Today is a very special day for me. It was 20 years ago, on January 7, 1992, that my journey with the Lord began. It most definitely was not religion that had come over me (although I did get 'religious' for a short while). Rather, the Creator of the universe, and the One who holds it all together, met me personally where I was at and began wooing me with His love and grace, and I've never been the same since.
I tinkered around with a written blog post, describing my thoughts about all this, but it just wasn't coming out right so I made this video instead.
Saturday, January 07, 2012
Friday, December 30, 2011
Do You Want To Be Made Whole?
“Surely He bore our griefs and carried our sorrows." (Isaiah 53:4)
“Do you want to be made whole?” This is a question that Jesus asked a man with a physical problem (see John 5:6), but of course we know that Jesus can do so much more than provide physical healing. He can work wonders on the inside of us that bring about healing and transformation of the soul.
But instead of genuine, Christ-generated transformation and wholeness, what we often find in the church today is people who are struggling to conform to a certain outward image or standard of behavior. Feeling pressure from all around (preachers, leaders, others in the church, and even themselves) to appear as if they have their lives together, they end up projecting an outward image of goodness, wellness and wholeness – while sadly knowing deep down that all they are doing is faking it. Their outward show doesn't truly reflect what's going on deep inside their soul. On the inside, they continually feel guilt and shame because they're not experiencing genuine healing and transformation, but rather are remaining the same or even getting worse. They aren't experiencing wholeness.
Why is this? Why is there a lack of real, genuine transformation in the body of Christ? Is it because there's not enough teaching and preaching about how to change and how to live godly lives? Is it because people aren't trying or don't want to change? Could I dare you to concede, along with me, that the reason is possibly because the majority of what is being taught in the church today is focused on outward change and on trying to live godly lives, with little or no attention paid to the only real thing that can bring about authentic transformation in a person's life – the actual, real living Spirit of God who is alive in us and always longs for us to allow Him to enter into our suffering, shame and pain with us so He can help us and heal us?
Christ Himself is the only one who can truly transform us. To get a glimpse into how He interacts with us and heals our hurts, look at how He designed us – the members of His body – to interact with each other:
“The way God designed our bodies is a model for understanding our lives together as a church: every part dependent on every other part... If one part hurts, every other part is involved in the hurt, and in the healing. If one part flourishes, every other part enters into the exuberance.” (From 1 Cor 12:25-26, The Message).
We've been designed as a body to be deeply involved with one another, just as Christ deeply involves Himself with us. True, vibrant life happens when we allow Jesus, who is always in us and with us, to suffer with us and rejoice with us. Just as we are able to enter into the hurt and suffering of one another, and to take part in the healing process of one another, so also is God all the more capable – and willing and eager – to enter into our hurt and suffering with us so He can heal and transform us as only He can.
People really do want to change. People really do desire genuine transformation to take place in them. People really do know that they're not living up to their full potential and they really do want to rise above the mediocre lives that they seem to be trapped in. People really do want to be made whole. But many have become complacent or despondent, or have given up because they've found the struggle to change to be too difficult and futile. This is where we can begin see the vital difference between “trying to change” and transformation that comes only by the life of Christ in us.
With a performance focus, even if we're able to positively change our behavior and put on a polished outward appearance, it doesn't necessarily mean that any transformation has actually taken place on the inside. People can put on a good show, and if they aren't allowed the freedom to experience the reality of true transformation and healing on the inside, they will continue to live fake, masked, untransformed lives. The church talks constantly about how Christ can transform us, but the continual focus on our performance actually blocks Christ out and makes it very difficult for any transformation process to actually take place.
What if people could truly believe that there really is hope for them to change! What if they were shown that there really is a transforming power alive and at work in them, and not just a set of rules or principles to keep on struggling to try to live by? Can you imagine them breaking out of the rut of complacency, despondency and hopelessness and truly beginning to look to and trust the healing, sanctifying, comforting, affirming, transforming life of Christ in them? What an amazing change in their experience it would be if they were able to get off of the tiresome and fruitless treadmill of self-powered attempts at change, and turn instead to trusting and depending upon God Himself, who works faithfully and without condemnation to transform their lives over time with great care and patience.
Will we open up our souls and allow Him to truly enter into our suffering (and shame and guilt and hurt and stress and sickness and wills and emotions) so that He Himself can truly heal and transform us from the inside out and not according to mere outward actions and appearances? Will we allow others the freedom to do the same? Christ is a living reality, and He wants His life in us to be real to us. He Himself has come to set us free and to make us whole.
Saturday, December 24, 2011
Saturday, December 17, 2011
New Mick Mooney Interview
I recently had a two part chat with Searching for Grace comic creator, and author of the new book God's Grace Apart From Law, Mick Mooney. The first part of the interview is here. The second part will be posted in a few days. Check out Mick's great insights on all kinds of stuff.
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
God's Grace Apart From Law - Mick Mooney's new book
Mick Mooney's new book God's Grace Apart From Law is now out (released yesterday), and it's an awesome book! It's available as a paperback and as an e-book (see reviews of the book and a link to Amazon here), and I highly recommend you get a copy for yourself and also copies to give away to others. Mick is offering some free bonus giveaways for those who buy the book before the 24th. You can get a free digital copy of his Searching for Grace comic book, as well as a free audio version of his book Look! The Finished Work of Christ, narrated by none other than... me! :D
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
"Your heart is your ally... not your enemy."
"In Christ, your heart is your ALLY. Not your enemy." - Jim Robbins
Saturday, November 19, 2011
Shocking! God's law was never meant for us!
God's law is "good and just and holy" (Rom 7:12), but it was never meant to help man live right or to help man in any way. God gave the law as a specific ministry. It was the ministry of death and condemnation (2 Cor 3:7-9). Through the law came guilt (Rom 3:19) and bondage (Gal 4:24-25).
Through the law, sin was imputed sin to man (Rom 5:13), and through the law, sin abounded (Rom 5:20)
The law is against us and contrary to us (Col 2:14), and the law is enmity with us (Eph 2:15).
"But sin, taking opportunity by the commandment, produced in me all manner of evil desire. For apart from the law sin was dead. I was alive once without the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died." (Rom 7:8-9)
All of this was the ministry of the law. All of this is the reason the law was given. God never intended the law to be something through which man could actually find life or righteousness. Actually, it was exactly the opposite of that!
Let me repeat - the law is not bad or evil. It is good and just and holy. However, all it can do is to produce is guilt, condemnation, bondage and death. That is the law's purpose. Always has been, always will be. God didn't give the law to help man in any way. That was never the purpose of the law.
Now that we are in Christ, we have no relationship with the law. The Gentiles (most of us) never even had a relationship with the law in the first place. Now that we are in Christ, by grace through faith (having never been under the law), we don't suddenly begin to apply the law to our lives, or to help us live. And as for Jews, they were told they had to die to the law in order to be "married" (joined) to Christ. They weren't told to die to it, and then to bring it back up for help with living. Life in Christ - whether for Jew or Gentile - is lived apart from law, but rather "by grace through faith." Our life in Christ is lived through the fact that we died and we no longer live, but Christ now lives in us (Gal 2:19-21).
The law is not evil. But it simply can never provide help for living, nor help with life or righteousness or godliness or any such thing.
Abraham and all those who were counted as righteous before the law lived by faith. God had given them no laws to live by, because laws were (and are) not necessary for people who lived by faith. When the law came, it never helped anybody live righteously. (It was never meant to do that). In fact, as the previous verses show, when the law entered things only got worse. When the law came, guilt and condemnation entered. Death and bondage entered. This is exactly what God had planned and purposed with the law.
But before the law came, people lived by faith. They lived lives of faith, apart from the law, and that is how we live now. The difference now - and it's a wonderful, awesome difference - is that not only are we free from the ministry of death and condemnation and guilt and bondage (the law), but we have the actual life of Jesus Christ living in us! We need no law to live by faith. In fact, Paul said "the law is not of faith" (Gal 3:12).
The law is not of faith. We live by faith, and those who live by faith have no need of law. Again, the law produces exactly the opposite of what faith produces.
Through the law, sin was imputed sin to man (Rom 5:13), and through the law, sin abounded (Rom 5:20)
The law is against us and contrary to us (Col 2:14), and the law is enmity with us (Eph 2:15).
"But sin, taking opportunity by the commandment, produced in me all manner of evil desire. For apart from the law sin was dead. I was alive once without the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died." (Rom 7:8-9)
All of this was the ministry of the law. All of this is the reason the law was given. God never intended the law to be something through which man could actually find life or righteousness. Actually, it was exactly the opposite of that!
Let me repeat - the law is not bad or evil. It is good and just and holy. However, all it can do is to produce is guilt, condemnation, bondage and death. That is the law's purpose. Always has been, always will be. God didn't give the law to help man in any way. That was never the purpose of the law.
Now that we are in Christ, we have no relationship with the law. The Gentiles (most of us) never even had a relationship with the law in the first place. Now that we are in Christ, by grace through faith (having never been under the law), we don't suddenly begin to apply the law to our lives, or to help us live. And as for Jews, they were told they had to die to the law in order to be "married" (joined) to Christ. They weren't told to die to it, and then to bring it back up for help with living. Life in Christ - whether for Jew or Gentile - is lived apart from law, but rather "by grace through faith." Our life in Christ is lived through the fact that we died and we no longer live, but Christ now lives in us (Gal 2:19-21).
The law is not evil. But it simply can never provide help for living, nor help with life or righteousness or godliness or any such thing.
Abraham and all those who were counted as righteous before the law lived by faith. God had given them no laws to live by, because laws were (and are) not necessary for people who lived by faith. When the law came, it never helped anybody live righteously. (It was never meant to do that). In fact, as the previous verses show, when the law entered things only got worse. When the law came, guilt and condemnation entered. Death and bondage entered. This is exactly what God had planned and purposed with the law.
But before the law came, people lived by faith. They lived lives of faith, apart from the law, and that is how we live now. The difference now - and it's a wonderful, awesome difference - is that not only are we free from the ministry of death and condemnation and guilt and bondage (the law), but we have the actual life of Jesus Christ living in us! We need no law to live by faith. In fact, Paul said "the law is not of faith" (Gal 3:12).
The law is not of faith. We live by faith, and those who live by faith have no need of law. Again, the law produces exactly the opposite of what faith produces.
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