Co-habitating with the Gospel

Those drives home from church are fairly typical. You talk through the sermon discussing those finer points of the message that you can sprinkle through your week like "love my kids more," "spend more time in devotions" or "doing more to serve those in need." But all of these mores usually disintegrate Monday morning on the drive to work. Today though, our drive home was different. The more I talked, the more passionate I became. The pastor today was talking about the explosive power of the Gospel and how regardless of whether the response is positive or negative, the explosion prompts a response. For some its fear, for some its joy and for some its opposition. I was thinking about fence-sitters like myself who find themselves often not responding as quickly or as strongly to the Gospel as I'd hope. And I was prompted to mind a modern-day metaphor to the "luke-warmedness" we read about in Revelation. It may sound strange but the reality is this: you cannot co-habitate with the Gospel. Either you're all in or you're all out.

Co-habitation involves reaping the benefits of marriage without the commitment of marriage. Its a lifestyle that has become more and more commonplace. It's a fence-sitting situation. Some might argue that it is about testing the waters of a relationship but the more I counsel people who participate in this lifestyle the more I see it being primarily a commitment issue. Basically, "I'll take the fruit of relationship without a commitment of caring for the tree."

The reality of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is that He asks for our lives by laying down His own first. By communicating to us, He's all in and inviting us to the same. "Take up a cross because I am fully committed to you." The Gospel reality, Christ's unfailing and unwavering commitment to us, has the potential to explode in us a response of "I do! I will! I'm yours!" I pray that God would move me out of a mindset and lifestyle where I reap the fruits of forgiveness without remembering the tree on which He hung. May the Gospel explode in my life and cause me to respond with utter joy and full devotion.

Protection from Exposure

I was spending some time this morning reflecting on a familiar passage - Psalm 121. "I lift my eyes to the mountains from where does my help come from?" And what specifically came to light today was my understanding of God as Protector. Often when I would read this Psalm I would find myself confused by the question "How in the world can the moon do any harm to us?" I get how the sun can harm or smite us but when we're out enjoying the light of the full moon, we're not dousing ourselves with SPF 30. The moon cannot do any harm to us unless...unless we're in hiding.

Darkness has the ability to protect us from being seen or discovered. Hiding keeps us in the darkness from an enemy pursuing us. Or hiding keeps our sin from the exposing light of God's truth and holiness. In the garden the first response to the enemy and to the sin was to cover up not only skin but our location as well. God asks the question "where are you?" knowing we are taking flight from Him seeing us in our true condition. The moon has just as much the ability as the sun to expose us to our enemies and reveal our sin. Day or night, our sin and our state as enemies of God has the potential to be exposed. Enter God as protector. We were his enemies. He protected us from himself through the covering of His Son Jesus' blood, from the judgment which was ours to deserve for ignoring Him and walking rebelliously away from Him.

Therefore we can say with confidence "The LORD will protect our comings and our goings both now and forevermore" because we are saved from God's wrath by God's covering for God's glory. No longer afraid of exposure, because we are shaded by His Son.

One Year Down

Monday morning after a summer of swimming through Hebrew, I came upon this poem a friend of ours gave us just after we arrived here. I'm amazed how the first year's experience continue to confirm these truths:

In heavenly love abiding
No change my heart shall fear
And safe is such confiding
For nothing changes here
The storm may roar around me
My heart may low be laid
But God is round about me
And can I be dismayed?

Wherever He may guide me
No fear shall turn me back
My shepherd is beside me
And nothing shall I lack
His wisdom ever waketh
His sight is never dim
He knows the way He taketh
And I will walk with Him

Green pastures are before me
Which yet I have not seen
Bright skies will soon be o'er me
Where darker clouds have been
My hope I cannot measure
My path to life is free
My Savior is my treasure
And He will walk with me

Anna L. Waring