adoption

How To Thrive After Being Crushed by the Church – Part 2

~ godisnotlikeyou ~ 4 Comments

Do you feel the church has used you up and thrown you away?

That it was a bait and switch experience? You got in, and then they threw the rule book at you?

You were promised a life of happiness, victory over temptations, and a new power and control.

Instead you were more miserable, your vices got worse, you failed more often, and you felt stuck and helpless.

And if you dared to speak of these things, instead of receiving support you were told it was your fault. You weren’t doing enough of the things (rules) sincere Christians were supposed to do.

Like more bible study, deeper prayer, being more committed to church and community group.

So you put your whole heart and soul into being more disciplined in the disciplines.

Only to crash and burn even more.

You eventually concluded that this Christian thing didn’t deliver. And you felt betrayed and angry.

You know what? You’re right to be angry!

You have a right to expect to hear the gospel preached every Sunday.

You have a right to be reminded that your sins are forgiven, that you are accepted in Christ, that you are a new creation in Jesus, that it’s not about your performance, but Christ’s that has merited heaven and God’s affection for you.

So go ahead and be angry at the church because it prefers to dole out rules for living instead of the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ.

Pray and ask God to change your pastor or find another church.

What you need to see though, is that your anger is directed at the church, not at Jesus. He’s your life and freedom and joy. He has kept his promises.

You are justified. All your sins are forgiven.

You are sanctified. You are wrapped in the righteousness of Christ.

You are loved. God chose you in love from before the foundation of the world.

You do belong to God. He loves you as much as he loves Jesus.

He’s not the one who has betrayed you!

Go ahead. Smile!

How Being Baptized Can Get You Killed

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You’ve heard stories about the underground church in China. You’ve also read stories about Christians who have risked their lives for the gospel in foreign countries.

This is a true story that is a little closer to home. It’s from a man who teaches a bible study in a federal prison in Northern California.

“We had six baptisms today. We have a tank outside the church and they fill it up when we do baptisms. One white man and two black men and three Latino men were baptized. One of the inmates told me that these men’s faith was genuine. I asked him, ‘How do you know?’ He said, ‘Because they were all baptized in the same tank.’

“You see, in this prison, everything is segregated by race. Each race has its own shower and toilet, sink and place to eat. You never eat or shower at the other race’s area. It can get you stabbed or killed. These men, of different races, were being baptized in the same tank. That can get them in trouble with their own race group. All they really have now is the church body.

“In our day, and in our country, I never thought that a baptism could get you killed.”

Here is risk for the sake of the gospel.

Here is also a beautiful picture of how Christ tears down the separation of the races and creates one new race in himself.

Those who belong to Jesus Christ are now brothers with the same Father, who share in the same inheritance, and look forward to the same eternal destiny.

Will The Real Gospel Stand Up?

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What is the gospel?

Is it, “Ask Jesus into your heart”?

Or is it to give your testimony in public?

Actually it’s neither.

The word gospel means good news. It’s an announcement, a report, of the historical facts of Jesus Christ and him crucified.

It tells you that you don’t need a set of rules for saving yourself because the good news is that Jesus has done the work for you.

From A to Z, the gospel is about Jesus. His life, death and resurrection according to God’s plan.

The gospel is not someone’s testimony about how he or she became a Christian. They became converted through the gospel, but their personal story is not the gospel.

If there was ever a group of people who could have given their personal testimonies about their relationship to Jesus, it was the apostles. On a few occasions when they did, they spoke of their fear and failure. Instead they spoke of Christ and his cross for sinners.

God himself says that his power lies in the gospel. This is the means by which he brings people to believe in his Son.

The gospel is not a set of directions for saving yourself, but good news about what Jesus has done to save you.

So what’s your responsibility in this?

You job is to believe God. To believe that he sent his only Son to rescue you from sin and death and hell. And when you place your faith in Jesus, you become a new creature in Christ, God adopts you into his family, and you live your life as someone who has been resurrected to a new life in Christ.

You are no longer your own, but you have been bought with a price, the priceless life and blood of Jesus Christ.

And from that moment on, you live in gratitude to God and in love to your neighbor.

 

It’s Not About Sin

~ godisnotlikeyou ~ 2 Comments

How do you handle suffering? (If you’re like me, I want to run and hide until it all goes away.)

Do you doubt God’s love for you? Feel his withdrawal? (You bet.)

Do you think he’s punishing you for something wrong you have done? (That’s what I think of right away.)

The truth is we’ve all done everything wrong, all the time, all our lives. That’s why we need a Savior. As Romans 3 says, none of us seeks God.

If we keep to that logic, we would deserve to be punished everyday of our lives. But even that would not be sufficient to a holy God.

The truth is we cannot pay for our sins. They are too awful, too deep, and too pervasive.

That’s why Jesus came to pay for them in our stead on the cross.

God isn’t angry with us anymore.

Let me say that again. God isn’t angry with us anymore if we have placed our trust in Jesus.

Jesus paid for every sin we have committed, are committing now, and will commit in the future.

If we believe in Jesus as God’s solution to our sin problem, then all of our sins are forgiven. We are adopted children of God. God now is our Heavenly Father. He loves us.

So with that in mind, trials and suffering are meant to mature us and build the image of Christ in us. There’s a real purpose to them. Read Romans 5 & James 1.

Don’t waste this opportunity to stretch your faith.

 

 

The Remedy for Getting Rid of Our Mistrust of God

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No short-cut that tries to bypass the patient unfolding of the true character of God, and our relationship to him as his children, can ever succeed in providing long-term spiritual therapy. But the knowledge that the Father has bestowed his love on us, so that we are called children of God – and in fact are his children (1 John 3:1-2), will, over time, prove to be the solvent in which our fears, mistrust, and suspicion of God – as well as our sense of distance from him – will eventually dissolve. – Sinclair Ferguson