June 26th Bible Reading: Mark 1-3

Pastor Zach, from Calvary Chapel Petaluma preached a great message on Mark 3:20-30. I would encourage you to listen when you have time. (Before bed or while cleaning my room works really well for me) Here is the link:

http://calvarypetalumasite.org/#/media/2011-1999-audio  The sermon is entitled "Beyond Forgiveness", and the ID is SM1005.

God Bless!

June 25th Bible Reading: Matthew 26-28

I was reading today's chapters, and I was just struck with the mercy and compassion God has toward us. I was pretty familiar with Luke's account in which Jesus tells the criminal on His side that today, he will be with Him in paradise, because of his faith, but Matthew, in verses 27:44, mentioned something I had never really thought about before. He said, "And the robbers who were crucified with Him, also reviled Him in the same way." They insulted, they cursed, they joined with the world as it scoffed Gods merciful gift of redemption. These two men did not only deserve death spiritually but also in the physical realm, yet they were insulting our sinless Savior along with everyone else; however, Christ still loved and had compassion towards them. Even in that moment of pain and suffering, being mocked by the ones He was saving, Jesus was still willing to forgive right then and there. He did not think it over three days, and pout in self pity as is our worldly tendency, but moments after He turned the heart of the man at His side, and was willing to let him into paradise. That criminal had nothing to offer Him.

Then there is us. We, who mocked Him daily by accepting His gift and then when circumstances are unfavorable turn and run, who are the scoffers, are still loved and shown compassion. All we have to offer are filthy rags, but somehow, Jesus could still love us enough to die for us. 

Matthew 23-25

Monday is day eight of the summer reading plan. I don't know about you, but I have really been finding great things in the reading. The portion size of these readings are really good--two or three chapters gives you context, but its short enough that I still have time to really digest the words I'm reading.
Today the reading is Matthew 23-25.
Jesus says this multiple times within Matthew. In Matthew 20 Jesus says, "whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave--just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many."
The challenge is to be a servant, to the extent that Christ was.
And Christ was quite a servant.

Invested in Us

2 Kings 3:11-12 (ESV)
And Jehoshaphat said, “Is there no prophet of the Lord here, through whom we may inquire of the Lord?” Then one of the king of Israel's servants answered, “Elisha the son of Shaphat is here, who poured water on the hands of Elijah.” And Jehoshaphat said, “The word of the Lord is with him.” So the king of Israel and Jehoshaphat and the king of Edom went down to him.

In the times of old before Christ came and set us free from the bondage that separated us from God there were few who could talk to God in an intimate manner. One of these was, as shown in this verse, Elisha.

But now, through the grace of God, there is no separation.

We have been brought together in unity with God our heavenly Father.

And, God has invested in us, Himself.

1 Corinthians 3:16

Do you not know that you are a temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?

The very power of Christ has been invested inside of us.

Yet why do we still live in fear?

Philippians 2:13
For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases Him.

1 John 4:4

Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world.

God has invested power in you, but will you still cower in the dark?

Will you not rise up and enter into the righteousness God has provided for you?

Elijah was one of the greatest men of God of the old testament, but we were meant for even more than he ever witnesses in his lifetime.

Or, look to John the Baptist. We were meant to rise higher than even he did as this passage expresses.

Matthew 11:11
"I tell you the truth, of all who have ever lived, none is greater than John the Baptist. Yet even the least person in the Kingdom of Heaven is greater than he is!"

The Word of God is inside you. Do not squander it.

Live in purpose. Live with vision.

Blessing be with you as you fall ever deeper in love with the Prince of Peace, Jesus Christ.

Jadon

June 23rd Bible Reading: Matthew 20-22

This is a sermon from Francis Chan. You may have read some of  his books such as Crazy Love and Forgotten God. This sermon is a great reminder of the second part of the commandment Jesus gives us in Matthew 22: 37-40. Overall is is a great sermon  (he misses some important emphasis in my opinion), but I hope that you are blessed by his words.

http://www.preachitteachit.org/index.php?id=305&file=fileadmin/Release_1/sermons/sermon_series/Frances_Chan/091006_Francis_Chan_Living_Unpredictably.mp3

The Substance of Faith: Matthew 17:16-20

"And I brought him to your disciples, and they could not heal him.” And Jesus answered, “O faithless and twisted generation, how long am I to be with you? How long am I to bear with you? Bring him here to me.” And Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him, and the boy was healed instantly. Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, “Why could we not cast it out?” He said to them, “Because of your little faith. For truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you.” -Matthew 17:16-20 (ESV)

What is Faith? 

Well, the well-known passage in Hebrews 11 describes is it as so: "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen."
  
"Faith is the substance."
Now this is where we begin to understand what faith truly is, as revealed by God.
Faith is not simply the extension of one's belief to bring something to reality. 
No, rather it is the actual realization of what is already matter of fact. 

Faith is the affirming of what is truth. It is not simply one's belief, but something much more concrete than that. As Matthew 17 says, "you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move." It is not something that is relative or metaphysical, it is real and tangible.

When we pray in the spirit and God says something is so, it is.
No matter if it has come to fruition in the physical or not, when God speaks it is so.
Faith is knowing as a fact (more than just believing) that something is so, even when the physical might not reflect it. 

Faith is not wishy washy. It is firm and solid. 
Faith in the declaration of what is so, not the belief of what could be. 
It is a far stronger force than we may realize, which is why Jesus was so intent on expressing both the lack of such that the disciples had and also His wish that they would indeed have that level of faith. 

Our call is to be like Jesus, and He had faith beyond measure. 
We should in turn be seeking to elicit the same level of faith in our day to day lives. 

Through God's grace that guides us ever onwards to His eternal promises of life and light,
~Jadon

June 22nd Bible Reading: Matthew 17-19

Here is an article I found of the RZIM (Ravi Zacharias International Ministry) website regarding one of  the verses in today's reading: Matthew 18:21. If you have not heard of this ministry, I would greatly encourage you to look them up, read Ravi's testimony, and find out all the amazing ways God is working through their team across the world.

GIVING FORGIVENESS

“I need to ask for your forgiveness,” the voice on the other end of the phone said to me. This friend from many years ago called to seek reconciliation with me for an old offense. We had worked together and in the course of our working-relationship our friendship was damaged. More often than I care to admit, I am the one who needs to ask for forgiveness. But in this case, I was the offended party.

I was surprised by this phone call, of course, since it came out of the blue and concerned events from quite some time ago. But I was more surprised by my own response. “Of course,” I intoned, “I forgive you.” And for the duration of the conversation, I really believed that I had forgiven my friend. But as I thought about the exchange, I brought back into the present what I had carefully stored away in my memory. Feelings of hurt and betrayal emerged just as if the event was happening all over again. In my heart, instead of feeling relief as a result of my friend’s phone call, I felt bitterness and anger choke me. And the desire to punish my friend—by withholding genuine affection or by issuing words of condemnation—became preeminent in my thoughts and feelings.

As a Christian, I am pained to admit that I have these feelings at all. After all, forgiveness is at the heart of Christianity, and having just come through the Advent Season where we celebrate God’s compassion towards the world in the sending of his Son Jesus, I should be overflowing with forgiveness. Instead, I felt more like the servant in Matthew’s gospel who even though forgiven of an enormous debt—a debt too large to ever repay—in turn, goes out, finds one who owes him a miniscule amount, and begins to choke this lesser debtor demanding immediate repayment. Instead, of extending the same generosity shown to him, this ungrateful servant punishes the other servant by throwing him in prison.(1)

My unforgiving spirit imprisoned my friend. But it also imprisoned me. An unwillingness to forgive locks us all up in bitterness, and throws away the key. It enslaves us to ingratitude, and chokes out gratefulness. It prevents us from experiencing the freedom that comes with free-flowing grace—both received and given—just as the ungrateful servant neither received nor extended grace in Jesus’s parable. The ensuing desire to punish those who have hurt us belies our smug, moral superiority that designates punishment as more fitting than grace.

Jesus tells this parable of the unforgiving servant in response to a question from his disciple Peter. Peter asks the question, “Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him? Up to seven times?” Jesus answers, “I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven.”(2) In other words, Jesus is saying that forgiveness is unlimited, and forgiveness by nature is something that cannot be measured in its appropriation. When we fail to forgive, we fail to recognize our own debt, and we fail to appreciate the reality of the limitless scope of forgiving grace on our account. Peter wanted to know at what point he could cease from offering forgiveness—after the seventh offense. But in answering Peter’s question by telling this story, Jesus demonstrates that none of us are in the position to withhold forgiveness from each other. In the end, we are all in need of forgiveness, and to withhold it demonstrates unparalleled ungratefulness for God’s gracious action towards the debt we could never repay to God.

To be sure, dealing with our human hurts and offenses, and becoming generous people who freely forgive takes time and effort. And for some of us, the hurts we have suffered and endured may never result in phone calls that attempt to reconcile and restore relationship. Nevertheless, the cultivation of a forgiving heart frees us from bondage and opens us to the possibilities of giving forgiveness instead of punishment. For the one who understands first and foremost her own need for forgiveness, and the one who then opens his heart up to forgive others, enters (perhaps even unknowingly) into the very heart of God. “And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven us.”(3)