Motivation; April 15, 2020

Posted on April 17, 2020 by jgarrott

John 20:31 But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.

John, writing several years after the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke had been circulating, wanted to fill in some of the blanks left by those accounts, as it says in verse 30, but his motivation is expressed here. And what a motivation it is! It should be one of the primary motivations of every believer. As self-centered as we are, we tend to be satisfied with our own salvation, forgetting that God loves the person next to us just as much as He does us. Love, by definition, wants to fulfill the desires of the one loved, so if we really love God, we should be working to introduce as many people as possible to Him, so that they too may believe and become His children. That we so generally fail to do that betrays the shallowness of our love for God. Here John is talking about what he has written, but this applies to far more than writing. The words we speak and the actions we take should be empowered by this same motivation. It all comes back to the two commandments Jesus specified: loving God and loving our neighbor. (Matthew 22:36-40) If we love God we will want Him to be happy, and since we want eternal life for ourselves, if we love our neighbor as we love ourselves, we will do all we can to bring him to eternal life. We really don’t think those two commandments through most of the time. I have said for many years that if every believer really knew who and what they were in Christ, the world would be transformed, and I remain convinced of that. We have so little grasp of what it really is to be a child of God! Right now with COVID-19 the whole world is being given an opportunity to reexamine their daily lives. Everyone is eager to “return to normal,” but what “normal” do we return to? If all of this causes any significant fraction of even the Christians (who are a fraction of the total) to return to Biblical principles for daily living, then the world will be a far better place for having gone through all of this.

This of course applies to me as much as it does to anyone. I have already dedicated my life to sharing the Gospel as a pastor, but my efficiency certainly hasn’t been very high. I need to allow the Holy Spirit to fine-tune my words and my actions to make them more effective. I have long said that I wanted to plan like I would live to at least 100, but live so that it would be fine to leave today. Likewise, my hesitation in asking the Lord to come back soon is that there are so many around me who are far from ready for that, and I want to take them with me before the Lord. I identify fully with what Paul said in Philippians 1:21-24. God has really been working on my motivations, and for that I am deeply grateful.

Father, thank You for this reminder. Show me what to do about it! It’s very appropriate as we have our annual business meeting Sunday that we would be thinking about why we are here. I pray that You would guide me in expressing this challenge to the believers, so that together we may seek Your will for how we are to communicate the Good News of the Kingdom in this new fiscal year. We tend to get sidetracked by financial considerations in one way or another. Help us seek Your will first, knowing that where You guide, You provide. We have a pretty spotty track record in that area to this point! May we rejoice to be Your children but not be satisfied with just us being Your children, so that many more may be drawn into Your family, Your life, for Your glory. Thank You. Hallelujah!

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Understanding the Bible; April 14, 2020

Posted on April 17, 2020 by jgarrott

Luke 24:45 Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures.

What a blessed thing! And how necessary! If we are honest, we too have to confess that sometimes the Bible seems like a blank wall, communicating nothing to us. However, when the Holy Spirit opens our eyes, we discover that the “blank wall” was really the inside of our spiritual eyelids! That’s why every time we read the Bible we should ask the Holy Spirit to be our guide, to speak into our hearts what the Father is saying to us. If we will do that, we will find that He is amazingly faithful to do exactly that. There is no embarrassment whatsoever in that. After all, those to whom Jesus was speaking here had been with Him personally for over three years, and yet they still needed to have their eyes opened. It’s like Paul said: “The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit.” (1 Corinthians 2:14) Without the Holy Spirit, the Bible can easily become the foundation of a legalistic, man-centered system, and that is tragic. We need always to read the Bible with the “running commentary” of the Author. (2 Timothy 3:16)

I had taken in occasional sips of the Holy Spirit from childhood, raised in the home that I was, but it wasn’t until I received the baptism in the Holy Spirit by faith that the Bible really came alive to me. I had had a clear example right under my nose for a few years prior to that, because Cathy was baptized in the Holy Spirit shortly before we left Hawaii when I got out of the army in 1972. After she had that experience, she couldn’t get her nose out of the Bible! Her foreign language in college was Biblical Greek, and every day while I was at work she would be digging into the Word, rejoicing to see it unfolding before her. Thinking about it, it wasn’t until after I was baptized in the Spirit in 1974 that daily devotions became an ingrained habit that is the foundation of my life. I had the groundwork of Biblical knowledge already, but it took the direct help of the Holy Spirit to enable me to understand what I “knew.” In the years since then I have found that often I will say things that seem completely obvious to me, since the Bible expresses them clearly and repeatedly, and those listening to me will say, “That’s so deep!” I should be used to it by now, but I’m still surprised by that at times. One of the joys of reading the Bible under the Spirit’s guidance is that often I will read a passage that is completely familiar and find that God is speaking to me now, through those very familiar words. That’s having the eyes of my heart opened, and I am deeply grateful.

Father, You know how much I want this life in the Spirit for each of those in my care, but I know You want it even more. Help me not try to make it happen by my strength – which is no strength – but allow You to use even me to bring it about. May we all be so filled with Your Spirit that Your Word comes alive to us and we hear You clearly, to be and do all that You desire, for Your glory. Thank You. Hallelujah!

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Faith; April 13, 2020

Posted on April 16, 2020 by jgarrott

Luke 24:25 He said to them, “How foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken!”

This doesn’t seem very politically correct to us, but it was spoken in love. That’s a good thing, because it applies to us, too! A major problem with mankind down through the ages has been the failure to believe what God has told us. We make up countless excuses for not believing, and the devil is happy to supply us with even more. About 50 years ago an expression was popular in Christian circles: “God said it, I believe it, that settles it.” The problem is, it would be more accurate to say, “God said it, that settles it.” Our participating in God’s blessings generally depends on faith, from salvation right on down the line, but God rules the universe whether we believe it or not. Some people seem to think they are hurting God by refusing to believe in Him, but they really are only hurting themselves. They seem to think that by denying the existence of a Creator, they free themselves from all of His rules, not recognizing that those rules are “baked into” the universe, so to speak. The tragedy is that every one of God’s rules is for our good, to keep us from harm and guide us into the abundance that He has prepared for us. The vast majority of the suffering in the world stems from people ignoring or deliberately flouting God’s rules. The thing is, God has gone beyond just rules, to tell us things that are going to happen. That is what Jesus was referring to here. From our perspective, the prophecies about the Messiah seem very clear, and the odds against any one person fulfilling them all in such detail are so beyond astronomical that it seems absurd not to believe in Jesus. However, many devout Jews even today take that position, because their preconceptions have blinded them. Even so, many Christians choose to believe fantasies people have extrapolated from the Bible, or even made up out of whole cloth, rather than believing God’s Word itself. We are indeed foolish and slow of heart!

This of course applies to me, as it does to every thinking person on the planet. I had the incredible blessing of being raised in a home that was steeped in faith and Scripture, yet I don’t remember hearing about the presence, gifts, and power of the Holy Spirit until I was an adult, and indeed the father of two children. I wouldn’t insist that I was never told about them, but it never penetrated at any rate. The NIV says “slow of heart,” but the Japanese says “dull of heart.” My heart wouldn’t have cut warm butter! Every once in a while things would get through, and I do have clear memories of some encounters with God that I had as a child, but really only about three in the first 25 years of my life. That’s pretty dull and foolish! Given that track record, I should have patience with those around me, but I will confess to wanting to say exactly what Jesus said here at times! However, God is incredibly patient and gracious, and He continues to save people in spite of our dull, foolish hearts. I am not to focus on human failures, either my own or those of anyone else, but on my Lord in all His power and perfection, and on all He has spoken to us His children, choosing to obey even when I don’t understand, because so often, understanding is beyond me.

Father, thank You for this powerful reminder. Help me operate in the faith You provide, not trying to drum it up on my own but accepting and applying what You place in me. May I be an effective instrument for You to impart faith to others as well, so that many may be brought from death to life, for Your glory. Thank You. Hallelujah!

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Our Place in Christ; April 12, 2020

Posted on April 16, 2020 by jgarrott

John 20:17 Jesus said, “Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet returned to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am returning to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.'”

The scene here is very easy to picture, with Jesus hardly able to stand because Mary has wrapped her arms so tightly around His ankles. We can identify with such intense emotion, even if we’ve never felt it directly ourselves. What Jesus says to Mary is very interesting, and I think I will understand it fully only when I am before His throne in heaven. He tells her not to cling to Him “because I have not yet ascended to the Father.” To me, that says that after He has ascended, clinging to Him is OK! We can’t cling to Him physically any more than Mary could after the ascension, but spiritually we should never let Him go. We tend to “let go of Jesus” for all sorts of things: money, pleasure, prestige, what have you. However, every bit of that is a mistake, because all of that is temporal, passing, when Jesus is eternal. The other “blow your mind” thing Jesus said was “my Father and your Father, my God and your God.” Linguistically at least, Jesus was raising His disciples to His level. We really can’t wrap our minds around that, but it fits perfectly with something He had said in the upper room after His last supper, and something He said in the same location in the evening after His encounter with Mary. “Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.” (John 14:12) “As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” (John 20:21) Paul wasn’t present on those occasions, but he expressed this truth as, “Christ in you, the hope of glory.” (Colossians 1:27) (Actually, Paul had a lot more to say about this, but it’s too much to quote here.) This also fits in with the logically impossible things Jesus said in His prayer just before He went to Gethsemane, about our being in Him as He is in the Father and the Father in us and all of that. (John 17) Perhaps the deepest joy of the life of faith is discovering by experience how all of this is indeed possible, even though human words can hardly explain it. We are not God, yet God raises us to His level in ways that we can hardly grasp, much less put into words. This is what being in Christ is all about.

Of course this applies to me, just as it does to every believer. It isn’t something we can grasp or achieve or even understand on our own, but God is incredibly gracious. My father wrote his doctoral dissertation on the Greek uses of “in Christ” and related expressions in the New Testament, but he told me personally, about two months before he left this earth, that he didn’t understand it until after he had a powerful experience of the Holy Spirit after he had arrived in Japan as a missionary. At the point he told me about it I was seeking the baptism in the Holy Spirit, but hadn’t experienced it because of my confusion about spiritual gifts. That was in 1974, and in the 46 years since then I have learned more and more of what it is all about. I wish I walked in it more completely, more consistently, but I know that it is already an accomplished fact and I look forward to its fulfillment. There is no room whatsoever for pride, but it does require my participation in submitting my will to Him, and that is what I strive to do, for His glory alone.

Father, this is beyond words to express. Thank You for Your totally amazing grace. Thank You for this glorious Resurrection Sunday. The weather is rainy, COVID-19 is rampant, and all sorts of other things seem less than optimal. But You are God and Christ is risen and I am in Christ, and that is all that really matters. Thank You. Hallelujah!

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Death; April 11, 2020

Posted on April 12, 2020 by jgarrott

John 19:30 When he had received the drink, Jesus said, “It is finished.” With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.

A great deal has been written and spoken about this verse, including by me, but the thing that strikes me most at the moment is the relief Jesus must have felt at being able to do this. We tend to cling to physical life as long as possible, and we desire and expect others to do so as well. One of the stages of grief is anger, often at the one who has died for not staying around longer. How selfish! Especially when someone is young, or relatively so, we tend to think, and say, “How much they have missed!” It doesn’t occur to us that, if they are in Christ, what they have gone to leaves everything they have “missed” in the dust! We have such a low view of eternity! Of all the people who have died, Jesus alone knew exactly what He was going to. That on top of the incredible suffering he had experienced in the hours leading up to this moment must have made this moment sweet indeed. I can hardly imagine the sense of accomplishment He must have had, because what He had finished (the Japanese says “completed”) was salvation for all mankind, available to all who would receive it in faith. We tend to equate death with failure and defeat, but sometimes, and certainly here, it is glorious victory. Right now we are all worked up over the many for whom COVID-19 has been the agent of their death, but we forget that everyone dies at some point – probably because we don’t want to face the reality that we will do so as well. It is not up to us to decide when that point is, for ourselves or for others. That is why suicide and euthanasia, not to mention murder, are wrong. Medicine, allowing long and productive lives on this earth, is hardly a bad thing, but it is ultimately stop-gap. What is far more important is where and how we spend eternity.

As a pastor I have been involved with death probably more than the average person. I have seen widows, particularly, quite angry at their recently deceased husbands for leaving them behind. And that has been the case even with some fairly strong Christians! For one of those, however, that anger very quickly dissipated, and she was deeply grateful when I conducted her husband’s funeral as a victory celebration. I think I was still fairly young when I realized that funerals are really for those left behind, far more than they are for the deceased. We desire and need a sense of closure, and funerals assist with that. I have been to Buddhist funerals for people whom I knew had committed themselves to Christ before they died, and I knew that the religious trappings made no difference at all to those people. My parents both died in the US while I was in Japan, but since their ashes are buried in Japan, I was able to attend their burials. They both died relatively young, my father at 64 and my mother at 72, but I have great assurance that they were both able to say with Paul, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.” (2 Timothy 4:7) They too could say, as Jesus did, “It is completed,” meaning their task on earth. It is my prayer that I will be able to do the same.

Father, thank You for this reminder of all that Easter means. We tend to focus on the resurrection, but there can be no resurrection without death. Thank You for removing the fear of death from me. Help me be increasingly effective in imparting that faith to others, so that we may walk together in the victory of the cross, for Your glory. Thank You. Praise God!

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Crucifixion; April 10, 2020

Posted on April 11, 2020 by jgarrott

Luke 23:33-34 When they came to the place called the Skull, they crucified him there, along with the criminals—one on his right, the other on his left. Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” And they divided up his clothes by casting lots.

The act of crucifixion is so horrible that Luke could do no more than use the bare words, “they crucified him.” Mel Gibson did us a great favor by directing and producing the movie, The Passion. The raw brutality, the reality of what was done to Jesus is hard for us even to imagine. We can quibble over the exact location of the nails in His hands, since a nail in the center of the palm would rip out with the body weight of the person crucified, and archaeologists have found bones that had had a nail run through the ball of the heel from the side, rather than simply with the feet crossed, but such details don’t change the fundamental facts. Jesus was nailed to that cross for us, not for His own sins but for ours. As a matter of fact, in the movie, Mel Gibson himself is the one holding the spike as it is hammered in. Luke doesn’t make clear the timing of Jesus’ statement recorded here, whether it was as the nails were being hammered, as he lay there nailed to the cross, or after the cross was raised and His weight was supported by the nails driven through His flesh, but that again is immaterial. The point is that He said it, asking that we be forgiven for our sins that brought crucifixion upon Him. And the point about the soldiers rolling dice to decide who got His clothing drives home the point that for the soldiers this was just a job, and the clothing of the executed was part of their pay for doing it. Paintings and movies always have some sort of loin cloth, but the reality was that He likely wasn’t left even with that, because shame was a major part of the punishment. We really don’t grasp all that Jesus went through for us, or the magnitude of the love that made Him do it. When we realize that it was our own sin that did that to Him, we are transformed as we need to be, and as Paul said, we are crucified with Him, and it is no longer we who live, but Christ who lives in and through us. (Galatians 2:20)

Every time I perform a wedding I do a minor dramatization of the crucifixion, to drive home the reality of God’s love for us, in contrast to our own conditional love. Even so, I could benefit from more meditation on the cross and all that transpired there. I have known the facts of the Gospel for as long as I can remember, but there is a world of difference between knowing facts and letting them “dwell in you.” (Colossians 3:16) Since Jesus is the Word of God (John 1) and He lives in me, in a way that cannot be explained by either physics or biology, then the goal of my existence is to let Him do so more and more, and a major factor in that is to live out the truth of the Bible. I find myself running in linguistic and logical circles trying to explain it, because it is indeed beyond merely human understanding. (Ephesians 3:19) I need both to be caught up in the wonder of it all and to live it out in fully practical terms, letting it control every detail of my life, because the love of God is worthy of that and more.

Father, this is Good Friday indeed. Thank You for that day 2000 years ago, and thank You for all that You have planned for today. Help me live each moment of today in right relationship with You and with those around me, by the love that only You can supply, for Your glory. Thank You. Hallelujah!

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Authority; April 9, 2020

Posted on April 11, 2020 by jgarrott

John 19:11 Jesus answered, “You would have no power over me if it were not given to you from above. Therefore the one who handed me over to you is guilty of a greater sin.”

Authority is a strange thing. God is the ultimate source of every bit of authority, and how we use it can be a grave responsibility. Even in a time of severe persecution Paul wrote, “There is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God.” (Romans 13:1) That’s one reason fathers and husbands are so important. It has long been noted that our relationship with our biological father greatly colors our relationship with God, who is our heavenly Father. Paul wrote about the authority of the husband/father in the home, in Ephesians 5, but there too we are no more than stewards of God’s authority. In one of the two times it is recorded that Jesus was amazed, a Roman Centurion expressed the whole matter of authority very clearly: “Lord, I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. But just say the word, and my servant will be healed. For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and that one, ‘Come,’ and he comes. I say to my servant, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.” (Matthew 8:8-9) We have no authority if we are not under authority, and all of that traces back to God. That’s what Jesus is saying here, even though the authority in question was being used to mistreat him horribly. That’s not to say that we are to be doormats; history is filled with people who served God in defiance of human authority. Peter put a point on that before the Sanhedrin when he said, “We must obey God rather than men!” (Acts 5:29) It was a very big deal indeed when Jesus said, just before rising to heaven, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” (Matthew 28:18) We need to submit to His authority first and foremost, and respond to, and exercise, all other authority in relation to that.

I have always had a somewhat uneasy relationship to authority. I was never particularly rebellious, but I have had a tendency to feel I knew better than whoever it was that had authority over me. Bureaucracy is a major frustration to this day! In its ultimate evil expression, it extends to those who conveyed the orders and kept the records of the Holocaust. We see echoes of that in the “deep state” that is being exposed in America today. However, I recognize their motivation, because when I thought I “knew better,” I wasn’t submitting myself to God, but was rather setting myself up as the authority. At the same time, I have hesitated to exercise authority in the church, and the church has suffered for it. Authority and responsibility are inextricably intertwined. The church belongs to God and Jesus said He would build it, (Matthew 16:18) but He has told me to feed His sheep. (John 21:17) Paul spoke of the authority he had been given to build people up, not tear them down. (2 Corinthians 10:8) I must not run from my responsibility to exercise the authority God has vested in me to feed, guide, and otherwise build up His children, for His glory.

Father, thank You for this reminder. Thank You that my school classes start again today. Help me exercise the authority I have been given over my students to build them up, not tear them down. May I so demonstrate Christ to them that they will be drawn to seek Him themselves, for their salvation and Your glory. Thank You. Praise God!

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Kingdom Authority; April 8, 2020

Posted on April 9, 2020 by jgarrott

John 18:36 Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jewish leaders. But now my kingdom is from another place.”

A weakness of every Japanese translation of the Bible that I have seen is displayed here. Where English specifies “kingdom,” the Japanese simply says “country.” It is true that all countries of that era were either kingdoms or empires, but still, “country” has a very strong sense of physical territory, whereas “kingdom” puts the emphasis on the king, the ruling authority. That’s why the declaration in heaven is, “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Messiah, and he will reign for ever and ever.” (Revelation 11:15) It’s not that all the countries on earth will be transformed into heaven, it’s that, as Jesus said in the Great Commission, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” (Matthew 28:18) When Jesus taught us to pray, “Your kingdom come,” He was speaking of His authority, His Lordship. If we want to operate in the kingdom of God, we need only to be completely submitted to the Lordship of Jesus Christ. Jack Hayford’s well-loved song, Majesty, hits the nail on the head: “Majesty, kingdom authority, flow from His throne unto His own; His anthem raise.” Jesus’ Lordship was not granted by the world, it was granted by the Creator, so there was and is nothing in and of the world that can take it away. Pilate owed his position to politics, to the Roman Empire and to the emperor, and he could see that Jesus was indeed operating in an entirely different dimension. That’s why he worked pretty hard, really, to let Jesus go, but ultimately his fear of political realities kept him from it. We today are very aware of politics, but we’ve got to remember that all authority ultimately rests in Christ Jesus alone.

I have been aware of authority and political systems most of my life. I was in the 7th grade when Nikita Khrushchev took his shoe off to pound the podium with it in a speech at the UN, saying “We will bury you.” (I even wrote a report on it for my English class.) I am a citizen of the freest democracy in the world and a resident of a country that has been learning democracy for the past 75 years, but I have been very aware of other governmental systems. That whole issue is also expressed in the matter of Church government. Sadly, many churches forget that Jesus is an absolute ruler, and they out-vote Him! No human being is supposed to be a dictator, particularly in the Church, but we’ve got to remember where all genuine authority originates. The Founders of America got it right when they recognized that our rights are given to us by our Creator, not by government. The assorted assaults on those rights actually originate in a defiance against that Creator. I need to remember that, and appeal to God in every case. In my own life, I’ve got to remember that I am a citizen of the Kingdom of Heaven, completely subject to the authority of my King. That said, there is tremendous freedom in that, because the rights of citizenship in God’s kingdom include the abiding presence of the Holy Spirit, and “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.” (2 Corinthians 3:17)

Father, thank You for this reminder. Help me operate fully under, and in, the authority of Jesus Christ my Lord, so that Your will may be done in and through me, for Your glory. Thank You. Hallelujah!

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Repentance; April 7, 2020

Posted on April 9, 2020 by jgarrott

Luke 22:61-62 The Lord turned and looked straight at Peter. Then Peter remembered the word the Lord had spoken to him: “Before the rooster crows today, you will disown me three times.” And he went outside and wept bitterly.

Many people down through the centuries have thought about what was different between what Judas did and what Peter did. We say they both “betrayed” Jesus, but Judas planned to do it and he received money for it. Peter, on the other hand, just kind of fell into it without thinking, out of fear for his own safety. Both of them had a moment when they realized what they had done, (Matthew 27:3 and here) but what they did then is the big key. Judas knew he had blown it, but he tried to stay in control, returning the money he had received and killing himself. Peter, on the other hand, acknowledged his own inability to be in control. It doesn’t spell it out here, but I think he threw himself on the mercy of God, acknowledging that he had no right to claim such mercy for himself. I think Don Francisco’s song He’s Alive is powerfully anointed and captures what happened with essentially historical accuracy. The point is, Judas regretted but didn’t repent, whereas Peter repented totally. The Japanese term for repentance provides real insight. It is a compound that means, “regret and redo.” Judas regretted his actions, but rather than turning to God in humility, he chose the self-centered dead end (no pun intended) of suicide. Peter, in contrast, just let go of everything. As a result, after His resurrection Jesus gave him a private audience, just as Don Francisco memorialized in song, (Luke 24:34, 1 Corinthians 15:5) and he was gloriously restored. We all stumble and fall at times, as John wrote so clearly. (1 John 1:8-10) However, again as John wrote, if we acknowledge our sins and failures and surrender our will to God for Him to turn us around, He will do that. It doesn’t matter how great the sin, because God is always greater and more powerful than the sin, just as I said in this past Sunday’s message. God can always enable us to start over, even if we have missed a great blessing by our unfaithfulness.

This is a very real issue in my life, as it is in the life of every human being, because indeed, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” (Romans 3:23) It was quite a few years ago, when I was struggling with a particular “besetting sin,” (Hebrews 12:1) that I realized that the more I dwelt on what I had done, the more likely I was to do it again. (2 Peter 1:9) It was when I realized that God could and did forgive me in Christ that I was able to let go of it and move on. That is what the “redo” of the Japanese “regret and redo” is all about. There is no repentance without regret, but there is also no repentance without faith that God can enable us to redo. That faith was what Peter had, but Judas didn’t.

Father, thank You for this reminder. Thank You for what You have taught me about repentance. Help me be effective in leading others into repentance, that they too may receive Your forgiveness and cleansing in full, to escape the traps of the enemy and walk in Your victory, for Your glory. Thank You. Praise God!

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Situational Obedience; April 6, 2020

Posted on April 8, 2020 by jgarrott

Luke 22:35-36 Then Jesus asked them, “When I sent you without purse, bag or sandals, did you lack anything?”
“Nothing,” they answered.
He said to them, “But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don’t have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one.

In my Bible, verse 36 is underlined in English but neither verse is underlined in Japanese. There is so much else that is important and famous in this section that these verses get overlooked, and that is unfortunate. The remark about buying a sword is used by gun rights advocates, reasonably enough, but the thing that speaks to me right now is that different circumstances call for different actions. That’s not to call for “situational ethics,” which are in general an abomination, but rather to say that we aren’t to act the same way all the time. God’s truth is unchanging, but how it is applied isn’t. Paul picks that up in Romans, when he says, “Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn.” (Romans 12:15) Keep in mind this is the same Paul who said, “Be joyful always.” (1 Thessalonians 5:16) We need to let the Holy Spirit guide us and not be rigid. That’s not at all to say that some sins are OK in some circumstances; the 10 Commandments don’t change. However, even there we need to remember that the 6th Commandment is “You shall not murder,” (Exodus 20:13) rather than the more traditional, “Thou shalt not kill.” The Hebrew words are distinct, and a police sniper who takes out someone who has a knife to someone’s throat isn’t committing murder. We need to let the Holy Spirit have full access to our hearts and minds, because otherwise we will be rigid on issues where we should be flexible and wobbly on issues where we should stand firm. Frankly, this is what spiritual maturity is all about. We need to let God be God, whatever that means to our preconceptions.

I was raised with the concept of absolute truth, and for that I am very grateful. It is no accident that the idea of absolute truth is under constant attack these days, because the devil knows that with no absolute truth there is no absolute God, and he wants to steal God’s place in people’s hearts and minds. My father lived by the principle of absolute honesty, and I have tried to do the same. However, I have learned (or rather, I am still learning) that absolute honesty doesn’t necessarily mean always saying everything you know, however true it might be. I have hurt people needlessly many times doing that. I am to speak the truth in love, and sometimes that means being quiet. The question of what would Jesus do (WWJD) was a fad and then a cliché, but it’s still a good principle. That said, I can’t reliably know what Jesus would do by my own intellect; I’ve got to let the Spirit of Jesus guide me. Today will not be identical to yesterday, so I need to seek, hear, and obey God’s instructions for today.

Father, thank You for this Word. The lack of underlining shows I haven’t really heard it before. Thank You for generating in me the habit of daily devotions. I pray that I wouldn’t just go through the motions, but actively fellowship with you, not just in these morning times but throughout each day, so that I may know Your will and do it, for Your glory. Thank You. Praise God!

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