My heart burns when I hear their declarations of the love of Father, Son and Spirit and the implications of that great love. I become overwhelmed with love for God and love for my fellow man. I become myself.
I can no longer accept a Gospel that's anything less - anything less than the Father, Son and Spirit's decision to include all of humanity in the life, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus - anything that threatens to steal from this bliss cannot be the Gospel.

For the past 15 years of my life I have wished for the boldness to preach the Gospel unashamed, to feel love for the unlovables, to learn splendid things from the Holy Spirit through the Bible and personal encounter. I've wished to be free from judgmentalism, selfishness and laziness. I've wished to know God as He knows me. I've longed to witness miracles and supernatural manifestations. I've hoped for contentment and thankfulness in all circumstances. I've wanted a desire to pray.

And after so many years of striving, of trying to figure out how to develop the character and nature of Jesus, of spending hours confessing my sins in accountability groups and with partners, of crying out to God in massive assemblies for revival, I was no closer to attaining my goal than when I first started. I believed in a god that doesn't exist.

It was only when I heard the Good News declared to me, "You're already like your Father revealed in Jesus, not because of anything you've said or done or believed, but because of what Jesus has done and believes" that I began to live and experience the life I always dreamed. The things that seemed impossible before are beginning to feel easy now; not because I've discovered the secret of discipline or will-power or dying daily to self or becoming a better person. In fact, I haven't done anything! I just heard the truth and, even that, I didn't believe out of my own good choice or decision. I only believed because I was persuaded. Otherwise I could not have just forced myself - willed myself - to believe. Sometimes we admit that grace is a free gift, but we want to hold on to the one good work that we think we have to offer, the one part we have to play: Faith, our free choice. This used to confuse me so much as a kid. I would hear someone say, "Jesus' grace is an absolutely free gift. You can do nothing to earn it. But you still have to believe in order for the blood to cover you." Somehow, if a person didn't believe then it wasn't true for them. It only became true, they were only included, once they accepted it. Until then, they were outsiders to the grace of God. What an immense amount of pressure this places on the work of faith! Then it becomes a labor to figure out, what must I believe and confess exactly to be saved? Well, you you must believe that Jesus was born of a virgin, was God in the flesh, was the Son of God, died on the cross to take away my sin, and rose again three days later (or one of the many variations of this). Funny, I believed all of this for years without experiencing the joy of my salvation. Maybe I was believing wrong? Maybe I wasn't sincere enough in my confession? Maybe my faith wasn't great enough? How many times have I repeated the Sinner's Prayer hoping that maybe this time it will stick?

One of the most wonderful treasures of 2012 was becoming convinced that my faith doesn't save me. But God's faith does! When I realized this, the roller coaster of my year peaked! I cried thankful tears of relief. It no longer was a burden of "What do I believe about God", instead it became the wonder of discovering what He believes about me!!! Make no mistake, it is wonderfully elating to uncover truth about God, but His heighth and depth and width and breadth will take an eternity to begin to comprehend. I do not have to understand everything or have it all figured out. The pressure is off and has been replaced by a peace that FAR transcends my own understanding. You see, if our salvation is dependent on our own faith, then we MUST figure out exactly what we believe. We must draw lines and create denominations when disagreements come about for fear that we might get it wrong, we might be led astray.

Imagine the freedom, the barriers that would crumble if we knew that only God's faith, that He revealed in Jesus, saves us; if we believed there is only one faith...His...and He is the author, perfecter and finisher of it. "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith-and that, not of yourselves! It is the GIFT of God." Ephesians 2:8. If we get this, we may finally begin enjoying our salvation! We could stop trying to figure out how to become more holy or righteous or how to tell people to get saved and realize that His faith already believes it's done! Proclamation of the truth encourages people to believe and be the saved people they already are!

Do you want to know my favorite thing that God believes? He actually believes that it is finished. He believes that the sin of the entire world was destroyed in the body of Jesus. He believes that ALL things were made new in the resurrection of Jesus. He believes that Jesus poured the Spirit out on all flesh...hey, that includes me and you, whoever you are! He believes that we're holy, blameless and spotless before Him. He believes that by His stripes, we were COMPLETELY healed. He believes that death has been defeated. He believes that as He is - standing face-to-face with His Father - so are we in this world. He believes that He has successfully found everything that belongs to Him. He believes that everything belongs to Him! He believes that He is all in all and that He fills all things. He believes that we're free, that we're His beloved sons. He believes that laying down His life was enough to justify, sanctify and make us righteous. He believes that He's reconciled the whole world to Himself. He believes that He's made peace with every man through His blood. He believes that He is Immanuel, God dwelling with us and in us!

So, either He is insane or it's all true! Not true for some, but for all! It's not held for some future date or event, not true when you believe it, but true right now, despite apparent contradictions. Faith is the substance of what we hope for, evidence of things unseen. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. So when we hear what the Word of God believes and declares as truth and His faith becomes awakened in us through hearing, we finally see what has been real all along! We recognize the substance of the unseen...the thing that is unshakable by circumstance or what is currently experienced. Faith allows us to, at last, enjoy reality. Hell and the uncertainty of our lives disappear as reality chases away illusion.

I'm definitely not implying that personal faith isn't important or necessary. How can someone revel in the vastness and glory of the Grand Canyon if they sleep through it? Or imagine that I own all of the money in the world and find a pauper and deposit the money into a bank account with his name on it. He is now a gazillionnaire. But if no one tells him the truth about who he is; if no one says, "Hey, you're rich!" he will continue to live the life and have the experiences of a pauper, even though it's a lie...a complete delusion. In the same way, if all of humanity has been reconciled to God, cleansed and justified and righteous and restored to perfection in the love from which they were originally created, but no one tells them; or if when they're told, they're still too wounded or hardened by the experiences and disappointments of this life to believe something too wonderful for words, they will continue living the life of someone alienated in their minds from Him. Even though it's a lie...a complete delusion.

God's union with humanity in the person of Jesus is undoable. We had no free choice in the matter because we were incapable of making a good decision. How can a slave make a "free" choice? We were slaves to sin who couldn't choose another master even if we wanted to. If we could have, there was no reason for Jesus to do what he did. He could have just told us the truth and we could have chosen to believe him or not. But he knew we were utterly infected by sin and its hold on us. We were blind, deaf and didn't know our right hand from our left. We needed a Messiah to save us from ourselves by making the decision for us! Our faith is not the one good decision we ever made, our faith is just His faith, His unshakeable faith, persuading us of the truth - the truth of who we are and the truth of who He is, as revealed in Jesus. It's the Good Shepherd gently leading us away from a cliff and into green pastures.

This may not seem like a big deal to some. After all, why does it matter if our faith makes the Gospel true for us, or if our faith simply recognizes what was true for us all along? Because it's the difference between seeing people as outsiders or insiders. It's the difference between seeing ourselves as beginning from a place of separation and being on the outs with God, and then, once we accept him into our hearts or profess our faith, we become one with Him, are granted forgiveness, etc. Rather than realizing that it's only because He's already forgiven that I can receive it. It's only because He already loves me that I can love Him. It's only because He is already kind that I can change my mind (repent) about Him and see His kindness. It's only because Christ is already in me that I can believe and see the truth, that has been hidden for ages, revealed! And it's only because He persuades me that I can believe. He has beaten us to everything!

For me, this clarification frees me from the fear of maybe not having it all right. It frees me from fear over whether or not my faith is genuine enough. And when I'm this secure and assured that my Father loves me and has done everything to ensure our reconciliation already; that when I was completely faithless and steeped in unbelief, He was still faithful; that when all I could see was a dirty sinner, He saw a holy, blameless and spotless daughter; I'm free to look away from myself. I'm free to love and live and consider others before myself. I'm overwhelmed with a desire for others to know about their union with God. I can look at anyone, no matter their belief or lifestyle or contradiction and I can proclaim Paul's words when he said, "I've come to the conclusion that if one died for all, then all died...I no longer regard anyone according to the flesh." I can understand the love that Peter was overwhelmed with in Acts, after his trance, when he went to Cornelius' house and said, "God has shown me that I must not regard any man as unclean!"

One of the hangups to the notion that our faith is more a persuasion of God's faith than our own good choice to believe the right way is that someone will ask, "Well then why are some not persuaded? And why are some persuaded immediately?" I probably do not have a satisfactory answer for you, but here's my thought:

We are all created as distinct individuals. Papa God through Jesus does not establish a relationship with the whole world while neglecting His relationship with each and every person. All of us come from different backgrounds, are raised in different families, surrounded by different friends. No two people have the exact same story. Not to mention, we all have incredibly different personalities. This is meant to be beautiful and to stir up awe and wonder as we engage in relationship with one another. Papa is not boring or unimaginative. He is patient as He enters into the lives of us all and works to reveal Himself through Jesus by the Spirit. I love this about Him. He doesn't force Himself upon us, but He gently earns our trust as He enjoys wooing us with His extravagant love, casting out our fear, while bearing patiently with our confusion and misconceptions about Him. He also leaves room for us to participate in this gigantic story! Those of us who are persuaded quickly run out to tell those of us who need to hear the truth one or two or 100 more times. His desire is that we would all be as intimately involved in one another's lives, and in the revealing of Christ in each other, as He is intimately connected with us. In John 17:20-21 Jesus prays, "I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they may also be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me."

I don't need to understand it all as much as I simply want to enjoy it. With childlike wonder, I'll watch the story of the world unfold and the stories of my brothers and sisters. And I'll dance with delight as Papa invites me to participate. I do love Him so. Jesus has accomplished the impossible and His accomplishment allows me to hope for all things!

Thank you Abba God for 2012. For persuading me of your goodness and leading me into truth. I know that you have been anticipating this year of my life since before you even formed me in my mother's womb. May 2013 bring new discoveries and may I participate daily, hourly, moment-by-moment in your romancing of the world! In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit! Amen!