Musings: 08/14/09, Has God Changed? by John.

Has God Changed?

When we look at the accounts of God in the Old Testament, it is easy to see His great power. It's easy to read His orders to various people, and we have to note that annihilation of cities and even nation doesn't seem to fit the New Testament picture of God, so, the question must arise, has God changed?

We look about us here in the midst of God's creation, and many like to think nothing has changed, but hasn't it? The most up-to-date example is the tiny virus. Some call the change in viruses' evolution, others call it adaptation, but all of us know they do change. That's the reason the world's medical experts tear their hair every year trying to calculate and prepare for the mutation of the influenza virus. Many of their miscalculations are caused by unexpected mutation or promulgation of the virus. But we have to acknowledge that everything around us changes. Many changes are so slow that we don't realize they are happening. When I was a little boy, people brought their automobiles into life using a crank and arm power. I remember the first auto I saw that had a starter! I also remember how unreliable those early starters were. I had to change electric contact brushes, and later solenoids on our family cars. I also remember country folks brushing their teeth with a twig cut from a tree. We more modern people used toothbrushes, but those are going out of style, too, now.

Change is the order of the day for everything around us. We cycle through the seasons thinking that even though each one is different from the one before, it will be like the one we experienced in the last cycle. But now the weather people say we are in for dramatic changes in the weather patterns!

Shouldn't we expect God to change? Isn't change natural? Well, let's consider a couple of things. First, no one wants to change perfection. Second, nothing of this earth is perfect. Third, God is perfect, and with Him there is no change.

That's right; God is the same today that He was when Adam and Eve walked the earth. He is the same as when Ahab faced Elijah, and Elijah killed all of Ahab and Jezebel's false prophets. He is the same as He was when He ordered the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. To us, He seems different, doesn't He?

James 1:17 says, "Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows." Hebrews 13:8 says, "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever." (I can almost hear someone say, "But that's not God, that's Jesus!") In John 10:30 Jesus said, "I and my Father are one." In John 14: 9, 10a, Jesus said, "Don't you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, 'Show us the Father?' Don't you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me?"

Jesus came to reveal the Father more perfectly than any of the Old Testament people including the prophets ever knew Him, and He did. It takes some thinking, and some praying, but when we do the two together with the Scriptures, we will begin to see that God is just as He said, always the same. Perfection cannot be improved, nor does it need to be.

Isn't it wonderful that we can trust our God to always be the same? Isn't it wonderful that He calls us His children because we trust and live in Jesus? Some years ago, our daughter adopted a teenage girl. Today, she has three wonderful children, and they are just as much our great-grandchildren as those who are in our bloodline! They receive from us and give to us love without any difference. If we can love like that, then that love must have come from the God Who loves us, and it does. I John 4:19 says, "We love because he first loved us." He loved us, and that love radiates through us to everyone around us.

God does not change, but we must change to be like Him, and His Holy Spirit lives within us to accomplish that very task! Read I John all the way through and dwell on the times "love" is mentioned. Another good place to learn about love is in the Gospel of John. I hesitate to pick out a section because it is all so helpful. You may want to pay attention to the 17th chapter when Jesus prays for His disciples, the whole church and all of us in particular.

Musings: 08/09/09, Dangerous Ground, by John.

Dangerous Ground

Two of the things I've learned about God across the years are: First, I can't protect Him. It's natural for new Christians to want to protect God. The problem for us is, it makes about as much sense as a minnow trying to protect the ocean. That leads to the second thing I learned. God does not need my protection. He is almighty and invincible. He is always present everywhere. He is loving. He knows everything, past, present, future. He is eternal. There is not a single area in which He needs anyone's protection.

I'm not an expert on God's will, so what follows are my assumptions based on my own experiences. I've learned it's God Who does the protecting. We can't protect God, but we really can't protect ourselves either. God can and does protect us. He set into motion creation laws, (We call them "natural"), and He doesn't usually set them aside for us. He does on occasion when it accomplishes His will, such as taking away Saul's sight and later returning it.

Personally, I believe Allah is the Arabic name for God just as YHWH (Yahweh) is the Hebrew name for God. "God" is the English name for the only God there is. We Americans certainly do not have a corner on Christianity or God. We are just thankful He allows us to have a relationship with Him just like people in other nations do.

My reason for musing about these things comes from notes from a person who considers Christ to be false, a concocted idea of Christians. He believes, or so he maintains, in One God, and he has no concept of trinity, or "tri-unity," God in three personalities. He thinks I am wrong, and I believe he is wrong. I don't hold it against him that he thinks there is no hope for me since I don't agree with him.

As far as I am concerned, the subjectit is not worth arguing when the Bible speaks specifically about it. I'm not a judge, but rather a witness. Genesis 1:1 says, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." Verse 2 says, "The Spirit of God was hovering over the waters." Verse 3 says, "God said...." In those three verses are the essence of the Trinity, God, Spirit, and Word. We believe in One God Who reveals Himself to us as triune.

As I indicated earlier, it is not our job to condemn others who do not believe as we do, but as witnesses, it is our task to state the truth as we see it to be. We believe the Bible is God's written Word. II Peter 1:20,21 says, "Above all you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet's own interpretation. For prophecy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit." I Timothy 3: 16,17 says, "All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work." When I John 2:23 says, "No one who denies the Son has the Father; whoever acknowledges the Son has the Father also." I accept that as truth. I believe to deny the Son is dangerous ground upon which to make a life stand, and I say that without malice. In fact, I say it attempting to love my neighbor as myself. If I did not believe in Jesus as my Savior and Lord, I would want someone to tell me I was wrong! Someone did in 1945, and he did it in a most loving and kind way. That testimony by Myron Hayter (pronounced High-ter) changed my life forever! And I will be forever grateful that I am now on solid ground spiritually! With the joy I have in Jesus, I also have grief for those who refuse Him, and if you are one of those, I urge you to read the accounts in the Bible of Jesus, Who He is, and what He cam to do and accomplished. I believe you will be filled with the same joy and peace I have. It's His free gift to all who put their trust in Him.

Musings: 08/06/09, My Experience with Death, by John.

My Experience with Death

Here I am almost 82, and all around me friends are leaving this life. Death is, or course, inevitable in the normal sequence of life. Psalm 90:10 says, "The length of our days is seventy years--or eighty, if we have the strength; yet their span is but trouble and sorrow, for they quickly pass, and we fly away. " I suppose we never get enough living done unless we suffer too much illness, or something so limits our desired pursuits that everything seems worthless.

One of the limitations that can make us feel like dying is to miss the Lord's calling. The writer of Ecclesiastes said in 1:1, "The words of the Teacher, son of David, king in Jerusalem: 'Meaningless! Meaningless!' says the Teacher. 'Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.'" That is exactly what happens when we miss the Lord's calling. I remember when two popular and famous screen leading men left notes saying they had done everything, experienced everything that life had to offer when they committed suicide! How can a person made in the image of God, educated, aware of the world around them, be so blind to spiritual truth? I wonder...

Yet, in my mind I know death is nothing to be feared. In my living flesh, I don't like to suffer, and in my human spirit there is a fear of the unknown. People who don't know Jesus have a reason to fear. Hebrews 10:31 says, "It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God!" Reflection on those words causes me to say, it is wonderful thing to step into the hands of Jesus! In John 10:27-30, Jesus said, "My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand. My Father who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father's hand. I and the Father are one."

Stepping into the hands of Jesus makes all the difference in the world as to how we view life! He gives us forgiveness of our past, present and future sins. He gives us direction in living. He gives us an everlasting purpose that we will carry with us throughout eternity. The relationships we form as brothers and sisters in Christ last forever, not just a lifetime.

Death, it seems to me, is just a moment of relaxation prior to our springing into new, limitless life in God's heaven! We need not fear it, and we certainly have no good reason to end the life we have early. God will leave us here until our work is finished, and He alone decides that.

Grief comes when family and friends move into eternity. That's normal. As David said when his and Bathsheba's son died, "While the child was still alive, I fasted and wept. I thought, 'Who knows? The Lord may be gracious to me and let the child live.' But now that he is dead, why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I will go to him, but he will not return to me.'" (II Samuel 12:22,23). David was grieving, and in spite of his grief he went about doing the things that needed to be done.

I have grieved a great deal over those who departed, not because they were gone, but because I missed them severely. I may not have seen them in a long time, but I knew they were available as long as they were here. Now they were gone.

I believe God's Spirit constantly monitors us. He lives within us, and He knows when we grieve. The Spiritual song of the past says it well, "There is a balm in Gilead that heals the sin-sick soul. There is a balm in Gilead that makes the sinner whole." Grief leaves a hole in our beings, but God's Spirit fills it with God's love and God's comfort. People leave us, but we are never alone! I find constant comfort in that thought, and then I find God is present when I turn to Him in prayer. He hears and answers the prayers of His children. In I John 5:14,15 says, "This is the confidence we have in approaching God; that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us--whatever we ask--we know that we have what we asked of him." When I need instant comfort, that's where I find it!

Musings: 08/03/09, Encouragement, by John.

Encouragement, an Activating Force

I received a note of encouragement from Bernard about my musing on wisdom. In the note, he told me that he was a young Christian writer, and that he had written and published a book. He suggested I "check it out." I've done that. The premise of his book, and the book reports about it make it sound like a very useful and worthwhile book. I plan to get better acquainted with it.

An aside: Thank you, Bernard. I appreciate your encouragement, and I hope this "musing" encourages you to think and write more. Encouragement is so important to all of us though some think they need none.

My thought was engendered by a number of sources many of which happened in the last week. Our church considers all people equal in God's sight. We help indigent people as we can, and we don't delve into their problems. We just seek to do what Christ told us to do. We maintain a food and clothing pantry, and we see in their faces that our aid encouragesment them.

Romans 15:4 is one of about 60 times the Greek New Testament uses the word translated "encouragement." It's also used in John 14:16 where it is translated "comforter" in the King James Version and "counselor" in the NIV. Real encouragement comes from our Heavenly Father. In that section Jesus told His disciples He would not leave them "orphans," but that He would ask the Father to send them another Counselor, the Holy Spirit of God. We are to be as much like the Holy Spirit as we can be when we deal with the pains and problems of this world's people.

Phonetically I spell the word in Romans as "paraclesis" and in John is "parcletos." They are two forms of the same word. The basic meaning is "called to stand alongside." In the courts of that day, they didn't have witnesses for the defendant, but rather a person known to be of good character who would stand with the defendant and witness that he was a good person. Today, nothing is more comforting in a crisis than to have someone stand alongside you especially if it is a very powerful and loving person. No one on earth is so loving and powerful as God's Holy Spirit. He not only comforts and encourages us, God's Spirit also prays for us in language for which there are no words! (Romans 8:27). He constantly teaches us the ways of the Father, and directs our paths for us. There is no earthly encouragement like that! When we encourage others as Christians, we should know that we are doing God's work in God's Spirit!

Jesus said, "Blessed are the peacemakers." Peacemakers channel Jesus' love and the encouragement of God's Spirit to others. Now, if you aren't an encourager, and you want to be, start by asking God to give you peace in Jesus. Then look about you, and see who you can encourage with God's message of hope for both the present and the future! Part of that encouragement will be to assure lost people that their past will be forgiven when they trust Jesus to change them and give them a new, eternal life. It takes only a moment to turn your life over to Jesus, but for so many of us, it is an exceedingly hard thing to do. Those of us who do it reap marvelous dividends in this life now, and we will continue throughout eternity! I think it was George Goebles who closed one of his TV shows saying, "It only take 14 muscles in your face to smile and 34 to frown, so let's frown all the time and get a lot of exercise!" I have no idea about the truth of that in any respect, but I know I am encouraged by the people I meet who have a cheerful smile that resonates from their hearts! I want my encouragement to others to bear the warmth of Jesus' love, and I want people to see it in my face. Be an encourager!

Musings: 08/01/09, We Are Free, But Thoughtful, by John.

We Are Free, But Thoughtful.

I've heard more than one person say, "Jesus freed me from sin! Now, nothing is sinful for me!" That is an old view. The translators of the King James Version of the Bible were familiar with it. It caused them to add the last ten words of Romans 8:4 to the verse one. They informed King James that their reason for doing that was that many would see verse one as a license to sin! Leaving those words off, 8:1 says, "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus." I can see how people might misunderstand verse one, but how can they apply verse one and not verse four? It says, "That righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." It is every Christian's character to fulfill the law by our new nature!

Romans 14:12 says, "So then, each of us will give an account of himself to God." We need to remember that Romans is a letter to Christians designed to help us be the people God wants and expects us to be. Paul has just quoted Isaiah 45:23, and he based the statement in verse 12 on that Scripture.

Many of us when we read that verse, and this whole section of Romans, glide quickly over it. Perhaps we feel it doesn't really apply to us because we have been freed, and we are free in Jesus. We are, and that is even more reason to consider these verses very, very carefully. We won't be what God expects us to be unless we the character given here develops in us.

Christians, we do not and cannot exist in a vacuum! We must constantly be aware that whether we have advanced a lot, or just a little, there is always some other Christian weaker than we are. In I Peter 2:2,3 we read, "Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation, now that you have tasted that the Lord is good."

In the Romans section we've mentioned, Paul tells us he thinks about those weaker brethren all the time. If eating meat is offensive to them, he will refrain from eating meat. I suspect he was talking of meat that may have been offered in sacrifice to idols and then sold in the market place, but he could have meant any meat at all, and he is careful to say, "Do not destroy the work of God for the sake of food." (v. 20). Is he really talking about food? Or is he talking about anything that causes a brother or sister to fall away from God and into sin? I think the latter!

He also said we should stop passing judgment on one another and we should make up our minds not to place stumbling blocks in our brothers' paths! That's in verse 13. It is in the present tense because Paul knew Christians were already passing judgment on each other!

You see, being a Christian is far more than being saved from eternity in hell. It is being saved and fitted for eternity as God's Own children! We are expected to be like Jesus. I've not seen an artist's conception of Jesus' likeness that pleases me. I have no idea about his physical appearance other than what I've read in Psalm 53. That pictures Him as homely to say the least. I'm content to recognize that He is God, and that means He is now glorious! Does our Father expect us to be like Him when we arrive in heaven? I think so. That's one of the things the Holy Spirit is doing with us. It's what Paul was talking about in Galatians 5:22-25, "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy peace, patience, kindness goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit , let us keep in step with the Spirit."

God's Spirit is fitting us for our presentation into the presence of our Heavenly Father. But there is a problem in my mind. Are we going to wait until the last minute to become the changed person God expects us to be? Don't you think He wants us to change now? Romans 8:27 urges us not to grieve the Holy Spirit of God. Do we grieve Him when we pay no attention to Him as He pricks our hearts to be like Jesus? I believe it does!

As a Christian, we are free, but we aren't free from the penalties imposed when we break human laws, and we are just as guilty when we refuse to be like Jesus. "WWD" What would Jesus do if He was here? Many use that as a guide, but He is here! The question is what should I do since Jesus is here, and the answer is, be like Him! If you don't know what He is like then read about Him in the Bible, and read what His disciples taught! Even that may not be completely efficient if we do not read the Bible with our minds and hearts open to receive God's truth through His Holy Spirit.

Ah, yes! We are free, but we must be thoughtful, constantly aware of the needs of those about us as
well as our own needs. We need to expect to be more like Jesus tomorrow than we were today! We need to be careful in our relationships with others not to put stumbling blocks in front of them, not to offend them by our actions, but to help them be the children God expects them to be!