Personal Relationship With Jesus

A TV preaching that heard recently ended his message by asking for people who did not have a Personal Relationship With Jesus to respond. He then led them in a “sinner’s prayer.”

Modern preachers use the phrase “Personal Relationship With Jesus” so frequently that we have forgotten what it means, and never ponder if it actually makes sense at all. I see several problems with the term.

1. One purpose of the term is to distinguish evangelical Christians from legalistic religion, or ritualistic religion. Yet once the preacher had identified those who wanted a Personal Relationship With Jesus and led them in a sinner’s prayer, he gave them a set of four rules to follow.

   • Pray every day
   • Read the Bible
   • Go to church
   I presume that he assumes that these rules will eventually produce a Personal Relationship with Jesus, but I am not sure if it does. It actually makes our faith seem like a legalistic religion.

2. Why do we need the word “personal” in the phrase? Aren't all relationships personal? A relationship that is not personal is probably not a relationship. So the term “personal” is redundant.

3. Jesus never told people that they needed to have a Personal Relationship With Him. He called them to be disciples and obey his teaching. He commanded them to obey him, because they loved him.

4. Jesus explained to his disciples that he was going away, so their existing relationship with them, whatever it was, would end. He promised that the Holy Spirit would come and that he would teach them to obey Jesus, but that would be a totally different relationship.

5. A personal relationship is not a political relationship. Jesus is a Messiah/King. His disciples called him “Lord”. So the relationship with Jesus is a political relationship. We relate to him in a servant/master relationship, so it is misleading to describe it as a personal relationship.

6. Paul did not tell the readers of his letters to have a Personal Relationship With Jesus. He talked about fellowship with the Holy Spirit (2 Cor 13:14), but we have forgotten what the term “fellowship” means. Friendship is the closest word to the meaning of fellowship, yet I have never heard a preacher telling people that they should become a friend of Jesus.

7. The television preacher told his listeners that they should go to church. I presume to develop their Personal Relationship With Jesus. However, I am not sure that is correct. I don’t develop a relationship with a famous person that I don’t know by:

   • reading a book about the person.
   • listening to people singing songs about the person.
   • listening to a man talking about the person.
   I might learn something from these activities, but there is no guarantee that I will get to know the absent person well.

8. Reading a person’s biography is not the same as getting to know them personally. To do that, I would have to be involved in their life in some way. So reading the bible is not a guarantee that a person will get to know Jesus personally.

9. Prayer is important: a few people enjoy it, but most people find it really hard. Many struggle and fail. So if prayer is the key to developing a Personal Relationship With Jesus, then it is not surprising that many church attendees are not sure if they have one.

10. People can appropriate the rescue that Jesus provided without becoming his best friend. They have done it throughout history.

So maybe a Personal Relationship With Jesus is a nice to have, but it is not the heart of Jesus good news.

My Experience
What has this been like for me?

I have been a follower of Jesus for fifty years. I call myself that because that seems to be the nature of the relationship. He is the leader, and I am the follower. (A follower does not have to be the best friend of their leader).

I think of myself as a friend of the Holy Spirit. He is the one who speaks to me. I get this quiet inner witness that I have learned the way that he speaks. I talk to him and give him permission to do things in my life and in the places where I exercise influence/authority. He is the one who acts, so it makes sense to talk to him directly.

I do not ask Jesus to do things. But I ask him to show me what he wants me to do. But it is usually the Holy Spirit who does that. And I often apologise to Jesus for not doing what he asked me to do.

I do not ask our father to do things very often. He knows better than me what needs to be done. My role is to give him permission to do it.

I love Jesus because of who he is and the wonderful things that he has done. For him to leave his place in the spiritual realms and become a human is amazing. For him to be willing to die on a cross for humans who had rejected him is mind-blowing generosity. So I love Jesus and tell him that he is wonderful.

This is a relationship of awe and wonder. I am not sure if this is the Personal Relationship with Jesus that the preacher was talking about. I love reading the Bible, but that is probably because I have an intellectual bent and a curious mind. I have learned a huge amount about who Jesus is and what he has done, but I also know that this does not automatically translate into a relationship with Jesus (although it can help).

I suspect that many Christians don’t have a Personal Relationship With Jesus like the TV preacher promises, but they pretend to have one, because they are unwilling to admit how tonight it is to be a follower of Jesus.

Challenge
I don’t like the expression Personal Relationship With Jesus. I know what the TV preacher is trying to say, but I don’t think his listeners really understand what he is offering them.

I presume that most of the preacher’s listeners are not sure how to obtain the Personal Relationship With Jesus that they are supposed to have. And I suspect that many preachers do not really know how to teach them about achieving it, either.

Followers of Jesus are called to share his message with a new generation of people who are unchurched. The expression Personal Relationship With Jesus does not mean much to them.

We will need to find more effective ways to communicate the gospel (even word is not very useful now). We will need to find better ways to describe what Jesus has done and how we appropriate it. We will have to find better ways to describe how we can follow him by communicating with his Holy Spirit.

Question
Tell me what it has been like for your in the comments. But be honest, do not pretend to look good.

Risky Plan

Imagine if
two evil spirits had attacked baby Jesus and strangled him while his protecting angels were celebrating his birth with the shepherds.

What if
the wise men had misunderstood their dream and returned to Jerusalem after they had found Jesus. Herod would have gone to worship him, but after he had left, he would have sent a couple of his most vicious henchmen to slaughter Jesus and his parents. Jesus did not receive the Holy Spirit until he was baptised by John, so he would not have been able to heal himself as he was bleeding to death.

What if
Joseph had not understood his warning dream, as we often don’t, and had remained in Bethlehem after Jesus was born, because work was plentiful and well-paid. Jesus would have been killed when Herod killed all the boys under the age of two living in the vicinity of Bethlehem.

What if
Jesus had been helping his father as a builder when a heap of stones fell from the wall of a building and killed him.

Any of the possibilities listed above could have happened. This shows that God took on a huge risk when he sent his only to the earth son to be born as a baby and grow into childhood and eventually to become an adult who would would deliver the people of the world.

If Jesus had been killed, God would have lost his only son. He could not create another one, because Jesus was not created. If Jesus was killed as a child, God’s plan would have failed. The Trinity would become incomplete.

The success of God’s plan depended on a dozen people hearing from God and doing what he needed them to do. If any one of these had missed it, as we often do, the plan would have failed.

More at God’s Big Strategy.

Whose Shoulder?

For to us a child is born,
to us a son is given,
and the government will be on his shoulders.
Of the increase of his government and peace
there will be no end.
He will reign … over his kingdom,
establishing and upholding it
with justice and righteousness
from that time on and forever.
The zeal of the LORD Almighty
will accomplish this (Is 9:6-7).

This is simple. Jesus has been born. He will be the government
from that time forward and forever.

So why does Donald Trump think that he should be the government?
or Keir Starmer, or Christopher Luxon?

Herod understood this prophecy.
He knew that his government was a goner,
so he tried to kill Jesus.

Satan understood the threat.
That is why he came up with clever deception that
This prophecy is not for now,
but for later,
This is why he pretends that his government is for now;
Jesus government comes at the end of the age.
You could trust Satan to thrust his shoulder in.

No!!
The government is on Jesus shoulders
He will govern with justice and righteousness.
and his government will never stop increasing.
The Zeal of the Lord will do it,
and all human governments will wither away.

Jesus

I have been reading Matthew’s gospel again. I am struck by how central healing and deliverance from evil spirits was to his ministry.

Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and healing every disease and sickness among the people. News about him spread all over Syria, and people brought to him all who were ill with various diseases, those suffering severe pain, the demon-possessed, those having seizures, and the paralyzed; and he healed them (Matt 4:23-24).

When evening came, many who were demon-possessed were brought to him, and he drove out the spirits with a word and healed all the sick (Matt 8:16).

And when the men of that place recognized Jesus, they sent word to all the surrounding country. People brought all their sick to him 36 and begged him to let the sick just touch the edge of his cloak, and all who touched it were healed (Matt 14:35-36).

Then there are all the individual healings that Matthew describes in his account of Jesus ministry.

Jesus Cup (4) Costly Mistake

Unfortunately for them, the spiritual powers of evil had made a huge mistake when they made Jesus drink the cup of their wrath. They assumed that if they destroyed him, they could squeeze God out of his earth forever, as no other human apart from him would be able to take their authority over the earth away from them. However, by killing Jesus, they gave up their hold over humans, because his blood was the ransom that they had demanded for their release. Once that ransom had been paid to them, they had to release humans from their control and could no longer keep humans in captivity. They decided to kill Jesus anyway because once he was dead, they believed they could entangle humans again, even if they had lost the authority over the earth that they had stolen from Adam and Eve.

The spiritual powers of evil thought they were being clever and checkmating God, but they did not reckon with his power. When they killed Jesus and shed his blood, their ransom demand against humans was met. God then raised Jesus from the dead. This was a massive defeat for the spiritual powers of evil because they had given up the right to demand a ransom from all humans in exchange for killing Jesus. However, they failed to get what they wanted because God raised Jesus back to life. Not only had they failed to kill Jesus, but because his blood paid the ransom on behalf of all humans, their hold over all humans who would trust in him was destroyed. Followers of Jesus were able to start pushing the spiritual powers of evil out of their empire and break their power.

Jesus Cup (3) Lord’s Supper

The Lord’s Supper that we share today points back to the cup of suffering in the hands of the spiritual powers of evil that Jesus drank on our behalf.

Is the cup of blessing which we bless not a common life with the blood of Christ (1 Cor 10:16)?

The cup we drink is a blessing for us. For Jesus, it was a cup of sin/suffering. It was a cup of wrath prepared by the spiritual powers of evil that Jesus drank on our behalf. This cup is a reminder to us that Jesus took on our sins and, as a consequence, took the wrath of the spiritual powers of evil. Our common life (fellowship) with Jesus makes the cup that he drank into our cup. When he drank the cup, he suffered terribly because the spiritual powers of evil got to attack him, but his suffering released amazing blessings to us by delivering us from their power.

New Covenant
The gospels describe the cup offered at the Lord’s Supper with these words.

When he had taken a cup and given thanks, he gave it to them, saying, “Drink from it, all of you; for this is my blood of the covenant, which is being poured out for many to release from sins” (Matt 26:27-28).

Jesus established a new covenant. He took on our sins and shed his blood to pay the ransom that the spiritual powers of evil demanded for setting us free. This released us from their power to control us and opened the way for all the blessings of his covenant, including the fullness of his Holy Spirit.

Paul explained the meaning of the cup offered at the Last Supper in this way.

After supper, he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me... as often as you drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes (1 Cor 11:25-26).

Jesus drank a cup of suffering/pain prepared for him by taking the spiritual powers of evil when he took our sins upon himself. This generous and courageous action allowed the spiritual powers of evil to shed his blood on the cross. Paul explains that Jesus paid the ransom that the spiritual powers of evil demanded in order to set his people free. Jesus’ ransom payment initiated a new covenant, which provides blessings through trust in Jesus.

The cup of blessing also points back to Moses, who initiated God’s covenant with Israel by sprinkling blood on the people. When we drink the cup of blessing during the Lord’s Supper, we are uniting with Jesus and accepting the covenant blessings that come to us because he took our sins on himself and allowed the spiritual powers of evil to kill him.

Jesus Cup (2) Psalm 22

When he was on the cross, Jesus called out, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me”. This was not a theological statement about God because he could not forsake Jesus, as they were always one. Jesus was referring to Psalm 22. In his time, the psalms did not have numbers, so people referred to a Psalm by quoting the first line. So Jesus was really saying, “Psalm 22 is being fulfilled in me right now”. He was using the psalm to describe the spiritual attack that he was experiencing.

The psalm refers to attacks by wild animals, but Jesus was describing the attacks by the spiritual powers of evil against him.

• Bulls encircled him.
• Young lions were tearing at his flesh.
• Dogs surrounded him.
• A pack of villains encircled him.
• Wild oxen were attacking.

Jesus used these images to describe the vicious spirits that were attacking him. They were tormenting his mind with accusations, flooding his imagination with fear and dread, torturing his flesh with terrible pain, and sapping his physical strength with emotional torment. Jesus did not just suffer physical pain.

The cup he drank was emotional and spiritual torment at the hands of the spiritual powers of evil. This happened because he loved us and took our sins on himself, which gave the spiritual powers of evil permission to go after him.

Last Supper
At the Last Supper, Jesus did two things. He broke bread and shared it with his disciples. He also shared a cup with the disciples. These actions are often interpreted as pointing forward to his sharing with us in the Lord’s Supper. But it had another, more sombre meaning.

The broken bread represented his physical body, which he was offering to his disciples to suffer on their behalf. By sharing a cup with his disciples, Jesus agreed to be one with them. They would share his life, and he would share their lives. He would share their sins with them. This was the first step in drinking the terrible cup of suffering that he would agree to drink at Gethsemane.

At the Last Supper, Jesus agreed to become the sin of his twelve disciples. He became sin for them. This opened the way for the spiritual powers of evil to attack him. They gained authority to stir up Judas to betray Jesus. He left the meal and made a deal with Jewish leaders for 30 pieces of silver. Jesus’ suffering in the hands of the spiritual powers of evil began.

Jesus’ Cup (1)

Jesus coming to live on earth as a human was a huge risk, as Adam and Eve had surrendered their authority over the earth to the spiritual powers of evil. Becoming a human made him vulnerable to spiritual attack. The only thing that kept him safe was his perfect life. If he had sinned, even just once, they would have been able to get at him, just like they attack every other human on earth.

However, Jesus didn’t sin, so the powers of evil had to leave him alone. They had stirred up Herod to try and murder Jesus when he was an infant, but they did not have authority, to touch him, so the Holy Spirit kept him safe. Everything changed when Jesus agreed to drink the cup that he had come to drink. Jesus agonised over this in Gethsemane Garden, but he submitted to his Father’s will and agreed to drink this terrible cup.

Taking on Sin
The cup that Jesus agreed to drink was not just obeying the Father, as is often suggested. The cup he drank was the wrath of the spiritual powers of evil, which came on him because he agreed to carry all the sins of all the people in the past, present and future who will put their trust in him. Paul explained,

He made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us (2 Cor 5:21).

In the garden, Jesus agreed to complete his work by taking on the sins of everyone who would put their trust in him. This committed him to drinking the cup of wrath that the spiritual powers of evil would inflict on him.

Taking on the sins of other people changed everything. Once he had taken our sin on himself and became sin, his spiritual protection was gone, and the spiritual powers of evil had authority to attack him. They hated him and were scared of him, so they attacked him with vengeance. This is why the events leading up to the cross were so terrible.

The New Testament describes the physical side of his experience, but the spiritual side was probably far more vile. Thousands of spirits had fallen from grace, but a few had become really vicious, violent and destructive. I presume that the most ferocious and hideous spirits attacked Jesus when he agreed to take on our sins. He drank the cup of their wrath. When the Jewish leaders accused him and beat him, the spiritual powers of evil were there, stirring them along. When the crowd called for him to be crucified, the spiritual powers of evil were winding them up. When Pilate surrendered him to the soldier to be beaten and crucified, the spiritual powers of evil were encouraging them to be brutal and aggressive.

The Holy Spirit was powerless to protect Jesus because he had become a sinner for us, and the spiritual powers of evil had authority on earth to attack sinners. Thousands of people in Jerusalem and Galilee had been healed and blessed by Jesus. If they had gathered in Jerusalem around Caiaphas’s house and then Pilate’s palace and called for Jesus to be released, Pilate would have been scared and intervened to calm the situation, as was done when Paul was arrested (Acts 22:23-25). Roman governors did not want to be embarrassed by riots. However, the Holy Spirit did not gather Jews supporting Jesus or legions of angels to protect him because he had agreed to drink the cup of human sin.

Freedom (3) True Freedom

Jesus spoke about the nature of true freedom.

If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free...
Very truly I tell you, everyone who sins is a slave to sin...
So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed (John 8:31-36).

He explains that there is a paradoxical side to freedom.

Jesus explains that most people are not truly free. They may believe that they are free, but if they choose to sin, they are actually partly controlled by the spiritual powers of evil. Most people believe they are free, but Jesus reminds them that they are actually slaves to sin, even if they don’t know it. The spiritual powers of evil have more influence on what they do than they realise.

Jesus promised that he will set free those who trust in him. He gives a very strong promise. Those who he sets free will be truly free. However, there is irony in this promise, because to obtain the freedom that Jesus promised, we need to submit to his teaching and do his will. In other words, to get the freedom that Jesus promised, we need to give up our freedom, and submit to his authority and obey the voice of the Holy Spirit.

We can’t obtain true freedom by exerting our right to do whatever we please. That just opens the door to control by the spiritual powers of evil. In contrast, if we give up our desire for freedom, and choose to obey Jesus, he makes us truly free.

Incarnation

A creator god becoming a human, a created species, is an amazing event. What problem made this extreme event necessary.

God had created humans in his image and given them authority over the earth. Because humans have authority, the solution to any problem on earth has to come from a human.

The spiritual powers of evil tricked humans into rejecting God’s authority. By submitting to the deceiver, they handed authority on earth to the spiritual powers of evil. They set about destroying every aspect of God’s good creation.

The creation was becoming a problem.

• Earth was being wrecked, but God could not do anything about it, because he no longer had authority to intervene on the earth. He needed permission from humans with authority on earth before he could act to rescue his creation.
• Humans had given the spiritual powers of evil authority on earth, so they were not strong enough to defeat them.
• The spiritual powers of evil would not willingly surrender their authority back to humans.

To break the impasse, a human person needed to take back authority over the earth. He had to rescue his fellow humans from the clutches of the spiritual powers of evil without being caught himself.

The only solution was for God to become a human. That is the incarnation. The Holy Spirit came upon Mary, and Jesus was birthed in her as God, yet also as a human.

Jesus was truly human, so he could take back authority on earth. He had the authority on earth to do what had to be done to defeat the spiritual powers of evil and rescue humans and the earth from their power. He never disobeyed God, so the spiritual powers of evil were never able to capture him. What a wonderful rescuer.

I explain this in more detail in Kingdom Authority.

Accused Woman

This morning when reading the New Testament, I came across the story of the adulterous woman in John 8:1-13. When the Pharisees brought her to Jesus, he did not accuse her, but drew in the dust on the ground. Most commentators claim that Jesus was showing that mercy is greater than the law, but that is not right. Jesus showed mercy, but he also applied the law more correctly than the Pharisees.

Commentators also speculate about what words he wrote that caused the crowd to slowly disperse, but they have missed the point. Jesus did not write any words. If he had, such powerful words would have been recorded. Every male should understand what he was doing. He doodled in the dust on the ground, because he wanted the people gathered to realise where he was looking.

Jesus was the only man in the crowd, who was not looking at the woman, and he wanted them to notice. (No women were there, because the Pharisees would not have allowed a woman to be a witness).

This woman had been "caught in adultery, in the very act". Women in those times wore a single garment. They did not have fancy lingerie. So, she would have removed her garment while she was engaged in the adulterous act. When they dragged her out of the house and placed her in front of Jesus, she would have been standing naked. Her lack of clothing during the middle of the say was proof of their claim that she had been caught in adultery.

I presume she was an attractive woman, or she would not have been in this situation, so every man in the crowd would have been ogling her. Except Jesus, who was looking at the ground. When they noticed that Jesus was not looking at her, they would remember that Jesus had taught on the nature of adultery.

The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought the woman to Jesus and made her stand in front of him. They demanded that he condemn her. They were testing Jesus to see if he would apply the law of Moses. However, Jesus understood the law better and applied it correctly to this situation.

The law has specific requirements for witnesses. Firstly, a person can only be convicted of a crime if there are two or three witnesses to it.

One witness is not enough to convict anyone accused of any crime or offence they may have committed. A matter must be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses (Deut 19:15).

The Pharisees and teachers of the law understood this, so they stood the woman in front of the crowd and claimed to be witnesses who had caught her in the act.

Jesus knew that the law had a second requirement. The witnesses must not have committed the crime they are testifying against. Adulterers cannot testify against adulterers. A witness who has committed the same crime is a false witness (Deut 5:20). Jesus reminded the teachers and Pharisees of this requirement, when he said,

Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her (John 8:7).

This was not a new idea, it was a requirement of the law of Moses.

After saying these words, Jesus continued doodling on the ground. Every man in the crowd would have noticed that Jesus was not looking at the naked woman, and have remembered that Jesus had taught on the nature of adultery.

I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart (Matt 5:28).

As they looked at the naked woman, and noticed Jesus had not, they would realise that they had committed adultery where they were standing. They had disqualified themselves as witnesses, because they were guilty of the crime that they were accusing her of committing. There was no alternative but to leave before Jesus revealed their sin.

When they had all gone, Jesus looked at her. He was probably the only man on earth who could do that without sinning. However, he had not witnessed her sin, so he could not condemn her. He told her to leave, and to stop sinning.

There was no witness, who was not guilty of the same sin, so the woman could not be convicted of a crime. Therefore, Jesus fulfilled the requirements of the law of Moses, he did not set them aside.

Jesus did more than that. He demonstrated that the adultery laws could not be applied. Given the nature of human hearts, it would be impossible for three men to observe a man and a woman completing an act of adultery without committing the same sin by lusting after the woman. If they did not do it at this time, they would have done so previously. Therefore, there could never be innocent independent witnesses to testify against the adulterers. Adultery is an unenforceable crime.

This was not new. Moses understood this. Jesus had already explained that Moses did not enforce the laws against adultery.

Moses permitted you to divorce your wives because your hearts were hard (Matt 19:8).

Moses did not apply the penalty of exclusion for adultery, because he understood human hearts and knew that he could not get three independent, innocent witnesses who had not committed the same sin. Instead, he allowed divorce as a pragmatic solution to the problem.
Jesus did not change Moses' standard.

I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another woman commits adultery (Matt 19:9).

Jesus did not abolish the law that required exclusion for adultery (Lev 20:10; Deut 22:21). He left it on the books, to demonstrate God's abhorrence for this sin. It is a serious evil that undermines society from the inside out. Jesus also confirmed that this law should not be enforced, because human hearts are not up to it.

Jesus Presence

When individuals/couples are sent out into the world from a Sunday gathering, they will struggle not to be absorbed by the dominant culture of the world, as they are going into the enemy’s territory.

To carry the presence of Jesus, his followers should go as twos and threes and live in close proximity in the neighbourhood where the Holy Spirit is moving. Two or three couples/families choosing to live in close proximity (within shouting distance) in a neighbourhood is what Jesus promised to bless (Matt 18:20). Living close together in the same neighbourhood establishes territory for the king, and ensures that their primary formation is in the presence of Jesus.

Incarnation

In my previous post, I explained why Jesus had to be human. However, he also had to be God. Our God is so amazing that our finite minds struggle to understand who is. By becoming human in Jesus, God gave us a revelation of himself that our human minds can grasp. We can know God truly, because Jesus has revealed his character and nature to us.

Imagine a man who damaged the entrance to the hole of an ants’ nest by mistake when he is hoeing his garden. He had not known the nest was there, so he wanted to tell ants the ants that he cared about them, even though he has damaged the entrance to their place of safety.
Communicating with the ants is a nearly impossible task. The ants might hear his voice, but they would understand what he is saying. They might hear the noise, but they would not understand that human language carries meaning.

The ants would see the dark shadow of the man’s foot as it approached, so he was a source of fear. From their perspective, the garden he had created was a jungle in which they lived. They simply could not understand his care for the garden. The biggest animal they knew was a dangerous beetle that tried to eat them, so they would never understand the man’s kind nature.

Even if the man could discover the method by which the ants communicate with each other, it would not help him much, because this communication method would be capable of describing his love, honesty, knowledge, etc.

The only way that the man could communicate his character and personality to the ants would be to become an ant himself. He could then show them what he was really like. He could prove that the did not want to destroy them. He could show them that they could trust them.
The thought of a human becoming an ant is absurd, but it is what God has done in Jesus. He came as a human so that we could have a true understanding of his nature and character. This is why Jesus was God.

We cannot know God through human philosophy or human religion. We can know him through Jesus, because he came down to our level. We must shape our understanding of God by the revelation we received through Jesus’ words and actions. The only way to know God truly is through Jesus.

Election

New Zealand has a king and his name is Jesus. He was raised up to that position by God, so we do not need an election to choose a new king, or political leader.

We should seek and honour the king who is already on the throne. Jesus is the only king who does not disappoint.

We need the Holy Spirit of God to teach us how to love and serve the king that God has given us.

Wrath (8)

The spirit called Wrath can have a go at those who reject Jesus.

Whoever rejects the Son... God’s Wrath remains on them (John 3:36).

Jesus warned his listeners that their rejection of him would release Wrath in their land.

There shall be great distress on the land, and wrath on this people (Luke 21:23).

The spirit of Wrath would bring great distress on the land.

Those who fill up sin will experience terrible Wrath.

They always fill up the measure of their sins. But Wrath has come upon them to the utmost (1 Thes 2:16).

Wrath attacks those who push into the depths of sin.

When the politicians get angry, they release the spirit of Wrath.

The nations were angry and your wrath has come (Rev 11:18).

When the Bible refers to the wrath of God, it is not describing God as an immature father who flies into a rage because his children ignore his instructions. It is mostly describing an evil angel who leads an evil army of demonic powers who are seeing opportunities to punish and hurt people who have moved away from God and lost their protection.

Wrath (7) and Mercy

The prophet prayed that the spirit called wrath would be turned away from the people.

I stood before God and spoke in their behalf to turn your wrath away from them (Jer 18:20).

God restrained wrath in answer to the prophets prayer.

Yet he was merciful; he forgave their iniquities
and did not destroy them.
Time after time.. he did not stir up his full wrath (Ps 78:38).

God restrained wrath from doing his worst on earth.

The people of faith are saved from wrath through Jesus blood.

Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from Wrath through him (Rom 5:9).

Jesus destroyed the power of Wrath when he died on the cross.

God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross. And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross (Col 2:13-15).

Wrath gained power by demanding to inflict the curse of the law. Jesus became a curse and experienced the worst that Wrath and his mates could do, and then rose from the dead. Wrath has not power over those who trust Jesus and walk in the Spirit.

Jesus and Law (10)

Jesus confirmed the validity of the Law of Moses.

Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law….For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law...(Matt 5:17-18).

Jesus never suggested that Roman law was better than Moses’ law. He did not prophesy that English law would be superior to the law for Moses. He did not promise that the US Constitution replace Moses law. Men cannot create laws that are better than God’s laws.

If Christians spent in the UK and America loved God’s law as much as David did, they would have something to offer to the world.

Oh, how I love your law!
I meditate on it all day long.
Your commands are always with me
and make me wiser than my enemies.
I have more insight than all my teachers,
for I meditate on your statutes (Psalm 119:97-99).

If Christians spent as much time studying God’s law, as they spent watching political debates and commentary on television, the world would be a better place.

Jesus and Law (9)

Jesus’ new commandment was a modification of the second most important commandment.

Love your neighbour as yourself (Matt 22:39).

Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another (John 13:35).

The direction of love changes from “neighbour” to “one another”. However, Jesus was not reducing the scope of love by giving permission to stop loving our neighbour. Rather the gospel should transform our society, so that our neighbour becomes a “one another”.

Jesus and Law (8)

Jesus said that loving our neighbour was the second most important commandment.

The second is like it: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself (Matt 22:39).

Love of neighbour is the heart of the law, so applications of the law must be based on love of neighbour. Therefore, we must read the law through the lens of love for our neighbour. The word neighbour extends to everyone in our community.

The parable of the Good Samaritan was a message about understanding the law. The Priest and the Levite complied with a strict interpretation of the law, but they did not understand it. Jesus exposed this problem, but we continue to accept a Jewish interpretation of the law. Those who seek the Kingdom of God, must apply the law in the same way as the Good Samaritan, and Jesus.

Jesus and Law (7)

The Sabbath had become a problem in Jesus’ time.

The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath (Mark 2:27).

The Jews thought they understood the Sabbath. The only hard part was deciding on the definition of work. Jesus had a radically different and more gentle interpretation of the Sabbath. The Sabbath was established to fr the benefit of the people, not to make them miserable.

The same applies to the law. The law was made for man, and not man for the law. Jesus interpreted the law in a way that made life better for people. It was very different from the miserable and mean interpretations of the Teachers of the Law.

Woe to you also, lawyers! For you load men with burdens hard to bear, and you yourselves do not touch the burdens with one of your fingers (Luke 11:46).

Interpretations of the law that place an impossible burden on people are usually wrong.

I suspect that many Christians see the Law of Moses through the eyes of the Teachers of the Law, rather than through the eyes of Jesus.