slave

As for me and my house

/ EllieJ

Every person on the planet—whether they realise it or not—has made a choice about God. There are only two ways to decide, but many ways that decision can be made.

  • Ignorance—some people’s choice has been taken out of their hands. By not knowing about God, sadly, their choice is against Him.
  • Misinformation—some people make their choice about God based on hearsay. They don’t really know the truth for themselves and trust in the word of another, whether right or wrong. Again, sadly, many make a choice against God because they believed a single person’s opinion over the actual Word of God.
  • Fact—I  personally know people who have weighed all the facts and still made a choice against God. It is a conscious decision to reject the Lord.
  • Personal desires— some are under the impression that a life lived for God is boring and useless and too costly, so they reject Him.
  • Truth—there are those still, who know and understand the truth of the Word of God and accept it.

No matter what we choose or how our choice is made, we do make the choice and there are consequences either way.

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life.

Romans 6:23 (NIV)

At the end of his life, Joshua gathered Israel together for one final pep rally. He recounted all that God had done in bringing them out of Egypt and into the land of promise. He closed with this:

Now fear the Lord and serve him with all faithfulness. Throw away the gods you forefathers worshiped beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord. But if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your forefathers served beyond the River, of the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.

Joshua 24:14-15 (NIV)

For Israel, the consequences of rejecting God to serve other gods was dire. Along the way from Egypt to Canaan, He made it pretty clear how things would go for them if they went against Him.

If you forsake the Lord and serve foreign gods, he will turn and bring disaster on you and make and end of you, after he has been good to you.

Joshua 24:20 (NIV)

Now, we are no longer under the law, but under grace (Romans 6:14). God is not going to smite us should we refuse His gift of salvation. No, we bring ruin upon ourselves.

Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone to obey him as slave, you are slaves to the one whom you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness?

Romans 6:16 (NIV)

No matter what choice we make, we must be prepared to live (or die) with the consequences. But, so long as there is breath in your lungs, it is never too late to make a declaration like Joshua: But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.

Read: Joshua 23-24 Luke 6:27-49

The great disturber

/ EllieJ

Read: Numbers 8-10, Mark 5:1-20

Charles Spurgeon said that the gospel is a great disturber of sinful peace. Take a moment to let that statement sink in.

Do you ever wonder why the greatest of sinners seem to make the greatest noise when confronted with the Gospel? Those who are most content in their sin are most disturbed by truth.

For whatever is hidden is meant to be disclosed, and whatever is concealed is meant to be brought out into the open.

Mark 4:22 (NIV)

In Mark 5, Jesus came across a man who had been cast into the dark, hidden away and forced to live among the tombstones (a place no Jew would dare to go because they are considered ceremonially unclean). Why was this man put out of his home? Out of his city? Because he had residing within him a legion of evil spirits. Those spirits gave the man supernatural strength, yet caused him to run about naked and cutting himself. As soon as Jesus drew near, the evil spirits knew what they were confronted with—Truth. And they didn’t like it.

Mark 5-7-8.jpg

Spurgeon went on to say, they view Jesus as a tormentor, who will rob them of pleasure, sting their consciences, and drive them to obnoxious duties. Those who believe themselves to be happy and content in their sin and evil ways are under the notion that, should they accept the truth, they will be forced into a life of awful servitude. What they don’t see is that a life of truth is a life of freedom.

Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.

John 8:32 (NIV)

Under the influence of evil spirits, the possessed man Jesus encountered was cast from him home, forced to live among the dead, stripped of his clothes (and dignity), and made to injure himself. Does this sound like a man who is free to do as he pleases? Whether a person is slave to a legion of evil spirits or a slave to a sin of their own choosing, a slave is a slave. There is no freedom to be found.

It wasn’t until after Jesus had cast the evil spirits from him that the man was free to live his own life. He wanted to travel with Jesus.

Jesus did not let him, but said, “Go home to your family and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how he was had mercy on you.” So the man went away and began to tell in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him. And all the people were amazed.

Mark 5:19-20 (NIV)

Had the man returned to his city and his family as he was, no one would have been amazed. No one is truly amazed by evil or sin or chasing after pleasure.

What amazes people is a life disturbed, disrupted, and changed by the power of the Gospel, that great disturber of sinful peace.

Control freak

/ EllieJ / Leave a comment

Nobody likes to hear the S word. Sin isn’t something anyone wants to or enjoys talking about. Even sinners don’t like their actions to be referred to as sin. It’s a dirty word. And so it should be. But just because sin is dirty, doesn’t mean we shouldn’t address it or even talk about it. Ignoring it won’t make it go away. So how do we deal with it?

We don’t.

He [Jesus] died once to defeat sin, and now he lives for the glory of God.

Romans 6:10 (NLT)

Jesus already dealt with sin. He defeated it. There is no maybe about it. There were no little stragglers that escaped. Jesus got it all. He didn’t just win the battle, he won the war.

What does this mean for us?

Our old sinful selves were crucified with Christ so that sin might lose its power in our lives. We are no longer slaves to sin.

Romans 6:6 (NLT)

There are days where sin feels mighty powerful in my life. I struggle with the temptation to give in—and often do. But if it’s lost its power, why is the struggle still there?

Don’t you realize that whatever you choose to obey becomes your master? You can choose sin, which leads to death, or you can choose to obey God and receive his approval.

Romans 6:16 (NLT)

Perhaps our struggle isn’t so much with sin as it is with control. Until the day we leave this earth, sin will always be an option. But just because it’s there doesn’t mean we have to allow it to control us. We should aim for the exact opposite.

So you should consider yourselves dead to sin and able to live for the glory of God through Christ Jesus.

Romans 6:11 (NLT)

Romans 6 goes on to talk about how we should be using our bodies as tools to bring glory to God. A tool is something to be used, controlled by the one using it. Our bodies should not control us, but we rather, should control our bodies. When we give ourselves over to sin, we give up control. Likewise, when we give ourselves over to God, we give Him control. The less control we hold for ourselves—the more we give to God, the less likely we are to give it up to sin. In a culture where control is everything, this is a difficult thing to comprehend or even accept. Yet the benefits in giving all control to God far outweigh the disadvantages (because there are no disadvantages).

For when we died with Christ we were set free from the power of sin.

Romans 6:7 (NLT)

Sin doesn’t have to control us. We don’t have to try to control sin. We must simply give all control over to God. Easy in words, not so much in action. But I believe that the more we strive to give God complete control and ask for His grace in doing so, the more freedom we will find.

For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 6:23 (NLT)

Daily Bible reading: Psalm 75-77, Romans 6

Be Excellent to Each Other

/ EllieJ / Leave a comment

Do you remember what it was like to be trapped in sin? If you were raised in the church, perhaps not. But in some way or another, we were all slaves to sin. We were all bound. We all needed (or possibly still need) salvation.

Now imagine you’re the one in need. You can’t escape from the never ending cycle of fear and faithlessness. Nothing you do seems to make a difference and you are without hope. How would you respond if someone who’d found their salvation looked down on you as though you were scum? Maybe it did happen and, in spite of that person’s opinion of you, you were able to find what you were looking for.

God spends a lot of time in the Old Testament law reminding Israel that they were once slaves. They were once held against their will.

Remember that you were slaves in the land of Egypt. That is why I am giving you this command.

Deuteronomy 24:18 (NLT)

What command did God give? He talked about not going back to glean again once you’ve harvested—leave what’s left for the foreigners, orphans, and widows. Don’t take a man’s cloak as security and keep it overnight lest he be cold in the night. Always use honest scales in trade.

You were once in a similar position of bondage and someone looked upon you, not with disgust, but with grace and mercy. It is our mandate, as the Church to continue that tradition.

Basically, in the words of Bill S. Preston, Esq., be excellent to each other.

Daily Bible reading: Deuteronomy 23-25, Mark 14:51-72

Free

/ EllieJ / Leave a comment

I like the word free. I like free stuff. I like free time. I like living free.

If you pay any attention to the news at all, you’ll see that (in North America at least), the governments are making an attempt to change the definition of truth and freedom. Unless we, as the Church, stand up and claim our freedom, it will soon disappear altogether.

Aside from our fundamental freedoms of speech, religion and association (as per the First Amendment and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms), there is another type of freedom that we have that the government can never take away from us.

So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth shall set you free.”

John 8:31-32 (ESV)

Let’s confirm the truth we’re talking about because this verse gets taken out of context all the time. Folks tend to use it for their own designs and purposes by quoting only the last portion. They speak of their own personal truths which may or may not be what Jesus was talking about.

Jesus wasn’t talking about perceived truth, but Truth. Jesus is Truth. (John 14:6) This is not a case of what’s-true-for-me-may-not-be-true-for-you. There is absolute truth and Jesus is it. Nothing, nothing can change that. Not your opinion, not your friends or family, not the government.

So now that we’ve established what the Truth is, what does it mean to be free? What does the truth set us free from? We know that it may not be freedom from the consequences of the law. There are Christians all over the world who are imprisoned for believing and standing up for Truth. There are Christians in North America being persecuted for standing up for Truth. Don’t make the mistake of believing that’s a Third World problem.

If the Truth doesn’t keep us out of jail, what good is it? It sets us free from the power of sin and death. That is something our government cannot take away from us. They can’t even pretend to have control over it (though they surely try).

Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin. the slave does not remain in the house forever; the son remains forever. So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”

John 8:34-36 (ESV)

While I firmly believe that the Church needs to stand up for Truth (not the truth of our own making, but Jesus and him alone), we also need to remember that, no matter what the government may say, there is a freedom in the one Truth that can never be taken away from us. If we abide in the Word and allow him to live in us, we will know the Truth and we will always, always be free.

Daily Bible reading: 1 Chronicles 6-7; John 8:21-36