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The Father is Seeking Such People

The Japanese art of kintsugi or ‘golden repair’ mends broken pottery with gold, silver, or platinum, and in the end, makes the piece worth more than it originally did.  While all we see are the ways in which we have been broken by sin, God, who loves us unconditionally, sees our great value to Him.  We are to return that love in kind through true worship.

I.  Romans 8:28-39.  The body is loved by the Bridegroom.  Academically, we don’t doubt His love for us (Romans 5:6-8), we claim.  We just doubt our worth.  But, many know that a parent’s love for a child doesn’t make the value of that child go up or down depending on the child’s behavior.  So, God loves us greatly and assigns us infinite value–so much that He gave us His Son.

II.  John 4:23-26.  The Bridegroom is seeking true worshipers.  When two single people are attracted to one another, they seek each other with a desperation, hoping that he or she is the one to marry.  So, even though God loves all He has made, He is seeking ‘true worshipers,’ those who will be part of His bride, the church, and will love Him back (in spirit and truth).  That manifests itself in repentance (Luke 15:4-21) as He mends us back together in kintsugi-like fashion to make us more valuable to Him than we were before.

III.  Revelation 19:7-9.  The bride makes herself ready, her fine linen the righteous acts of the saints.  This is the true worship she engages in–that which is in spirit and truth.  So many today have the zeal for God without right doctrine.  They are like blindfolded dart players, rarely hitting the target.  Like the five virgins who had forgotten to buy oil for their lamps, they eagerly await the Bridegroom in vain (Matthew 25:1-13).  We must return His seeking of us with true worship that combines both.

Any relationship is two-sided.  We deceive ourselves if we believe God will seek us if we aren’t seeking Him in return.  We must return His love with true worship.

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Let Them Save You

Idolatry.  That’s so Old Testament!  After all, no one today worships something they put before God … oh.  Well, maybe there’s money and materialism, success and sensuality, jobs and hobbies, food and entertainment.  Perhaps the list could even extend into all the negative ways we seek to escape the stress of life instead of putting our trust in God.

What’s the reason the cycle of sin in the time of Judges as well as now continues to repeat in God’s people?  What is it about idols that made them and us forsake God, so that they and us cry out for a deliverer?

I.  Judges 10:6-16.  God knew that mankind, if given the chance, would turn to other things than Him and so carved it into stone (Exodus 20).  The foundation of idolatry is covetousness (Colossians 3:5).  We are made in God’s image, but since we cannot control God, we strive to make God in ours.  Instead of taking joy in being God’s chosen people, we compromise to become like everyone else.  And then we become complacent because what we serve is not greater than ourselves.

II.  Romans 1:15-16.  How can the gospel break the cycle of sin.  Our world of relative morality works to make us believe that sin and judgment aren’t real and so paves the way for idolatry.  At times in Judges, God’s people would temporarily break the cycle by acknowledging their sin.  We must be convinced that repentance is essential (Romans 2:2-5), judgment is real (Romans 14:10-12), and that the gospel is the solution (Romans 6:1-11).

III.  Hebrews 7:22-25.  But unlike God’s people of the time of Judges who would fall back into sin and idolatry when the judge died (Judges 2:16-19), we have a Judge, the perfect deliverer, who always lives to intercede for us.  Therefore, once rescued from sin and death, we never need to go back into the life we once lived.

Christians, who know the power of the gospel, need to return to trusting God fully and not seek idols of their own fashioning.

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Come and Reign Over Us

In a time so much like today, God’s people in the time of Judges struggled to live out His commands without compromising with the evil world around them.  Often, they failed, found themselves enslaved, and would cry out to God for deliverance.  When they did, God would send a judge who would save them, but the people only remained faithful until the judge died.

Abimelech was one of those judges, and his story teaches us several lessons.

I.  Judges 9:1-24.  Gideon’s illegitimate son, Abimelech, was a terrible guy who went to his terrible family and gathered around him terrible people to do a terrible thing: he killed the seventy sons of Gideon, his half-brothers, all except Jotham, the youngest.  As Jotham tells Abimelech and his family that they will destroy each other, he gives an extended metaphor that helps us today.  The trees (the family) was trusting in brambles (Abimelech) to rule over them, but they won’t like the refuge that brambles offer.  We must not put our trust in the things of this world but only God.

II.  1 Corinthians 9:24-27.  Also, just because you’re being used by God doesn’t mean He approves of what you’re doing.  Pharaoh teaches us this (Romans 9:17).  So do the wicked men who put Jesus to death and probably thought they were doing the right thing (Acts 2:22-24).  We must persevere in the face of discipline (Hebrews 12:11-17) and obey God’s commands so that we will not be disqualified for the prize.

III.  Psalm 46:1-3.  Thirdly, we must be careful in whose or what we’re taking refuge in.  Our situation being so similar to God’s people’s situation in the time of Judges, we must be careful not to compromise with the world.  The brambles are all around us, begging us to come rest in their shade: the economy, politicians, health, youth, friends, self-concept.  These are all temporary and will melt with the elements in the heat on Judgment Day (Psalm 20:1-9).  Christ and His work on the cross and at the tomb, however, are eternal.  Only in Him, the King of Kings, may we take refuge and live.

In who or what are you taking refuge?  Examine your life, the way you interact with others, your social media posts, how you spend your time.  While calling yourself a Christian, you may find that you’re spending a lot of time in the shade of brambles.

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As I Have Done to You

Our idea of ‘servant’ is probably in the context of ‘public servant,’ someone who should work for us but acts more like a king on an elevated throne.  Jesus the perfect king-servant showed that a servant is one who sacrificially helps others above self.  Indeed, the only way a biblical servant is above another is when he stoops to lift another up.

I.  John 12:12-33.  Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead in full view of the crowds got everyone’s attention, especially those in power who wanted to hold onto their power.  A line was drawn in the sand, and Jesus’ challenge was heard: “if anyone serves me, he must follow me.”  To Peter and others who thought in worldly ways, following Jesus meant glory and honor … and power (John 13:31-38)!

II.  John 13:1-8.  Jesus illustrated that this wasn’t the case when He, through whom all things were made, removed the trappings of one above all others and did the work of the lowliest servant–washing feet.  Confused by this, Peter, who surely remembered Jesus’ transfiguration (Matthew 17:1-5), balked at this redefinition of serving (Philippians 2:5-8) and had to submit to its necessity.  With the later help of the Holy Spirit, he seems to have gotten it (1 Peter 2:21-25).

III.  John 13:12-17.  Before Jesus explained His actions, He “resumed his place” as their Lord and Master.  The disciples must have recalled their earlier conversation about who was greatest among them (Matthew 20:22-28).  That person, Jesus explained, is the wheat willing to fall to the ground to die to produce many seeds or the one who gives his life for a friend (John 15:12-17).  Just as Jesus would be the greatest servant for mankind, He calls us to do for others what He has done for us.

We have been given great freedom to choose how we live our lives.  May we not in selfishness indulge the sinful nature with that freedom but rather serve one another in love (Galatians 5:13), just as Jesus did.

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And They Devoted Themselves

A wedding is an event; the marriage is an endurance race.  As parts of the bride of Christ, we should plan ahead for the time beyond the “I do” of baptism to the daily walk with our Bridegroom.  A glimpse into the lives of the 1st Century Christians can help us in the 21st Century.

I.  Acts 2:42-47.  How long would a marriage last if after the honeymoon, the bride returned to her single life and only spent an hour with her husband once a week?  There’s much we can learn from the early church’s devotion to their new life.  In western culture, we are in the habit of scheduling time with Jesus along with the other things that we do.  But, a marriage is not something we can schedule.  It is through our relationship with Christ that we live our lives.

II.  1 Timothy 2:1-6.  Just as newly married soldiers in Israel were to stay home to work on the devotion to their wives (Deuteronomy 24:5), new Christians especially need to work on their relationship with Christ through their devotion to learning from God’s Word, serving with fellow Christians, remembering Jesus’ sacrifice and resurrection through the Lord’s Supper, and praying as Christ desires all to come to salvation (Acts 2:42).

III.   Ephesians 5:31-33.  And, of course, as the years go by, all couples need to maintain their marriages through such things as retreats, date nights, and good communication.  These keep their oneness from splitting back into two individuals again.  The formula that Christ and His bride use is sacrificial love and obedient respect.  This takes work as well as devotion in our spiritual walk to do the things that benefit ‘we’ and not just ‘me’ (Acts 2:43-47).

Rather than treating our Christianity as a checklist, we should seek to do those things that a good friend or spouse would do with our Bridegroom to have a loving and lasting relationship.

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For As the Man Is

In an age where our secular culture attacks any show of masculinity as ‘toxic,’ should the church settle for the feminized version of what it means to be a man?

I.  Judges 8:18-21.  Having overcome his fear and fully trusting in God, Gideon routs the armies attacking Israel and captures two of their leaders, who basically tell him to kill them himself if he were to be a man.  Gideon does, but is it toxic masculinity or doing what has to be done–even if it’s hard?  Fear almost always is the cause for most men to shrink back from being ‘men.’  Describing David as a man after God’s heart, God explains that he would do all of His will (Acts 13:22).  So, to be a godly men, we must be a living sacrifice to know what God’s will is (Romans 12:1-2), choosing to do His will–even if it’s difficult.

II.  Hebrews 5:7-9.  Jesus was such a man, who suffered greatly in His obedience to His Father’s will, but became the source of salvation to all who obey Him.  We are told to fix our eyes on Him as our example and for perseverance to obey because the way He endured the cross was “for the joy that was set before him” (Hebrews 12:1-4).  Jesus fulfilled what it means to be a godly man in the fullest sense and then left us an example to follow (1 Peter 2:21-23), even forgiving from the cross (Luke 23:34).

III.  Psalm 18:29-40.  So, only in Jesus and walking as He did (1 John 2:6) are we able to be ‘men’ by God’s definition.  “For as the man is, so is his strength,” Gideon was told.  Since “the weakness of God is stronger than men” (1 Corinthians 1:25), how better to truly be a ‘man’ than through Him?

God made both men and women in His likeness.  There’s no reason why the church must accept that there’s no difference or that gender is somehow fluid or subject to choice.  Rather, both men and women must live out how they were intended to be in Him as outlined in His Word.

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With You Are Too Many

“I’ll tie one hand behind my back just to make it a fair fight!” says someone who believes himself at a great advantage to start with.  But what about God?  If He’s going to fight for you, what does He have to do to make it a fair fight for your enemies … or so you can understand His power?

Isaiah records that one angel slew 185,000 Assyrians, and yet Jesus said in Gethsemane that He could call 12 legions of angels to Him if He wanted to.  With a legion being 6,000 strong, that’s a total of 72,000 angels capable of handling 13,320,000,000 enemies.

With God on your side, who indeed could stand against you?

I.  Judges 7:1-21.  But, Gideon didn’t understand that.  He lived in a time when the great things that God did for His people were just dusty stories from long ago (don’t know what that’s like!).  Just telling Gideon that He will be with him is not enough for trust in God to be built.  So, through a series of tests, God shows Gideon that He will take care of him.  God had to get Gideon (full of man’s idea of strength) out of the way so God could be seen as GOD.  Paring down Gideon’s army to a mere 300, the bully, Midian, flees.

II.  Exodus 14.  In fact, throughout the Bible God uses impossible situations to show His power.  Gideon cites God saving them out of slavery in Egypt with the plagues, but it is at the Red Sea that God is seen as GOD.  Armed for battle in all of man’s strength (Exodus 13:17-18), the Israelites were nevertheless disorganized and unprepared to meet Pharaoh’s army.  Backed against the water with chariots bearing down on them, God–through Moses–parted the water and the Israelites walked through as on dry ground while the Egyptians drowned.

III.  Romans 8:26-31.  The cross is, of course, the greatest impossible situation in which God was seen to be GOD.  And, we have the reassurance that if God would not even spare His own Son for us that there’s nothing He wouldn’t give us.  He fights for those who trust in Him to be GOD, and so He uses those who can get themselves out of the way, be still (Psalm 46:10), and let Him battle for them (1 Corinthians 1:18-31).

But do we?  So often we go at the impossible situations in our lives with our own strength and resources.  Like Gideon, we need to know that God is GOD, and that when He is fighting for us, there’s nothing resembling a fair fight!

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He Went About Doing Good

When someone says ‘good enough,’ he’s referring to a minimum standard he hopes he has met.  Many around us often express that they hope the good they have done will be ‘good enough’ to get them into heaven–as if God is weighing deeds with some great cosmic scale.

In addition to believing that God has a minimum standard for entrance into heaven, another problem with this view is that it eliminates Jesus and His work on the cross and in the tomb entirely from the solution for sin.

I.  Acts 10:1-48.  If there was such a cosmic scale, Cornelius had tipped it heavily towards the good.  He had good deeds as well as having a good character … but God said that all that was not ‘good enough’ and sent Peter to preach the gospel to him.  It was after Cornelius obeyed the gospel that he had salvation.

II.  Hebrews 5:7-9.  Once God had taken on flesh in the person of Jesus and went about doing good works as Peter described Him to Cornelius (Acts 10:38), wasn’t that ‘good enough’ to get Him into heaven?  After all, Jesus was sinless (2 Corinthians 5:21).  No, He needed to learn obedience from what He suffered and with loud tears cry out to God who was able to save Him.

III.  Ephesians 2:8-9.  Having been saved through Jesus’ obedience, we must not think that we can ever be ‘good enough’ to somehow work our way to heaven.  Rather, we, who are in Christ, do good works out of obedience to the One who saved us through His obedience.  We walk as Jesus did (1 John 2:1-6).

We must examine why we do good things.  Are we doing them to earn our way to heaven (working) or are we doing them as acts of obedience (walking)?  ‘Good enough’ is never ‘good enough’ with God.  He holds us to the maximum standard that His Son has met, so that in Him we can meet it too.  This is why the gospel truly is good news!

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He is a New Creation

As the road is wide that leads to destruction, much of mankind are caterpillars concerned with things below.  It’s when one realizes a need, turns, and obeys the gospel that he enters Christ through baptism and changes to be born a member of Christ’s body the church.  From there the butterfly … erm, Christian … walks (or flies–to keep the illustration consistent) as Jesus did upon that narrow road that leads to eternal life.

I.  Romans 5:18-21.  Sin marred the image of God that we were created in, but Christ was the perfect image of God who lived perfectly and then died so that in Him we could be restored to that perfection (Romans 6:1-14).  When we enter the chrysalis of Christ, we become a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17-19).

II.  Colossians 3:1-17.  God’s ways and thoughts are so much above our own (Isaiah 55:8-9), yet in Him we are united with him and change to live differently.  Our minds and hearts need to be set on things above, not on earthly things.  After all, butterflies have wings and do not have the concerns of caterpillars.

III.  Ephesians 2:4-10.  The flutter (collective noun for a group of butterflies) that make up the bride of Christ works (obedient living) for the Bridegroom, walks as the Bridegroom (1 John 2:3-6) does, watches for the Bridegroom (Luke 21:34-36), and waits for the Bridegroom (Hebrews 9:27-28).

Jesus has made us to be a new creation as we enter the chrysalis of His body, the church, and are reborn as something entirely different.  Why live as if we don’t have wings?

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If the Lord is With Us

In the midst of a culture that was reaping the consequences of sin and turning away from God, God calls Gideon and declares that He is with them.  Citing the great ways of the past in which God showed Himself to truly be with them, Gideon asks a question that Christians could certainly ask today, “If the Lord is with us, why then has all this happened to us?”

I. Matthew 14:28-33.  We have the same reassurance that Gideon received–that God is with us (Matthew 28:20) and that He will never forsake us (Hebrews 13:5-6), yet we, like Peter stepping out of boat, take our eyes off Jesus because the winds around us are so fierce.  Our circumstances and situation in a dark world are going to rage (2 Corinthians 4:16-18).  This doesn’t mean that God is not there.  We must fix our eyes on Him (Hebrews 12:1-3) to not grow weary or fainthearted.

II. Judges 6:11-32.  More than just his circumstances, Gideon was overwhelmed because he saw his weaknesses and helplessness in the midst of the culture he was a part of.  Most Christians feel this way today.  We, like Gideon, can take great reassurance that this is exactly the situation in which God works (1 Corinthians 1:25-29) so we may not boast.  Paul, in pleading for the ‘thorn’ to be removed from him, was told that God’s power in his life was made perfect in Paul’s weakness (2 Corinthians 12:8-10).

III. Judges 6:33-40.  Jesus said if we had faith as small as a mustard seed, then nothing would be impossible for us (Matthew 17:20).  God readies Gideon to take on His people’s enemies by first taking a ‘smaller’ step at home.  After he tears down his father’s altar to Baal and burns his Asherah pole, Gideon is defended by his earthly father and his heavenly Father sends him an army.  We too need our faith tested if we are to become mature and complete (James 1:2-4).  Are you willing to take that step?

Are circumstances or weakness coloring your perspective?  Or, are you seeing clearly through faith?