Unabashed Truth: Are You Offended?

When I first became a Christian I implicitly understood that the gospel was to be offensive. For at that time, there was a lot of talk about seeker-friendly churches. In my being drawn to our Lord and Savior, I was greatly offended, as I have offended many a similar Utah Catholic. In my immature understanding though, I thought we were to immediately tell people that they were sinners, that they had no hope but through Jesus Christ, which is all true, but my approach left something to be desired and the offense was to be a more delicate, personal, internal perception. I was offended that all these seeker-friendly churches were trying to attract people with music, décor, and eliminating a lot of the essential dialogue attributable to saving grace.

Yesterday, as we finished off our study of Galatians, we spoke of the offense of the gospel, more specifically, grace was offensive. We started by reiterating the fact that we, as a Church, gather for training; we dine-in but we must remember to carry-out. Today, a church that gathers on Sunday is the norm and being a disciple is not. In all this we see that being a Christian, a true Christian is divisive, as we see throughout all history.

I have confidence in you in the Lord that you will adopt no other view; but the one who is disturbing you will bear his judgment, whoever he is. But I, brethren, if I still preach circumcision, why am I still persecuted? Then the stumbling block of the cross has been abolished. I wish that those who are troubling you would even mutilate themselves.
For you were called to freedom, brethren; only do not turn your freedom into an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another.
But may it never be that I would boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. For neither is circumcision anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation. And those who will walk by this rule, peace and mercy be upon them, and upon the Israel of God.
-Galatians 5:10-13; 6:14-16

We need to know that the gospel has teeth; it shreds the ideas that the Judiazers were perpetrating upon those who received the grace God offers. The gospel strips us of all self-reliance. It shatters self-righteousness. And tears down false religions. We have a choice: the gospel or the law.

The cross is offensive. It is offensive to the intellectual in that they believe all we need is wisdom, or we just should be told something practically to do, or just taking the fact that common sense rules. It is offensive to the common man because we can’t look down at each other or play the card that says we are too bad for God to love us.

Have you let the cross offend you? We all have to come to a point that the cross offends us. It is so unfair. We have to be able to do something to gain God’s favor. But we all have to get beyond that. We have to either accept the glory and grace of the cross, or remain in a state of being offended, knowing intellectually that it must not be this way, for God goes against all human intellect and common sense. We are to accept and receive and finally boast only in the cross of Christ. Boasting in something other than ourselves also goes against our common human nature. We hate people who boast, not because we are offended in it not being in the cross, but because it takes the attention away from ourselves. Our boasting in anything else other than the cross will fade.

So as we go beyond being offended and reject our own intellectualism and common sense, we are given the gift of the Holy Spirit in understanding this. We see the cross as the perfect balance between love and holiness. God is holy and expects us to be holy, but He knows us, and yet still loves us. He was on the cross because of love, to fulfill prophecy, so that we can be seen as holy, take His perfection according to the law. We only see this when we are redeemed.

“But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised.” I have a close relative who teaches theology at a Catholic high school. When I lived in Utah we would have debates at family gatherings. I wouldn’t bring things up, but I always had to answer his questions. When he started everyone would roll their eyes and tell us to not start, not only because I thought they didn’t want to hear such a personal argument, but because they didn’t want to hear what I truly believed. One night during an especially boisterous discussion I went home and found the verse above. It brought me a lot of comfort knowing I had the Spirit, and others just didn’t or wouldn’t see. I boast in Christ and the cross and know that He is my savior and that all that this life has to offer, good and “bad” is all about Him and points to Him because He is in me. In Christ, in the cross!

So instead of being all fired up about being offensive, I know that naturally the cross will cause the offense and divide us. I pray that you go beyond being offended and see the perfect union of law and love in the cross.

~Mayo

Unabashed Truth: Fear or Pride or the Third Option

I like to consider all things when I am learning new things, and one of the things I am learning is to truly love Jesus, and someone I am reading and listening to regarding this is Frank Viola. In the intro to his book, “The Jesus Manifesto” Frank talks about how we are at a point in the American church, where the most important thing we believe we have to consider is whether we move to the left or the right in the spiritual/political spectrum, when we don’t even know the choice is to move forward. This third option is the optimal one and we hardly see it, much like we don’t consider the reaping of what we hope is spiritual when we have sown to the flesh.

As we come near to the close of the study of Galatians we want to look back a bit: When it comes to the Gospel, it needs to be handled with care: we do not take anything away, we do not add. Who are we looking for approval? Do we hope what we wear, what we say, and what we do, will gain us approval? When we sow to the flesh, pain is always the result.

Last week we learned that what we sow we reap, we are always sowing, there will always be a harvest. So, how do we know when we are sowing to the spirit or when we are sowing to the flesh? For that, we again go back to the bible, just a few chapters back. So take a look at Galatians 3:1-5, and do as we did, see if you can see what it might be to sow to the flesh.

Are you done? What were your findings? We see that the flesh is comparable to the law, and that the spirit is to faith. Also see that it says we began by the Spirit, so why would we continue in the flesh? So what we began with is what helps us grow. We see that sowing to the flesh means going back to the law after being in the spirit. We Christians follow the law because it is easy and we are lazy. It is easy to go back to believing we can do our way into heaven. It seems that when we have made the whole Christian experience about bringing others into the kingdom of heaven, it comes down to what we do. I guess though it is always this way otherwise Paul would have had no need to address the issue. We are all susceptible to falling back into the law. We need to remember that it is not what we do, but what has been done. That has been the whole theme of Galatians.

A great reminder of how we understand the gospel; Ask someone what the gospel means. A majority of people asked might say it as, “love God and love your neighbor as yourself.” We should remember that this is what the law is summed up as. So if we see the gospel as love God, love your neighbor we are following the law.

We know we are following the law when we make laws for others, and when our world is falling apart. Following the law or, sowing to the flesh always brings pain. When we follow the law we will always fail; we feel guilty, ashamed, fearful. If we believe we are doing well we get prideful, believing that, “they shouldn’t be doing that…” We put others under law, we expect them to be elevated to our height. We do things out of fear or pride.

Let us take another look back to gain more understanding in this, in the gospel, in our growth, in what we are sowing and reaping. Following is Galatians 5:16-20, read this and see what you glean from this study of flesh and spirit.

One thing we discussed was that the flesh sets itself against the spirit. We also see that the flesh is doing the things we please. Doing what we want is the easy path. From what we previously learned, following the law is sowing to the flesh and the list from verses 19-21 is not itself sowing the flesh, but a result of sowing the flesh or, following the law. So we see that the list is a result from following the law, and we come to understand why Paul said that he wouldn’t have known sin if not for the law in Romans 7:7. The law heightens the deeds of the flesh.

There is a difference to being under the law, than obeying the law. Jesus says if you love me you will keep my commandments. Think about what we are told when young if we lie. “No one is smart enough to lie.” We lie because of fear, and we continue lying for fear of being caught, and then it is said: “Our sins will find us out.” So now we don’t lie out of fear. We see that all this following the law is based out of fear, when we should see a better way. We don’t lie because it is the best way to live, because we see what Jesus did for us and love Him so much that we do what is best because we are thankful. No fear, no pride, just the right way to live, because we are thankful.

And finally let’s look at Galatians 4:21-26; 28-29. We see two sons born by Abraham. One born by the flesh, the other by the spirit. One born by the bondwoman, “slave”, one born by the free woman. One seemed right, it was common sense, Abraham thought he was helping out God. It was the practical thing to do. God made a promise, it wasn’t happening, so perhaps he needed to start something: to take that first step. It was the flesh verses the spirit and the flesh persecuted the spirit; Ishmael persecuted Isaac. Through that flesh, pain was reaped. For Hagar, for Ishmael, Sarah and Abraham. And look at the future reaping… what religious system believes that Ishmael was the son of promise. Much pain has grown from that. But our God is sovereign.

This is the one thing that hit me strongly today in this sermon: That common sense or practicality is not always the best way, even when it seems as it is. In what ways was God sensical or practical in the things He has done? In this we must live by faith as many of those called had to do. I am an admirer of common sense, in the practical decisions. It was much this way when I had to make the decision about Denver a month or two back. (See this blog post.) It also reminded me about the Deacon training regarding love: Let God define love. If we believe we are being loving and haven’t considered what God might define as love, we may in fact be hurting rather than helping. These are hard things to absorb. Also, we need to know that just because it may seem like common sense or practical does not mean it is not of the Spirit. We need to practice listening to Him so that we do not quench the Spirit or turn down the volume on what God would say to that.

We come to how we sow to the spirit. Gospel must be at the heart to grow and change, for the sake of Him and not us. We don’t want to get caught up in following the law out of pride and fear, but there is a better choice: out of thankfulness, joy, love, and that ultimately this is the best way to live. We sow to the spirit out of our heart. We see what we reap out of sowing the flesh and we know that needs to change. In the issue of lying we have a choice: to listen to that still small voice or to ignore it. If we ignore that small voice gets smaller. Hearing and obeying is sowing the spirit. Obeying out of love for all He has done for us. Reaping the sowing of the spirit is to hear Him more and more. Make sure you are learning and are being taught by someone who is reaping from sowing the spirit.

It is dangerous for us to begin thinking in any way that we are becoming successful in sowing to the spirit, keep your heart in-line with His, love him. The other thing about Frank Viola that I appreciate is his focus on the Church and our love for Christ. When we begin to focus more on doctrine, apologetics, and those other things that are “good,” rather than Christ it serves to divide His Church, His bride. We are sinful and lazy, and this church that culture and history has made for us is not perfect, but we can do all we can to unite by finding that common love we have for our Lord and savior, Jesus Christ. I will seek to unite, not for pride or fear, but because it is the best way to live and the way Christ intended for His Church.

Let us finish with Hebrews 3:12-15:

Take care, brethren, that there not be in any one of you an evil, unbelieving heart that falls away from the living God. But encourage one another day after day, as long as it is still called “Today,” so that none of you will be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. For we have become partakers of Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end, while it is said,“Today if you hear His voice,Do not harden your hearts, as when they provoked Me.”

A warning to take heart that an unbelieving heart that falls away. We are to encourage each other every day. Find that someone, join a community, encourage and know you need to be as well.

~Mayo