Bold, Unafraid, and Clever

Joshua 2

Joshua sent spies secretly to check out the land God had promised and they sought refuge with Rahab, the harlot - absolutely the last gal two religious guys would expect to get or want help from. Rahab boldly believed they were from Jehovah God and fearlessly put that faith into action, risking her life to hide them. Rahab was clever; she understood that Jehovah had given the Israelites the land and she asked for safety for her entire family in return for hiding them and fooling the King’s messengers.

The spies agreed.  Does the scarlet thread the spies told her to put out her window (so that she and her family would be saved) remind you of the lamb's blood over the door's in Eqypt for the Passover, and the blood of Christ which can save us and our "whole household?”  

I love that Rahab was a harlot because later she is mentioned in the New Testament in the lineage of Jesus (Matt 1:5) and that tells me that even a prostitute can bear great things - it's kind of like a smack of the reality of God's love and acceptance that he uses the "unloveable" and the lowly to further His Kingdom. This shows me that God is not prejudiced or "religiously” correct. 

Rahab’s freedom to act with faith, not in fear is inspiring.  She is bold, unafraid, and clever in her decision to help God’s people. In the list of the faithful (Hebrews 11) only Rahab, the harlot, and Sarah, Abraham’s wife are the women listed by name. A harlot and the mother of Isaac on the same level. This means that even I, as sinful as I am, because of Jesus, can put my faith into action and God can use me. If Rahab could do it, so can we! I hope this story encourages you to freely do the same, regardless of the danger or your past.  

Click on the title above and let us all know what you got from this reading!

Posted by Allyson Good

Transition to Freedom

Deuteronomy 34 and Joshua 1

Transitions are opportunities and transitions are threats. Our freedom is most threatened in the face of transition, be it a move, a new school, a new environment or a new relationship. With the death of Moses, the Israelites and their freedom were threatened by a leadership void that could set them backwards. These two chapters give us great insight into how to handle our transitions well to maintain our freedom.

Grieve well: The Israelites specifically spent 30 days grieving the death of Moses before moving forward. It is important to reflect deeply on what has our affections by what we lose in our transitions. Understanding what we deeply care about and taking the time to recognize their loss enables us discern the virtue of the things we care about. If we are not reflective in the way we leave things, there will be greater temptation to attach ourselves in our new place to new things that promise to fill the void but without the virtue of what was left behind. We see Jesus regularly pulling aside for time with his father during key ministry transitions. This is a pattern for all of us to follow.

Hand the Baton well: When Moses laid hands on Joshua, it was clear to Joshua and the entire nation where the nation’s Spiritual leadership would come from. Joshua had proven himself faithful and his character was solid. He would need this for the troubles and challenges that would lie ahead of him. Whenever we make a transition, we need to give the utmost attention to the kinds of voices we find that will guide us in our new endeavors. Jesus Christ has empowered witnesses to him and has released leadership in the church to shepherd and lead God’s people in every place and in every generation. We must always find ourselves under Jesus’ shepherding leadership through those whom he has empowered to care for us.

Focus on the Fundamentals: Joshua’s success was going to be based upon the way he handles the basics of the faith. As he is careful to understand God’s ways expressed in the law and align his life to them, through obedience, his success would follow. Jesus said it this way, “If you remain in me, I will remain in you. If you obey me, you will bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.”

A Loss of Freedom for Everyone

Number 12:1-16

 

How often have you seen it play out this way?  After the death of Zipporah, Moses first wife, he takes a Cushite wife and his brother and sister begin questioning his leadership.  This stops everything!

 

Moses, Miriam and Aaron are called by God to meet him at the Tabernacle like three school children pulled from a fight.  God addresses this issue head on.  The real issue isn’t Moses’ wife but what kind of leader he was and in particular what kind of prophet he was.  “Hadn’t God spoken through them as well?”  That kind of division is a cancer to a leadership team.  Or should I say it is an encumbrance that restricts the freedom and impact of a leadership team.

 

The entire mission was set back because of the division at the core.  Not only did Miriam need to experience the leprosy of her divisiveness (notice the imagery between leprosy and divisiveness), but the entire community had to experience the impact of her sin.  That is the reality of leadership.  The leader’s slavery and brokenness  becomes the followers problem. 

 

Do you lead?  A family? An organization? A friend or sibling?  A ministry?   Stay clear of encumbrance, for your slavery will become slavery for those whom you lead.

Clean vs. Unclean

Leviticus 11

 

OK, this is where the distance between Biblical history and our time becomes very real.  Leviticus 11-15 discuss this Old Testament theme of unclean versus clean. 

 

Much ink has been spilled by theologians, archeologists and anthropologists trying to figure out the rationale behind why some animals were clean versus unclean.  Candidate theories draw from health reasons, to creating a basis of norms in Israel, though no theory is without their holes.  Sometimes with things such as this it is better to look for the purpose versus the reason.  The purpose is pretty clear.  The purpose of these is to establish the people of God as different and “holy” from the nations around them.  Their distinction as a people were that they were God’s special people (Ex 19:4), and they were to live in such a way as to retain that uniqueness.  It is probably true that many of these laws did contribute to their health in Ancient Near Eastern culture and they did communicate to Israel God’s concern for all things in life. 

 

Jesus apparently violated this law in the town of Nain when a widows only son was being carried to his grave.  Jesus stepped forward and touched the coffin, violating the laws of uncleanness.  Yet, Jesus didn’t take the uncleanness of the dead, for the dead took the cleanness (and life) of Jesus.  Jesus in his righteousness was clean from the inside out and was able to reverse the effects of uncleanness.  We do not need to obey the "clean" laws today, for Jesus has taken the curse of uncleanness and has made us his special people, declaring us holy, and clean (1 Peter 2:9).  The laws of clean and unclean teaches us that this is a morally corrupt world and there are unclean parts of this world that can corrupt us if we let them.  There are things that we should avoid for they will draw us into their corruption. 

 

How do you know the things that are clean or unclean in your life?  Let’s think of ourselves like Jesus.  When I interact with this controversial thing (alcohol, friends, pop culture, certain movies and music), which direction does the influence move?  Does the “thing” make me more like itself, or do I make it more like myself, and (hopefully) like Christ?

 

How have you seen this play itself out?

 

Hope for the Conscience

This week will highlight the Troubles that the people of God had on the way to "happily ever after"

Leviticus 1-2

Integral to the freedom for Israel would be the relationship of Yahweh with his people. Yet, if there is a genuine relationship, there needs to be a way to maintain that relationship. When we fail in our earthly relationships, we can simply go to the person, apologize and make amends for whatever we did wrong. But how will God’s people do that if, because of his Holiness, they cannot appear before him personally? That leads us to understand the tabernacle/temple and understand the book of Leviticus.

The tabernacle was designed to be the dominant fixture in the life of Israel, set up in the center of community, so that the community would be built with Yahweh as the central person in the life of the nation. The tabernacle was where God dwelled. It became a tangible place where an Israelite could come and interact with God through one of the priests.

Just like in our human relationships, we need to move past our offense and guilt before genuine relationship can occur, the same is true for God. That is why Leviticus offers specific instruction about sacrifices to cleanse the people of God of their guilt and to represent atonement for their sins. These two chapters offer insight into the purpose of sacrifice in the life of the Israelite worship.

1. Sacrifices required blood because atonement was costly. From the beginning, God told Adam and Eve that if they disobeyed them, they would surely die. Well, when they did, they died to God spiritually, but God in his mercy spared their physical lives and took the lives of other animals instead of the lives of Adam and Eve. Because sin is a life or death issue, only the shedding of blood can truly demonstrate the cost of sin—therefore blood sacrifice for sin.

2. Offerings provided for the Spiritual leadership of the nation. The Israelite worshippers were required to offer the best tenth of all of their earnings to bring for worship. This ten percent provided for the entire tribe of Levi (who had no allotted land in Israel) who were charged with caring for the temple and offering spiritual leadership to the people of Israel. To this day, God’s people give ten percent of their earnings to provide for the church to offer Spiritual leadership.

3. The offerings were to come with salt—this was a reminder that the covenant that God made with his people was lasting. This covenant is in a certain sense still in effect today, except Jesus has fulfilled it. He was the perfect sacrifice that could cleanse forever the conscience of all of God’s people. Because of his sacrifice, what more could any of us bring? How could we add to his perfect sacrifice? All we can do is gratefully receive it and live out of the new reality of freedom and forgiveness it offers us.

Posted by Marc

God's throne among his people

Exodus 25:1-22

Ok, true confessions. When I was first investigating the faith, I said arrogantly, “I will read the entire Bible and decide if it is true, then….” I had great ambition, I charged through Genesis and Exodus until I came to these last few chapters. When I got to this part about the tabernacle with its incredible detail, I gave up. It seemed completely irrelevant. Why so much detail about church furniture?

This is what I didn’t get. There is no such thing as a free motif. Have you ever watched a movie and noticed a clip that seemed to be a throwaway clip? No such thing! Movie producers spend $1000’s per second of final movie time. Every moment of the movie is carefully chosen--The same thing is true with scripture. God doesn’t just throw in filler to keep even spacing in the books. Each word and each subject is meaningful and is there to reveal God.

So what does this reveal about God? This chapter details the place where God will sit upon his throne among his people. Yahweh will come and sit upon the mercy seat. This was a magnificent moment in the history of the world. God himself, who dwells in heaven, will begin dwelling on earth in the presence of his Spirit at the mercy seat within the tabernacle, within the community of Israel. Here, God would receive sacrifice for sin and be a tangible picture of the truth that declares, “Yahweh is their God, and he is their people.”

Like a ring on the hand of a married person is a sign of the marital covenant, the tabernacle was a sign to Israel and to the world of God’s covenant faithfulness and commitment to be with them and to be their God as they are his people.

Jesus has superseded the tabernacle. “He came and dwelled (literally tabernacle) among us” (John 1:14). In the Old Testament, once a year on the Day of Atonement, the mercy seat would be sprinkled with blood for the atonement for sins of the people of Israel. Those who are united to Christ by faith now have their “hearts sprinkled to cleanse them” (Hebrews 10:22). So, with clean hearts from the blood of Christ, he can send his Spirit into the thrones of our hearts that he may sit there as we together represent his tabernacle and are a sign that Yahweh is God and we are his people.

A Vision for Life

Exodus 20

Sometimes when people think of religious rules they imagine a balance beam between two sky scrapers. There is a mean nasty God on one end daring you to obey the rules, forcing you to pull off a miracle by walking the balance beam. If you are not able to obey the rules, you fall helplessly into the urban abyss below while the almighty laughs a bellowing cackle! Or, people consider the rules to be a small 7x7x7 windowless room that you need to stay in, for fear that you might start enjoying yourself.

The Ten Commandments are a vision for a new life in a new place with a new freedom. The only way of life the Hebrew people knew up until then was a life of slavery under despotic leadership. They were bound to repeat it, either as slaves or as despots, unless they could learn a new way. The Ten Commandments were the new way, not just for Israel, but as they modeled it, it would become a new way of life for the world. The Ten Commandments weren’t just a moment in the life of Israel, but a moment in the course of history where law became codified and a nation was bound together not just around superstition and personality, but around a common story and a common way of living. That common way of living has held together the Jewish culture ever since. It became the foundation from which Christianity, and all of western culture for that matter, sprung.

The people were receiving from God a land that would be their own. The law was for them to enjoy the land and live the lives that God intended for them. Just like there are laws of physics that if you break them, they will break you—try to fly for instance; there are laws of morality that if you break them, they break you—try revenge or adultery, or ignoring the Sabbath. Imagine a dog receiving a new home with a new, huge yard filled with trees, flowers, hills and other animal life. An electronic fence is put in, not because the owners wants to keep the dog from enjoying life, but so that the dog may remain safe and can enjoy life even more. As long as the dog stays in the yard (a big yard, mind you—think rural, not suburban), he is safe and can enjoy all the goodness life can offer. The dog may look outside of the yard and think that the bunnies are slower outside the yard or the grass is greener outside, but they are the same bunnies and the same grass. Though things may appear differently to the dog, the only thing that is different, is that the dog is outside the safety of his owner, and is in disobedience to his owner. The bunnies are just as fast and the grass isn’t any better.

We need to make sure that we do not mistake freedom for autonomy. There is no such thing as autonomy. We are all bound to die; we are all bound to the laws of physics; we are bound to a certain place in history; we are bound to the reality that we are social creatures; and we are creatures who are shaped by generations of ancestry. No one is autonomous of these things except God. Freedom comes from placing ourselves under his ownership, and following the ways of this world that he wired into from creation. The Ten Commandments are a pretty good start.

Posted by Marc

Holiness is Hopeful

Exodus 19:1-26

We see in this passage a picture of the holiness of God.  The fearsome sight of a mountain covered in darkness and fire, trembling, while the sounds of trumpets blasting to unspeakable volumes became an image in the collective psyche of Israel for the rest of their generations.  Unfortunately, the idea of holiness often generates in us pictures of fear, or more problematically, irrelevance.  

Back in the 70’s, President Jimmy Carter would often carry his own bag on and off Air Force One. The idea, which I am sympathetic to, was that he was no better than any American, and since he put his pants on one leg at a time like other people, he should carry his own bag like other people.  This practice caused him to lose respect and get a lot of grief.  He was the president—let somebody else worry about the bag.

Carter wanted to be a man among the people, but by being one of the people among other things, he lost his distinctiveness that allowed him to lead the people.  

Holiness is hopeful, because it teaches us that God is different.  God is not pulled down by the brokenness of this world—he is the “Blessed” God—the happy God.  God is not enraged beyond control, but is “patient, not wanting anyone to perish.”  God is not confounded by the problems of this world, but is “the God, only wise” who is executing his plan to take what we “meant for harm to make it good.”

If God is not holy, then his love really isn’t helpful.  We have all seen the mother who loves her son but won’t let him go.  Her love actually crushes the man, because she cannot bear to see the boy face any problem or difficulty without her comfort.  Her love is not free, but bound to the comfort of her child.  She is not different enough to set her affection within a greater scheme for his life.  God’s holiness is hopeful for us because it means that He is different from us and can lead us and this world back to where it is supposed to be.  

Posted by Marc

A New Opportunity

Exodus 19:1-6

The difference between a slave and a freed person is more than external. We have said before that is one thing to take the person out of slavery and it is quite another to take the slavery out of the person. In the readings this week, God will begin giving his people a new vision for life, a vision of life lived outside of the shackles of man and bound like God is—to truth, goodness, hope and peace. They will meet God at Sinai, receive the Ten Commandments and begin getting a picture of what life in relationship to God should be all about.

Today, we read how God establishes the covenant. He begins by recounting his goodness to the people and showing them the promise before them. The promise for Israel is that they would be God’s treasured possession, a Kingdom of priests and a holy nation if they will obey his voice. That promise has been given to us in Christ. Though Israel, never lived up to the promise, Jesus did, for he fulfilled the big “if” of the passage. So all who are united to Christ are truly treasured by God, a royal priesthood and holy.

Knowing and experiencing these things to be true for ourselves is one the richest aspects of our relationship with God, and yet, probably the most elusive. I would suggest that there are two misguided paths that lead us away from enjoying this new identity that leads us into freedom.

1. When we read the “if” of this passage, we immediately apply it to ourselves and skip out on what Jesus has done. I am only a treasured possession to God when I fully obey. So, we base our assurance on our performance, and relegate the cross to symbolism (Gal 2:21)

2. When we read the “if’ of this passage, we recognize Jesus’ fulfillment of it, but stop there. It is wonderful to embrace the work of Christ on the cross, but it is easy to forget to that our connection to Christ isn’t just legal but it is lifestyle. Paul describes being united to Christ as something that draws him into a completely different life with a completely different agenda. “I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live. The life I live in the body, I live by faith…” (Gal 2:20).

Posted by Marc

Battle!

Exodus 17:8-16

The battle for freedom is tangible. Each of us must take personal responsibility to fight the battle for freedom. The battle for freedom is Spiritual. It must be fought with Spiritual weapons. The battle for freedom is social. We cannot win the battle alone, but we must fight together to win.

As Moses is leading the people from the shores of the Red Sea, and they are getting their first experience of freedom, a new tyrant takes a cheap shot at the people of God. We learn in Deuateronomy 25 that Amalek came from behind and attacked the weak and the elderly of Israel, a dishonorable and twisted approach to battle. So Israel defended herself.

Joshua needed to go and fight. Surely, this was a real fight and if he didn’t fight the battle with real strategies, real weapons and real, gritty courage, they would have lost. We need to recognize that freedom, though it costs us nothing to receive, is work to maintain and grow in. We need real strategies to grow our faith, real disciplines to develop new patterns of thought and action, and real effort to achieve them.

Moses need to go and pray. We fight a real struggle against the flesh and real objective enemies to our faith, but the battle is not solely about our strategies and disciplines. Our strategies and disciplines are only ways to center ourselves within the moving work of the Spirit. When we have disciplined ourselves before God, the Holy Spirit can do its work. If our disciplines are only about making ourselves better in our own strength, then that is all we will develop—the fruit of our own strength. But if our work brings us into God’s presence where we can pray, the work of God happens in us.

Aaron and Hur needed to help. The battle for freedom isn’t a personal battle. We are not just seeking our personal freedom against lust, materialism, fear and people-pleasing. We are seeking to be a freed people who are no longer enamored by the charms of the flesh. So Joshua needs Moses and Moses needs Joshua. Both of them need Aaron and Hur. Together, they wage the war tangibly, spiritually and socially and God gets the credit.

Which part of the battle comes most easily/difficult for you? Tangible? Spiritual? Social?

posted by Marc

Exodus 17:1-7

This is the third chapter in a row where the Israelites have a complaint. The battle is clearly labeled by Moses “Why do you put the Lord to the test?”  God provides; Israel is having a hard time understanding and remembering that God is leading them and he will provide. This lack of trust in God’s promise or forgetfulness of God’s provision in the past will ultimately be what keeps Israel wandering in the desert for forty years.

Why do we put the Lord to the test? We have less excuses then the Israelites did. The Israelites could remember God’s faithfulness yesterday, his faithfulness the week before, his faithfulness to Joseph, and his faithfulness to Abraham. They had a few generations of stories to remember. Yet they forgot and grumbled against God and his leaders. 

We have God’s faithfulness yesterday, his faithfulness last week, his faithfulness last year, and over two thousand years of more examples of God’s faithfulness to those who followed after him. Wouldn't it be time well spent to remember God’s provision to others and to us in the past? This will help us examine how we approach trying situations. Do we put our trust in God’s provision and ask him for provision as a child would of a father? Or do we forget, grumble, or even return to Egypt, where we used to be enslaved, for our provision? Let's remember whose children we are!  Click on the title above and comment!

posted by, Danny

Manna: God is Our Provider

Exodus 16:1-36

Isn’t it amazing how God provides for us even when our motives are not fully in line? God is in the midst of reshaping Israel’s preconceptions. They do not understand anything other then slavery; hunger is natural so it does not surprise us that the Israelites wanted food. What is surprising is that the only way they can think to feed themselves is to go back to Egypt. They are hungry and the only way they know how to get food is to be enslaved and let their masters provide. God shows them a whole new way of provision. He is their provision! God is showing Israel that he can provide any benefits that slavery had and much more.

We fall into this same kind of trap again and again that the Israelites fell into.  We become enslaved to money and we cannot think of solutions to a problem we have that don’t require money.  We become enslaved to our image and the only way we can think of having self worth is to become enslaved to feeding that image again. There are a hundred ways of becoming enslaved and each one has an alluring security that will pull us back into slavery if we do not take the time to remember we have a God that freed us and continues to free us. Our God provides, no matter what the circumstances; and in him, not slavery, the benefits are found in fullness. 

Where are you choosing to find fullness today?  Click on the title above and comment!

posted by, Danny

Marah: Trusting Yahweh as healer

Exodus 15:22-27

Our God is the God of redemption. He frees us from sin into a new life. He heals our brokenness.  There are many times in life we come upon a Marah situation. It’s a situation in life that is filled with undrinkable water. 

This Marah situation may be our own hardened and bitter heart where no sweet water can be found. It may be someone close to us that always takes emotional energy from us and never gives in return. Let’s face it, there are many bitter, non-life giving, undrinkable situations in life. So we grumble. We complain. We try to make the best of it. We try to squeeze the water we need from a stone.  We forget that God is in the business of redeeming the old, the stale, the decaying, and making it new. 

God not only provides for his children, sometimes he does it through the very situation, the Marah, which is the focus of our frustration; he takes something as simple as a piece of wood and makes bitter water sweet. In the end there is no doubt it was God who changed the situation. Who else would use a piece of wood? Who else would take undrinkable bitter water and make it a source of refreshment for all of Israel? Do we remember our God in Marah situations or do we try to sweeten the water ourselves? Do we complain to God or do we request healing from God and give him glory for the change?

Let’s challenge each other to remember that Jesus is in the business of redeeming the old, the stale, the decaying. It is Jeuss who makes us new. He turns the bitter in us to sweet. Click on the title above and let us know if you are ready to let him turn a Marah in your life into something sweet.

posted by, Danny

Christ: Our Passover

Exodus 11:1-12:50

Freedom must be purchased.  The nation of Egypt paid for the rebellion of her ruler, “god” pharaoh.  The kind of deliverance Egypt would need would require the very presence of God among them.  If God was to be among them, their sins would need atonement.  So Yahweh gives Israel the opportunity to sacrifice a spotless lamb as atonement for their sin.

Egypt had no opportunity.  Pharaoh was holding back God’s very own son in Israel, so God requires Egypt’s first-born sons as judgment against their rebellion.  Israel, whose sin was just as great as Egypt’s placed a sign over their door that blood had been spilled for the sins of that particular house. 

The lamb is only a picture of the true son of God whose blood was shed for the forgiveness of sins.  Like the Israelites spread the blood of the lamb over their doors on the night before their departure from Egypt, our identity with Jesus’ atoning sacrifice becomes the turning point for our freedom.  Will we need to walk through our respective Red Sea’s and claim our place in the Promised Land?  Yes, but none of those journeys begin without blood to pay for our sins.  

Many of us are trying to break into the Promised Land through the back door because we feel a sense of guilt in our lives.  We claim that Jesus blood has paid for our sins, yet we act as if God is waiting for us to be good enough so that we are worthy of Jesus’ sacrifice.  As the song says, “If you tarry until you are better, you will never come at all…”  We can only get the the Promised Land through the front door:  Jesus,  the Way, the Truth, and the Life.  Each of us must  recognize our sins, confess them, repent of them, believe in Jesus as the Lamb of God who takes away our sins and walk into the Promised Land God has for us.

“…let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean…” Hebrews 11:22

Demonstration

Exodus 8:16-10:29

Not only is God committed to demonstrating his supremacy over Pharaoh, but he is committed to demonstrating his supremacy over the rest of the Egyptian pantheon of gods.  The plagues are a complete subversion of all of the Egyptians gods. Each of the plagues demonstrates that the gods of Egyptian mythology are not in control of the situation.  Each plague demonstrates that Yahweh alone is the God who should be served.

This is helpful for us in thinking through our freedom.  The tyrants in our lives are other sources that we look to for comfort, hope, encouragement and support instead of to God, in the old testament they were called idols and we may as well use that name as well.  Idols often take forms that seem quite good, but when looked to beyond their capacity, they begin to rule us, a pharaoh.  A glass of wine is a great way to celebrate and enjoy the gifts of God’s creation, but when looked to for escape or comfort, we give it power over us that only God himself should have.  

A spouse or friend is also a great source for encouragement, but if we find our sole identity in the approval or affection of another, we again place a responsibility upon them that they could never bear, and we find ourselves subject to them and all that happens to them.  Instead of showing them the kind of love that God calls us to show, in our neediness we use them to get the kind of affection, attention and affirmation that only God should give.

When reading through the plagues, allow yourself to wonder at the majesty of God in his supremacy over the elements of creation.  Ask yourself about your own freedom.  If God were going to demonstrate his supremacy over your own personal pantheon of gods, where would he start and what would it look like?  Maybe he has already started?  Can you see his hand at work?

That You Will Know that I am the LORD

Exodus 7:1-8:15

 

The Plagues are the reversal of creation.  It is fulfillment of the promise to Abraham that God will curse those who curse his people.  But God takes all that he created, in its beauty and order, and releases it from its order upon Pharaoh.  Scholars note that it is the unleashing of creation upon Pharaoh in response to Pharaoh’s assault against Israel and their creation mandate (…bear fruit and multiply, Gen 1:27).  Pharaoh tried to stop the purposes of God in creation and so God allows Pharaoh to truly experience the brokenness of creation.

All this is so that Pharaoh and Egypt would know that Yahweh is Lord.  Literally, “know that I am I am” (7:17).  Everything in creation reveals God because God’s touch is in it.  When it goes wrong it reveals God in the sense that we know it shouldn’t be that way.  Because of that, all of life can reveal God to us, the good, the bad, the broken and the painful, can all be sacramental revelations of God.  If we see something as good, it is from him.  If we see something as broken, we know that it is broken, because we believe that God made it to be whole.  All of life reveals God.

Judgment occurs when we refuse to see God as creator and sustainer of life.  Pharaoh hardens his heart because he prefers to see himself as god.  In the hardness of his heart, he acts foolishly.  

All of our struggles and sins come back to the fact that we don’t see God in our lives as Creator, Sustainer and Savior.  When we don’t see him, our hearts are hard and miss out on the way he can reveal himself to us.  Our opportunity in this is simply to ask God to show himself to us in all things that we might see him, believe in him and respond to him in all things in life.  

Where do you see God in the good, the bad, the beautiful and the broken? Share with us by clicking on the title above and commenting.

Posted by Marc

God Reassures Moses

Ex 5:22-6:13

Moses had two problems: his enemy and his teammates.  On one end, Pharaoh has no respect for Moses; and on the other end, his followers are losing respect for him quickly as his efforts to deliver them are only making their lives more difficult.   Yahweh’s (Hebrew of The Lord) response is to tell Moses that the people of Israel have only seen a few glimpses of Him as Hw met with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, their current picture of Him is too small for this next season.  

When we begin our lives in Christ we have an initial burst of freedom coupled with fresh, powerful experiences of God’s presence.  It is easy to consider these sufficient for the rest of our lives.  We can have seasons of renewal where our faith is fresh and vibrant, when dependence is natural, and our expression of it is bold.  Yet new challenges come over the horizon or deeper issues of bondage emerge from  the buried layers of our personality.  It is tempting to want to lean upon what we have known of God to draw us through these challenges.  Those lessons of the past are crucial; yet if they were sufficient, then the problems you are facing wouldn’t exist.  You need to know much more of the breadth of God’s personality as well as the depths of His character.  You cannot get that by reading old journals, you must write new ones.  

In this passage, Yahweh tells Moses that this is a new chapter in the relationship between Him and His people, for now He is revealing Himself as the “I AM,” the one who hears the groaning of His people, remembers His promises, who brings them out of slavery, delivers them, redeems them, takes them to be His people, to be their God, and to deliver them to a land which will be home.  Before, with the patriarchs, God sort showed up out of  nowhere and was passed down from father to son.  He surely was God and He surely did provide, but now He reveals Himself as the ever present one, who is always with them, who fights their battles, who takes charge and shows them His love.  

Your current picture of God will be insufficient for the next challenge to come over the horizon.  That is both intimidating and good news.  God is eager to show Himself to you.  He may very well be sending your next challenge so He may follow on the heals to reveal Himself to you.

Have you experienced challenges recently that have forced you to look for God in a way you may not have before?  How did he reveal himself to you? Just click on the title of the blog to comment and let us know.

Posted by Marc 

Resist the Tyrant

dDay 11

Exodus 5:1-21

Freedom is rarely neat, nor is it easy. Enter a pharaoh and we have for ourselves a true spiritual battle.

In Egypt, Pharaoh was considered a god. Pharaoh’s words reveal that in his heart, he believed it and there was no way that he was going to bow down before another god. It is Yahweh versus Pharaoh. In this battle, Pharaoh resists any request for Israel to go out to worship (literally “serve” from the Hebrew “abed”). Pharaoh did not want them to serve Yahweh, because as a god, he expected them to serve him.

Just like the Israelites and Pharoah, if we are seeking freedom from our sin and brokenness, it means that there is another master involved in our life - a pharoah, a tyrant. Like Pharaoh, that tyrant will resist our quest for freedom. As we begin to leave it behind, it will yell at us, “idle!” demanding and threatening for us return to serve it. At this point we need to look back to the original exodus and the original deliverance and remember that it is a spiritual battle.

It is not you against your tyrant for your freedom. It is Yahweh against your tyrant. Are you involved? Absolutely! Is it neat and pretty? Rarely. Learn to fight against your tyrant by resisting its demands day by day; and, moment by moment, replace his words with the words of God's truth which will draw you trust God, the One who does battle for you. He is jealous for your worship and is committed to your deliverance. He will fight for you and you can trust Him.

Please leave a comment by clicking on the title above and entering our blog. We like hearing from you! What tyrants are you facing, which ones are you overcoming?

"Let My Son Go"

Exodus 4:18-31

When Moses is to speak for God, he would not just be saying, “let my people go…” but “let my son go.”  Israel was to be God’s firstborn son.  Moses was instructed to warn Pharoah, “my firstborn for your firstborn.”  Pharaoh at that time was considered God and the battle that was to take place was to be  demonstration of who the true deity was in the world—Yahweh or Pharaoh.  Moses was to warn Pharaoh about the specialness of the firstborn and the consequences of enslaving Yahweh’s first bornn.  

Yet, as we said, Moses couldn’t speak on behalf of God’s firstborn son if he hadn’t set apart his own firstborn son.  The sign of the agreement between God and Israel was 

signed by man through the sign of the covenant.  Since his son was away while they were born, he was never circumcised.  So that needed to be done.  Circumcision produced blood and that blood was the sign that distinguished Israel from the nations.  That blood was needed for Moses’ to cover the offense of trying free God’s firstborn while ignoring the sign of freedom for his firstborn. 

In the ultimate release of the Hebrews from slavery, blood would be used on their doors to mark them as different (free) from the Egyptians.  That sign was a protection; for eventually the angel of the Lord came and claimed the first-born children that God promised for Pharaoh’s resistance.  The blood set apart God’s people as holy to Him and protected them amidst the battle between Yahweh and Pharaoh.  

The blood of Jesus, God’s perfect, true firstborn son of creation(Col 1:15) still protects us in the battle between God’s Kingdom and the kingdom’s of darkness in this world.  It sets us apart as holy.  It declares us as separated unto God.  Dark forces and Satan cannot control us because the blood of Christ has broken us free from their power.  Because of Jesus’ blood, we are made holy in God’s sight. Because of his blood, we are able to grow in realizing that holiness because we don’t need to purchase ourselves into forgiveness, but we can live in that forgiveness as dearly loved children.  That is freedom.

Freedom From My Misperception

Exodus 3:12-4:20

If Moses was going to free his people from Egypt, he was going to need to be free himself, free from a small view of God and free from misperceptions about himself.  Coming into this passage, Moses has received the call to go and free Israel, but he has questions.

The change in Moses is subtle though profound.  We don’t actually see it in him, but we see it in him through his staff, his shepherd’s rod that he carries with him to shepherd the sheep.  God knew that Moses needed 

more than just answers to questions, for Moses needed to experience God and to understand himself differently.  At the beginning of the passage, the staff was known as Moses’ staff, a staff that he used to do his work as a shepherd and marked him out in his identity as a wanderer, away from his home.   Then God changes the staff to a snake and Moses needs to trust God’s words enough to pick it up by its tail.  The act of obedience in faith increases Moses ability to trust God, for he experienced God when the snake turned back into a staff.  Something happe

ned to the staff also.  At the end of the passage we read (4:20), it is no longer Moses’ staff, but rather “the staff of God.”

Moses would take this new tool to shepherd people, not sheep.  It represented a change in Moses identity.  Answers to his questions weren’t enough.  He needed to step out and faith and trust God.  Once he did, he saw life, himself, and his calling differently.  He moved forward becoming a man of freedom who could lead others there as well.

Your ability to experience freedom is directly related to your ability to trust God in obedience and in so doing, experience Him.  The more you experience Him through this trust, the deeper your well of faith gets.  None of us will ever arrive at perfect trust in God—Moses sure didn’t, but we can practice it.  The more we practice this trustful obedience, the more it becomes second nature, and the more we become, well a person who trusts God.  

We can never give up and think we do not have anything to learn here.  Until we go and be with Him, we should count on God meeting us and challenging us to deeper steps of trust.

A Strange Calling

Exodus 2:23-3:12

There is a strangeness to our calling.  We cannot approach God because of his holiness, but we can’t accomplish anything without His presence with us.  As we consider our calling, it is good to look at Moses’ calling.  The most dominant aspect of the story of Moses calling is that the story has very little to do with Moses.  The person in discussion in this story is God himself.

Our freedom is a calling.  We are called out of the darkness and into His light.  We are called out of our old lives marked by the flesh and its desires and into new lives marked by the freedom of the Spirit.  We live our lives learning to leave behind the flesh and its desires for the new way of the Spirit.  Yet, none us should go for too long without wondering about the specifics of what God wants us to do with our time, what is my ‘calling’?  Or, to draw off the Latin root of the word, ‘vox,’ what does the voice of God say to me regarding my task?

With Moses, as with us, our calling comes from knowing clearly who God is.  He is holy to the point of danger (‘take off your shoes”).  He is compassionate to the point of sharing in our sufferings (‘I will be with you’).  It is a paradox almost too deep to plummet.  Yet it is God’s own character that He draws us to.  Are there things about ourselves that are helpful to learn as we discern our calling?  Yes. Yet here Moses needs to learn about God and the more he understands God, the better he will understand himself, his world, and yes, his calling.

How has understanding God better shaped your understanding of your calling? Click on the title above to take you to the blog and leave a comment.

posted by Marc

A Failed Attempt at Freedom

Exodus 2:11-22

There was Moses way and then there was God’s way.  We see both Moses (v.11) and God (v. 25) looking upon the mise

ry of their people.  They were both concerned.  Moses acted rashly to deliver the Hebrews in his own strength and with his own wisdom and found the respective results of that equation, needless death, deception and despair.  So Moses has to run and, in a sense, goes into his own exile from his own people.

While in exile, Moses is going to go to school on the art of delivering people--God’s way.  He couldn’t deliver all of Israel, but he does deliver seven women from some scoundrel shepherds.  Moses was hoping to deliver Israel from the hand of Egypt, but instead he delivered some women from some shepherds.  Then Moses became a shepherd himself.  This new life of tending sheep, patiently nurturing them, leading them to food water and protection would be an internship for Moses on

 what it means to be a leader.  As Moses learns to lead sheep, he will begin to learn to lead people.

We should listen well to the consequences of our mistakes.  They are often our greatest teachers.  We should expect to continue learning as long as we live on this earth.  If we stop learning, we stop believing that God has more for us.  Stopping the learning process suggests that God is done with us, maybe done with this world.  

That is not the God we have witnessed in these two chapters.  Behind these past two chapters rests the gaze of God, listening to the cries of his people, hearing their groaning, remembering his promises and preparing history and this world—for freedom.

The Making of a Deliverer

Read Exodus 2:1-10

The problem with slavery is that it steals your memory of freedom.  When slavery passes down a generation, it becomes a way of life.  Slavery is akin to captivity in that they preclude freedom to be an inside-out endeavor.  Each needs help from the outside.  Prisoners need someone from the outside to open the gates.  Slaves need a non-slave to purchase them.  Who will set the Hebrews free if they are all entirely subject to slavery?

But what if there was a Hebrew who experienced freedom for himself? Then there would be an insider who would know a life outside of slavery.  That is exactly what is going here.  The oppression and dishonor against God’s people was only growing, and so God took action to shape Moses' life from birth to become the very one who could deliver God’s people.  He was an insider who knew life on the outside, what it meant to be free.  We know that Jesus himself was prepared

 in the same way.  He sets us free spiritually because He knew the complete freedom of life outside of this broken world before He came to live in it to deliver us from this world.  He was a free man, who lived as a slave in order to lead all of us slaves to freedom.

We have, and will continue to speak about, how God delivers us for our freedom; but it is important here to notice a fundamental principle of ministry.  Paul speaks to those who have found freedom in Christ in Galatia saying, 

“You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love.”  Galatians 5:13

As freed people we have a special opportunity to reach and to serve others in love.  What makes Moses and Jesus unique in their ability to bring freedom to others is:

• They were people who were stewards of their own freedom.  They had experienced freedom for themselves.  As believers our authority and ability to help people with their sin is established by our own experience of freedom from sin.
  
• Though they could have stayed as outsiders, they made themselves insiders.  Though our authority is shaped by the freedom of our moral integrity, our impact is shaped by how close we get to slavery.  One friend of mine said, “if you want to help someone, their problem will become your problem.  If they struggle with anger, they will get angry with you.  If they struggle with manipulating, they will manipulate you.”  But that is ministry.  There is no way around getting our hands dirty.

Moses is going to have learn this the hard way.  We’ll save that for tomorrow though.  How have you seen people get their hands dirty in your life?

Posted by Marc

Are You Breaking Stones?

50 Days to Freedom: Day Seven

Exodus 1

Notes on this chapter for Bible Reading

In the opening words of the Bible’s second book, observe that God is fulfilling His promise to bless Israel’s children; growing their number exceedingly over 400 years, bringing brings a sense of threat and a violent reaction from Pharaoh. This is an important chapter for it lays the ground work for the entire book as well as Numbers and Deuteronomy. To understand its importance, we need to go back to the key verses of the Old Testament found in Genesis 12.

“And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.  

I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and through you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” (ESV)

The promise laid out here Genesis 12 is the driving theme of the Old Testament and is as follows:

1. God will Bless Abraham and his family
   
2. God will make Abraham’s family into a great nation—Israel
   
3. God will give Abraham and his family Israel a promised land—Palestine
   
4. Those who bless this family will be blessed and those who dishonor it will be cursed
   
5. Through this family (ultimately Christ) the entire world will be blessed.
   

These promises are being fulfilled as God is making Israel into a great nation, adding to their numbers.  The promise is being fulfilled as God blesses the midwives who bless the Hebrews.  Yet, the promise is being threatened.  Even a reader who is marginally familiar with the protagonist (Moses) of Exodus recognizes that the small time genocide attempt of the Hebrew male infants could very well be the hand of Satan opposing the rise of a deliverer for God’s people, for in this chapter Moses was yet to be born.  God was preparing to move and Satan was making a counter move.  For a parallel, remember the birth of Christ (Matthew 2).  This lays the groundwork for a curse to those who dishonor God’s family.  The coming plagues as a result of this curse looms in the coming pages like debris that has fallen onto train tracks around a bend.  Nothing will get in the way of God blessing the world through Israel.  

Application

Some of the problems we face are from our own hands; some we inherit.  What is seen from the beginning is that sin and brokenness build on each other.  Sin breaks things, leaving people in its wake broken and prone to sin more, and break more.  The people of Israel were in slavery and had been so for a very long time.  Their king is attempting to wipe out a generation of their children. Their lives, at least on paper, are quite miserable, yet God is on the move, keeping His promises, aligning the nations, using Egypt as a womb to mature a family into a nation that will burst upon the world with the promise of nothing short of salvation for all nations.  

Tell that to the guy breaking stones for Pharoah.

You may be breaking stones and you may feel spiritual threats on your family, yet we get to see that God is always at work to bring salvation and to work in and through even the most broken of situations in order to bring freedom, salvation and hope to you and this world.  Believe it.

Let us know if you can see this.  We would love to hear your stories of how God is at work in ways we not always see.

Posted by Marc

God meant it for good

50 Days to Freedom: Day Six

Genesis 37, 39-45, 50:20

 

The book of Genesis should break us from all of preconceived notions that Christian spirituality is about stuffy people pretending they're perfect and looking down on others.  Genesis is about how the fall breaks creation in every way and the amazing potential people have for good and for bad (add Gen 4 and 38 to your reading to get more potential of the bad). Genesis is also about how God is going to work through the bad and the broken to see His purposes prevail.

 

Joseph’s story is the perfect story.  Here is a kid who was the favored child in a hugely dysfunctional home.  His brothers hate him, mock him and sell him to traders where he spends his life alternately achieving and spending time in prison.  Imagine being a counselor and trying to deal with his broken family—from Rachel to Leah, to his twelve brother and Jacob as a father, what a mess.  Yet, Joseph sees it all come together and makes that point clear when he says to his brothers:

 

“As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring about that many people should be kept alive as they are today.”

 

This was Joseph’s story, but it wasn’t just his story—it was Jesus' story.  Jesus took the evil perpetrated against Him and God used it for good.  But it is not just Joseph’s and Jesus’ story, it is our as well.  God teaches us that none of our sufferings go without His notice and involvement.  He is at work in our prisons and our betrayals. 

 

The thing is, we are used to suffering being able to be redeemed in 105-145 minutes.  Most movies redeem suffering in under two hours.  Joseph sat in a stinking jail for two years.  It is so easy to just turn the page and see the redemption on the next page.  That wasn’t how it was for Joseph and that wasn’t how it will be for us.  You may be 18 months into your imprisonment, you may be three months.  What you can count on is that God is at work to redeem all things and take all the things that are evil and use them for good.

 

What do you think?  Have you seen this?   Are there other obstacles to believing this?  How do you remind yourselves of God’s purposes in the midst of painful experiences?  Click on the title of this blog to comment.

Posted by Marc

Wrestling with God

50 Days to Freedom: Day Five

Genesis 32-33

Jacob has a problem.  He is a scoundrel.  He sins.  Not only does he sin, but he pays the price of his sin.  He sins and then things break, like his relationship with Esau; Jacob, and everyone around him, are experiencing both sin and brokenness.  But regardless, because of His promise, God still chooses to bless Jacob and make him wealthy in the foreign land before God calls him back to the land of promise. 

 

Just like God met Jacob on his way out of the Promised Land, so he also meets him on the way back into the Promised Land.  We can learn a few things about how God meets us in our lives:

1.       God meets us through our vulnerability and brokenness—Jacob’s clear demonstration of fear of Esau and submission to Esau reflects 14+ years of apprehension, guilt and pain over this broken relationship.  He expects Esau to be looking for justice.  The  night before this meeting is the night when God comes to wrestle with Jacob.  We are often tempted to get ourselves together so that we can hear from God.  God wants to speak to us when we are humbly dependent; not prideful, independent and sufficient.

2.       God stoops—the man/angel/theophany that Jacob wrestles with is said to not be able to overcome Jacob, and yet Jacob knew He was God.  Clearly, this is akin to a father wrestling with his children, allowing them the mastery over him.  God meets us in a way that we can handle and gives us enough information for us move forward.  When a child asks the parent, “when will we get there?” the parent does not discuss the map, the traffic and the weather, but simply gives enough information to answer the question in the child’s mind.  God sees a much bigger picture and gives us enough information for us to wrestle with.

3.       God does not leave us the same—Jacob takes a new name—“Israel.”  Jacob knew himself to be a scoundrel, but now he is known as one who “strives and prevails.”  He has a new identity to build himself, his life and his family around.  For the rest of our lives, God will be continually at work to rebuild our identities as His children.

4.       God wounds—Though Jacob was able to strive with God and prevail, God clearly demonstrated His power by touching Jacob’s hip and leaving it wounded.  We often look at our wounds as solely evidence of the fall, but we do not receive a wound without the touch of God involved.  Some of these are quite painful and no explanation short of heaven will suffice.  Regardless, we can trust God, who allowed his son to be “wounded for our transgressions”, to wound us in such a way to draw us to Himself and to be used for His purposes. 

These are painful truths about God.  I like this God, who is close, involved and has Hs hands dirty in this world and my life than the distant, aloof God I am prone to believe.  He is real, He is true and He is there.

 

Posted by Marc