You have been good to me

For my family and I this year has had a bit of everything. We welcomed our fourth child, Thomas and we rejoiced in God’s abundant blessing. We also grieved the passing of my grandmother and our dear elderly sister in Christ, Mavis. The joy of new birth and the sadness of death were all happening at the same time. We thanked God in each of these times for His blessing, His mercy and His faithfulness.

This year has also been a difficult one physically, probably the hardest and most painful I have experienced. In these difficult times my family and I have cried out to the Lord with great urgency and also with great confidence. We know Him as the Great Physician and we know He hears our prayers. We have learned to pray with greater clarity and have better understood the will of God in relation to our prayers. Simplicity has come as we now just say ‘Speak Lord Jesus’. We are so thankful that in the midst of all the pain and suffering we have known miracles, healing and answered prayer. We thank the Lord for speaking as clearly as He has throughout the year. His words have been both a healing balm and a grace to endure.

The Scriptures tell us that ‘all things work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to His purpose’. Without the Lord there is little purpose or understanding in the different and difficult circumstances of life. There is little meaning to the good or to the bad. With God all things find purpose and meaning. God’s mercies are new every morning and His compassion never fails!

In this season I have recalled to mind Psalm 13. This Psalm became very precious to me 20 years ago when the Lord spoke clearly in the midst of another difficult and painful year. My testimony and the song in my mouth is the same. “I have trusted in Your lovingkindness; My heart shall rejoice in Your salvation. I will sing to the Lord, because He has dealt bountifully with me.” Psalm 13:5.

The Lord is indeed good to those who wait for Him, and He has most certainly been very good to me.

Except to be amazed

Each Christmas season Joan and I like to send a card to all our family and friends, both here and abroad that we don’t have the opportunity to see personally. In it we want to express our thankfulness to the Lord for His faithfulness and something of His heart towards us for the coming year. This year we wrote the following line, ‘Together with you we look forward to a memorable 2016 where we can expect to be amazed with what God is able to do when we obey His word.’

In our Christmas service last week we were privileged to hear the testimony of a number, whose lives during the course of the past year have been personally transformed. In each case we heard of the miracle of change that has come because they heard a word and were obedient to that word. That’s the key!

A verse that has captured my attention in recent times is from Galatians 3:5, and it asks the question, “So then, does He who provides you with the Spirit and works miracles among you, do it by the works of the Law, or by hearing with faith.” Who doesn’t want and need God to work miracles in their life? We could all do with a miracle or two or three, Amen! But miracles are not achieved by us hoping harder or trying harder, that’s the efforts of our own law at work. On the contrary, Paul reminds His readers that God provides us with His Spirit and works miracles among us because we hear and obey His word. This is how the faith of Christ comes to us, “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.” (Rom 10:17) We are to join Christ in His hearing and the word that Christ heard and was obedient to was the word of the Father. (Matt 4:4).

One miracle that God wants to work in our lives is the miracle of His forgiveness. To be forgiven of your wrongs is a thoroughly cleansing and freeing experience. But in particular I want to highlight the miracle of being able to forgive another as we have been forgiven. (Matt 6:14-15) In describing the love of God Paul writes, “Love does not take into account a wrong suffered.” (1 Cor 13:5). How can we do that accept God provides us with His Spirit so that we can love and forgive as Christ would and not suffer as victims to the many wrongs that happen in life. Expect to be amazed over and over again with the miracle of forgiveness when you hear and obey God’s word.

Christmas Message

The apostle John began His gospel by saying “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.” John 1:14. God came in flesh at the birth of Jesus Christ. In Jesus Christ was life, and His life would become the precious gift given to all who believe.

John later summed up the mystery of the gospel and Christ coming in flesh when he said “The testimony of God is this, that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son has the life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have the life”. 1 John 5:11-12.

The apostle Paul picked up on this theme when he wrote saying “Christ in you is the hope of glory”. Col 1:27. Paul also said that if Christ was in you, your spirit is alive (with the life of Christ) because of righteousness. Rom 8:10. Just as the Word of the Covenant came in flesh at the birth of Jesus Christ, even now the word of the Covenant is coming in our flesh. This word is full of grace and truth and we see how glorious it is. We are able to demonstrate in our lives the glory of God the Father. His words are becoming true in us. What He says is happening in our lives. This is the remarkable reality of substantial Christian living. We see sons and daughters, young and old living in the reality of God’s perfect plans and shining forth the light of Christ’s life to other.

We belong to the one new man (Jesus Christ), and have been raised up with Him (in this life through baptism) to walk and live in a completely new way. Having been raised with Him in this life we know for certain that we will be raised with Him for all eternity in the new heavens and the new earth. The evidence that Christ came in flesh is Christ dwelling in our flesh. What a promise; what a hope and what a life to be lived! He who has the Son has eternal life. To live in Christ with our brethren in Christ is a gift to be treasured above all others.

Help Among the Tents of the Righteous

“The Lord is for me; I will not fear; What can man do to me? The Lord is for me among those who help me.” – Psalm 118:7

The Psalmist is confident that the Lord is for him and because of this he is not afraid. He expresses that the Lord is for him among those who help him. Who are those who help him in the way that he needs to be helped? The answer becomes clear in verses 13-15, “But the Lord helped me. The Lord is my strength and song, And He has become my salvation. The sound of joyful shouting and salvation is in the tents of the righteous; the right hand of the Lord does valiantly.”

His help comes from the tents of the righteous. This is where the right hand of the Lord is valiant on our behalf. All of us will need help in our Christian walk but we need the right kind of help, not just any help. It is important that we know where to go to get the right help that is going to encourage us in our sonship rather than in some other way. Furthermore the psalmist writes in verse 26, “Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord; We have blessed you from the house of the Lord.” We need the help of those who come to us in the name of the Lord. Amen!

Our weekly communion is the gathering of the tents of the righteous. It is where the saints come together with an attitude to encourage and help one another in their sonship. We come as ones controlled by the love of God and who are not living for ourselves but living for Him and His body. (2Cor 5:14-15) Communion is a time where the body ministers to itself to edify, exhort and comfort one another (1Cor 14:3;12;26;31). The throne of grace is in the midst of the tents (houses) of the righteous and this is where we receive mercy and obtain help in our time of need. (Heb 4:14-16).

The fellowship of the tents of the righteous is also the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is called the Helper. (John 14:16;26) The help of the Holy Spirit is especially found amongst the fellowship of the righteous ones. (1Cor 13:11-14) “Therefore, let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another; and all the more as you see the day drawing near.” (Heb 10:24-25)

Being Restored to First Love

For the love of Christ controls us, having concluded this, that …He (Jesus) died for all , so that they who live might no longer live for themselves, but for Him who died and rose again on their behalf. 2 Corinthians 5:14-15

When Jesus is speaking to the church in Revelation chapters 2-3 the first thing He addresses is the fact that they have left their first love. As a consequence of leaving first love Jesus says they are fallen. He then calls them to repent and to return to first love as their only mode of living. First love is the fellowship of the Godhead. It is not only the way They live, it is Who They are. God is love. (1John 4:16) As such They completely live for the other and not themselves.

In the first case Jesus was talking to the leadership of the church. He referred to the leadership as being a star that was in His hand - “The seven stars are the angels (messengers) of the seven churches” and again He speaks of Himself as, “The One who holds the seven stars in His right hand.” (Rev 1:20; 2:1) In the second case He is talking to the whole church because He says if they don’t repent He will remove the lampstand out of its place. The lampstand being the church. (Rev 1:20) As a result what we can clearly see is that both the star and the lampstand have fallen from His hand. To fall from first love is to fall from His hand.

The deception that we see with the church at Ephesus that Jesus is addressing and it is also the issue with the Corinthian church, is that there is much ministry activity and functioning going on. Of course this should be the case, but if these works are not motivated and activated by the love of God then, as Paul says to the Corinthian church, it means nothing. (1Cor 13:1-3)

In considering the impact of this upon ourselves, I don’t think we have ever attained to first love to have fallen from it. But we must see ourselves as ones who are fallen and needing to be restored to first love. This is His word of restoration that sits before us all during this present season. The Spirit is urging us to no longer live for ourselves but for Him. This is why the emphasis on being baptised into the death of Christ has become so critical to our restoration to first love.