Monthly Archives: May 2020

Unrepentant & Safe

Everything had happened so fast. She had been in bed. Then suddenly all these men, and shouting. She was grabbed and dragged. Everything was a blur. Bright light and many voices and dust as the shouting & dragging continued down the street.

Then she was thrown down and heard them discuss starting the stoning. No surprises here. She was guilty and understood how things worked.

Then it got quiet.

Then it got quieter as the number of sandaled feet began to decrease. Shouts had become murmurs which became silence. Then there was only one pair of sandals close to her, and they belonged to the most compassionate eyes she had seen in years.

“Who is left to condemn you?”

There are no other sandals waiting. “They’re all gone.”

“I don’t condemn you either. Go, and don’t keep sinning anymore.”

She hadn’t repented nor declared her faith in Messiah. She found herself caught-in-the-act guilty at the feet of the Living God, full of all holiness and power.

And she was perfectly safe. He hadn’t come to condemn her but to save her. Even though she wasn’t confessing, repenting, or even fully aware of the situation, she was safe.

Do you feel that safe with Jesus as you wrestle with your sins? Do you help others know the safety of His presence?

It is not safe to remain in your sin. There is a day of judgement coming which makes now the right time to accept forgiveness. Come to Him, even and especially if you’ve been caught in the act. Right now the safest place for a sinner is at the feet of Jesus.

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Dry

The tree planted by the water does not wither when the drought comes and the desert winds blow.
It doesn’t mean it’s not pretty dry out.  
After another weekend of pandemic preaching, wandering through an empty building that seems to get quieter each week while the outside voices get louder and hotter, I can feel the grit of the blowing sand.


My bark is dry.
Life is sustained and I am not withered.  My soul sits intact and secure, yet that’s not what it feels like.
It feels like dryness and wind.

Sitting in heaven, you never knew that feeling, did you?  But you came down, took on flesh, and experienced the best and worst of what it means to be human.
You got tired, so tired you slept through a storm.
You got lonely enough that after years of praying alone, you couldn’t bear to be alone on that terrible night and asked your friends to be with you.  
You got dry enough that you cried out to your Father and expressed your feelings of abandonment.
It wasn’t a sin, and it wasn’t a sign that you weren’t abiding in God.
You were just dry.
My bark is dry.
Its Monday and the deserts been a bit hotter lately.   My roots are ok, my leaves are green but
my bark is dry.

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Has the Church been Idol?

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.

All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.

Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

(2 Corinthians 5:17-21)

As Paul speaks to a church that had a tendency to get caught up in all the latest passions of its culture, he reminds them of both their new identity (new creature) and new purpose (ministry of reconciliation). He’s been building this picture of identity for several chapters, including comparing the church to clay pots and tents. He is reminding us that we do not represent earthly strength and permanence. Now he uses the image of ambassadors. Visting, but not citizens.

Working together with him, then, we appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain. …..
…We put no obstacle in anyone’s way, so that no fault may be found with our ministry,

(2 Corinthians 6:1, 3)

Working with Jesus then, the goal is that call to reconciliation, to salvation through Jesus. To accomplish this, Paul wants to make sure nothing gets in the way of that work. He wants to present no obstacles in how he does ministry that would interfere with the call for reconciliation.

Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness? What accord has Christ with Belial? Or what portion does a believer share with an unbeliever? What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said, “I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing; then I will welcome you,

(2 Corinthians 6:14-17)

Paul draws the argument together here. We cannot lift this passage from its context to just teach about marriage. This is about the ministry and identity of the people of God. A warning not to mix the idols of the world’s culture with the identity and ministry of the church.

The world has many idols; the things it turns to for guidance, comfort, and control. Our current culture uses tribal grievance, character attacks, outrage at opponents/political enemies, claims to hidden knowledge and conspiracies, and a strong sense of grievance. The western church, especially in America, is too easily swept up into the use of these. From pulpits to Tweets to Facebook pages people who claim to have heard Christ’s call cheer and support politicians and movements that are built on these idols. Not only that, but we step into the yoke and share these idols, using them to advance our agendas. We declare that this is good, or at least necessary.

This is to be not separate at all, but rather yoked up and working alongside the world. Its’ idols are now our idols. We believe that somehow we have found common cause with those who are serving Belial. Christian, may we be visibly, materially, substantially, and eternally apart from these things!

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