Living Hope

1st Peter 1:3-5 says, "Blessed be the God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled and that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith for salvation ready to be revealed in the last time."

Hope is all we really have to live for. That's what belief and superstition are built on. I believe that one day I will be in heaven, and that is my hope. We heard  a story early this week that really made us think about hope. We climbed a mountain called Bell Rock in Arizona. We were super excited to have been all the way to the top and the next day made a reference to our hike to our tour-guide while looking at Indian reservation items. He told us a story of two-thousand New Age believers sitting on Bell Rock and in a huge circle. They crossed their legs and interlocked their fingers hoping that something would happen.

They believed that the earth would soon start to change and there would be more visual changes in the world we know. One of those changes would be Bell Rock raising itself out of the ground and lifting itself into space. The New Agers wanted to be a part of the change, so they tried catching the ride. I can't imagine watching the disappointment after they all come down from the mountain.

They hoped in a prophetic word and a fairy tale and they were wrong. This is what everyone worries about: having a false hope. We dread the day that we get to the end of our lives and we find out the truth. "What if what I hoped in was wrong and I lose control of where I am going?"

I'd encourage you guys to not fear this interaction. Peter says it plainly: our hope is a living hope, different than everyone else's. Don't you love knowing the answer while everyone else doesn't? There is a sense of pride knowing that you have the key to the door while everyone else is looking everywhere and picking up keys that will never fit. We're not told to hold on to our key, or our knowledge of Christ and His resurrection. He tells us to share what we know and hope in with everyone over all the world.

This is huge! Our hope is living! It's not something that has no real evidence but the earth itself is proclaiming the life and death of Christ. The sky proclaims the glory of God so that none can deny it! It's so evident. We literally have the key to all the questions the world can ask! We have been given the gift of eternal life and the ability to press in on the presence and reality of who God is. Our hope is living and works in us every day. Our inheritance is coming and we have been assured by the coming of the Holy Spirit into us.

What are we waiting for? I could go on about how we need to share the Gospel of who God is even further, but is that really the issue? The issue is we don't understand the value of what we have. God is in love with us and desires for us to join in the song of His glory. When we are dedicated to glorifying God, He gives us joy in return. There is so much worth in knowing and being with God daily. It's like knowing a rockstar that you get to hang out with personally while everyone else longs to meet him. We have complete access to the throne of God! We are still to recognize it as holy and sacred, but we also can come before God sinless.

The Gospel is a beautiful thing and it is our job to rediscover the value of it everyday and how important it is to us and to our world. When we understand what we are living for and the importance of it, that's when our minds start to zero in. We start concentrating on how to give God the most glory and how to live every second in His presence. The living hope we have literally lives and moves within us. In everything you do,  be assured by the living hope of the death and resurrection of Christ that we are going to receive an inheritance that is not corruptible but completely obtainable.

Have hope. Christ is our living hope bringing us to His glory - Forsake All

How Measureless and Strong

Deuteronomy 6:4-9 says, ““Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord is one! 5 You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. 6 These words, which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart. 7 You shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up. 8 You shall bind them as a sign on your hand and they shall be as frontals on your forehead. 9 You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.”

Sometimes, I wish we were so quick to see symbolism in the Bible. I really wish that we would write things on our foreheads or our gates or doorposts. It’s not some sort of radical experiment but if something is written on your forehead, don’t you think you’ll remember it? If you don’t, people will remind you.

But why should we love Christ? 1^st John says that we love Christ because He first loves us. Paul says that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. It’s not something that we need to do when we truly understand what he does for us. When we get hit by something that big, we don’t need to react. Take our example of being hit by an 18-wheeler. In that case, we don’t need to fall back down the road a few yards because the impact of the vehicle will do it for us. In this, we are not called to just love God because we have to, but we are simply called to react to His true love for us and the way that shows His affection by dying on the cross.

My heart is to pastor people and to lead people closer to Christ, but sometimes I feel like pastors, and a lot of times myself, try to perfect everything in a Christian’s life but not touch on the love of Christ. The only reason we sin is because we don’t understand that depth and width and height of the love of Christ. If we did, we wouldn’t chase after other things like money, worldly success, and relational gratification.

I don’t write this as an expert on the love of God, but as someone who needs to be informed and consumed by it. I need God every day to explain how much He is lavishly in love with me. I need Him to reveal His love to me when I wake up and go about my daily duties. I need to remember His love and affection in the days where my heart is wondering. I might as well write His love upon my head.

So chase after the knowledge and fullness of the love of Christ and pray to be impacted, which then is the fulfillment of the greatest commandment – Forsake All

The Beauty of Sin

Psalm 73:25 says, “Whom have I in heaven but You? And besides You, I desire nothing on earth.” This is such a powerful statement that Asaph wrote years ago that still impacts and touches our hearts. It makes our mouths water and say in desperation, “I want to be there.” How freeing it would be to live in a world where the only thing you desire is to be with God and to worship at His feet. To live out the soul purpose of our existence is the only thing that can bring us ultimate joy and satisfaction, but the question remains: how do we get there?

Psalm 73 isn’t a song about the goodness and glory of being in the presence of God from the very beginning. I remember being told about this amazing psalm by a friend and looking at the first several verses and saying, “I must be in the wrong chapter.” Asaph begins to write that all his righteous living is in vain. He sees the wicked, and those who give way to their own desires, succeed and prosper and then looks to the heavens to cry out in agony. In verse twelve he says, “Behold, these are the wicked; And always at ease, they have increased in wealth.”

In the very next verse he says that he has kept his heart pure for no reason but just out of abstinence. What a crushing statement to the Christian life! How awful it would be to live your life pure and away from evil only to discover at the end of your days that it all was just to keep you from prospering or having riches?

Verse seventeen turns everything around. He says, “Until I came into the sanctuary of God, then I perceived their end.” This post isn’t about the glory of knowing you’re right and everyone else is going to hell, but the impact and the change of mind when someone enters the presence of God. I’ve probably used this example from Paul Washer several times already, but being in the presence of God or experiencing God is just like getting hit by an 18-wheeler. There is no possible way to walk out of the situation unchanged. But people do! I’ve been to church camps where the presence of God seems to be so thick that people are crying and confessing sins to friends, but as soon as they leave they begin to talk about normal and worldly things as if they never had gone into the worship service in the first place.

What’s wrong with this? Should we be concerned that the presence of God is showing up every week and with us daily but we aren’t being changed? I believe in sanctification and want to let you know that I’m in no way saying that you need to change now or you’re not experiencing the fullness of His presence. I believe God is more sovereign than my mind and all of my thinking and His timing is perfect and just. It’s really easy for me to look and people and judge them, but every time, God is showing me a piece of my heart that I’m not giving to Him.

If I’ve experience the presence of God and worshiped Him in spirit and truth, why do I still lust? Why is my way of thinking still deformed? Am I doing something wrong? On the contrary, I should rejoice in the way that my sins bring me to the presence of God to worship. I shouldn’t find joy in my sins in themselves, but in the way that they bring me to my knees in desperation crying out to God, “Lord, I give my life to You. Use me for Your kingdom.” That’s the beauty of sin.

I’m still trying to “figure out” the presence of God. Hopefully I’ll never find the complete answer until I ascend with the fellow believers, but man, I am intrigued. If you’re also curious about this pursuit of knowledge, I’d love for you to check out Pure Praise by Dwayne Moore. Amazing author and book. I’ve finished the first week and I’ve learned more than any devotional book I’ve ever picked up. Praying for you guys and would love to know ways I could specifically pray for you by you sending me an e-mail or commenting on this post.

Pray for me as I explore the beauty of what God is revealing to us. – Forsake All