How We Shine

 "Come, mighty Spirit, penetrate

This heart and soul of mine;

And my whole being with thy grace

Pervade, O Life divine....

Thus life within our lifeless hearts

Shall make its glad abode;

And we shall shine in beauteous light,

Filled with the light of God."~Horatius Bonar

The Story of Light

 
  In the Beginning God said "let there be light" and this was the start of all life on Earth.  His first human creations, Adam and Eve, disobeyed him and brought a new darkness into the world. This was the start of all death. At the crux of time  God's son Jesus came to offer light to us once more. When  he hung bleeding, then died on a cross for our disobedience, he tore open a veil, one that had darkened our heart, separated us from God,  and kept us from knowing the one who is light itself.  

   Jesus died, and at first, to the undiscerning and the powers of darkness, it seemed darkness had prevailed. But darkness can't overcome light. God the Father raised Jesus from the dead. Thus everyone who believes what Jesus has done gains the right to become children of light-----children of God. Once more God says  "let there be light"---this time in our heart.  Thus when we believe in him, we come alive.  

The Beauty of Light

 
   As children of light, Christians are beautiful beyond compare. Beauty and Light have much in common: Both are pleasing to the eye and both draw people in .  In addition, usually, those with glowing faces are considered to be beautiful. Beauty and light are body deep; a true and lasting glow actually comes from the inside. When I eat healthily, my complexion becomes brighter, and I typically get compliments for it. (Carrots in particular produce a lovely radiance). It's the same with spiritual things. Jesus said the Church is the light of the world. Christians are called light; yet most of us would agree we don't physically shine like the sun. However, one day the righteous will shine like stars , inwardly AND outwardly. 

                                              

  Radiant

    Through God's Spirit, Jesus, the light of man,  has come to live inside us.  The only reason we shine at all is because Jesus, the light of life, dwells within us. Like a light bulb, Christian light sources from within. One day soon we will see Jesus in all his glory: One day soon we will see him clearly. As he is.  Right now we see Jesus through dark glass but soon the glass will be removed----- and  then-----face to face.  That moment suspended in the air, when we look Jesus in the eye, our vision of him will become crystal clear.  Jesus himself once said "The eye is the lamp of the body. If your vision is clear, your whole body will be full of light (Matthew 6:22, BSB). Therefore when our vision of Jesus becomes clear , our whole body will fill with light. 

Once our eyes drink him in, we will be so filled with  light that our skin won't be able to contain it. Like the sun breaking forth,  ascending the horizon, scattering beams everywhere,  Christ's light will break through us and our skin will pour out glory. At the end of time, we will physically shine bright because of the incredible light within us. Yet even now, if we fix the eyes of our heart on Jesus, still we can shine spiritually to all the world. 

The Most Glorious Woman on Earth

  Who is She?




   At a passing glance she wouldn't appear remarkable.  With her hair disheveled from battle, face streaked with dirt, dressed mottled from flight, she may seem unattractive. It's said men have entertained angels unawares. Perhaps we've entertained queens with the same ignorance. Would you be terribly shocked if you've heard  that you've sat in the presence of royalty? That the hobbled woman down the road carrying a tattered bible and a cross around her neck, also stood in the courts of heaven----that even the middle aged woman filing away at his desk is also "queen"? "How can that be?" , you may ask. I say this because the most glorious woman on Earth is not a normal woman.  She is the Church, or all those who believe in Jesus. She's the Bride of Christ :


    ...we are members of his body. “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church [1].


     When Adam first saw Eve he exclaimed “ this is now bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh”. In other words “this is my self.   I see you, and I see me too.”   Just like Eve was taken out of Adam’s side, the Church was taken out of the side of Jesus: When Jesus was pierced, outpoured blood and water. From this the Bride of Christ was born. Therefore the moment we individually say yes to  Christ,  we become his. With one “yes” we are his Bride. Because both men and women compose the Church, both are apart of the Bride.  God created "man" in his image as "male and female". We are all equally in the divine image. Therefore, God uses both genders to represent humanity. In the spirit, the Church is female.   Rich, poor, plain, beautiful---the Bride is all those who confess Jesus the King of Kings. She may not look beautiful according to the flesh,  but she is beyond compare to those who look with the Spirit. 

The Most Beautiful Woman

      The beauty of the Church doesn't come from herself. Unlike the women of the earth, she doesn't spend hours primping in front of the mirror.  Her only foundation is Jesus. Lipstick isn't needed to make her lips pop. Her eyes draw you in with the light of Christ, rather than  with shadow and mascara. I say this not to  disparage the use of make up ( I wear it occasionally) ,  but to draw attention to the fact there is a superior cosmetic called holiness.

The Church wears the holiness of Jesus.

.........Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her, 26 so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless. [2]

   As we can see the Church is made holy by Christ. When two people get married, everything they have belongs to the other. Jesus who knew no sin became sin for his Bride so that she can become the righteousness of God, just like him. Her sin died with him on the cross so that both of them could be free from sin. Three days after Jesus died,  God raise him from the dead and seated  him at his right hand so that only his perfect righteousness would remain. The Bride has received Christ's righteousness , which is her wedding garment.

The Most Important Wedding

     At the end of the age there will be a  wedding ceremony called the Marriage Supper of the Lamb. The Church officially married Jesus at the cross. However the marriage is in the style of the ancient Jewish wedding system. The Jewish wedding is two -part. The first stage is kiddishin (bethrothal) and the second is nussin (full fledged marriage). In the betrothal phase, a young suitor would first approach a young woman’s father. If the father and the girl agreed, then the couple would sign a marriage contract. The moment the couple signed the marriage contract, they were considered husband and wife. However , the Jewish custom was to not to live together until they had the wedding ceremony and communally celebrated their marriage.  This living apart phase was generally for a year. During the wait period, the suitor would return to his father's house and prepare a wedding chamber. Like the Jewish wedding tradition, salvation is  two-part with an interim period. Jesus died for our sins in the first part.  He then returned to his Father's house to build a home for us. Now the Church awaits his return during this current intermediate period. In the last part that's coming soon, Jesus will come again and give every believer a new glorious body (Hebrews 9:28).

    At the end of the age, the Church will be unveiled as the wife of the Lamb. In that day her beauty and worth will be known to all.  Jesus will make her enemies who fight her daily bow at her feet and acknowledge that he has loved her (Revelation 3:9).  As for our now, if you have believed in Jesus, enjoy your status as his Bride, though no one around you may know your true worth. If you haven't believed, believe so that you too can become the most glorious "woman" on Earth. Believe so that you too can enjoy the priviledge of belonging to the King of Kings.







[1] Ephesians 5:31-2 NIV

[2] Ephesians 5:25-27 NASB

Turning Tears to Wine

     God turns tears to joy-----mourning to dancing . What a boundless God he is. Lately he's been giving me much revelation from the Psalms. The Psalms are the human heart made poetry; they run the gamut of emotion, from fear to frustration all the while managing  to honor the Lord with every verse. In Psalm 58, verse 8, David was especially sorrowful. He notes to God "You have kept count of my tossings." You maybe familiar with his next words "Put my tears in Your bottle. Are they not in Your book?" (ESV)

  Of this bottle I'd always envisioned a tiny vial. Perhaps crystal, with  swoops of color across the  curve.  Today God corrected this image. In the tiny notes of my NIV translation Bible, was an alternate translation of "bottle." The NIV suggests the word  also be translated as "wineskin." God's bottle for our tears is a wineskin-----bottleshaped skin that holds the drink that makes us glad. 

  
   Didn't Jesus turn water to wine and aren't our tears as salty water? God promised through several prophets to make new wine overflow. New wine, as you may have guessed, is fresh and it was also known as "sweet wine"[1].  Sweet, new wine was also highly inebriating.  Wine is a symbol of the Holy Spirit(Eph 5:18). When God pours out his Spirit in the New Covenant, he brings joy and sweetness to his people that is intoxicating (Acts 2). This morning God gave me a greater picture of his tear-bottle. Perhaps he turns those tears into the wine of the Spirit. Maybe when we are heart broken, he empties out that wineskin of pain, then pours the happy mixture over us.  He gives us the Holy Spirit and intoxicates us with the joy of his love.


   [1] "Strong's Greek: 1098. γλεῦκος (gleukos) -- Sweet New Wine." Strong's Greek: 1098. γλεῦκος (gleukos) -- Sweet New Wine. Accessed August 02, 2016. http://biblehub.com/greek/1098.htm.

Whole-Hearted Faith

The Lukewarm

    There are such people as pew warmers; warm bodies with cold hearts that occupy seats in churches. Pew warmers  think they are Christians because they were born in a Christian family. Some may have heard a few snippets from the Bible, and nodded heartily to what was heard , all the while failing to put it into practice.  Others may simply equate Christianity with good people and conclude if good people are Christians and they are “good people”,  then surely they are Christian.

Interestingly some pew warmers don’t even go to church; but both the churched and non-churched  variety are nominal Christians. Christians in name only.  I would know because I was one of them.

    Throughout high school I  thought I was Christian because it was the religion closest to me. It was the one I was born into. Like with my last name, I took Christianity because it was there , then thought nothing of it.  One day this thoughtless belief  changed. While a freshman in college I surrendered my  life to God.  Before then,  I  wasn’t sure God even existed, but I did suspect that if I were to  truly follow God he would require all of me. For many years I wasn’t willing to give up all my life to him. I had been fine  treating him distantly and going to him only if I was scared or in trouble. Deep down I knew I was holding back yet didn’t care. Until I became desperate. On the day I surrendered I knew I couldn’t hold back anymore: I was so tired of my life, so tired of feeling lonely, so tired of my pain. So when I tearfully looked up from my bed and said “ I can’t do this anymore God”, I meant it. I made an active, conscious  choice to surrender control of my life. In an instant I went from pew warmer to real Christian.


 Real Christian

  The difference between a pew warmer and a real Christian, is that a real Christian has decided actively to follow Jesus.  When this happens God makes them a new person (2 Corinthians 5:17). Not only that, real Christians have  chosen to believe with all their heart. This can be seen in the book of Acts.  In Acts chapter 8 vv 26-38, God supernaturally leads an evangelist named Phillip to meet an Ethiopian eunuch. When Phillip came to the eunuch, the eunuch was having difficulty reading a passage from Isaiah. The eunuch didn’t know it but he had been reading about the messiah Jesus.  He asks Phillip what does Isaiah mean. Phillip uses the opportunity to preach the gospel of Jesus. When Phillip finished preaching, the eunuch said

“Look, there's water! What would keep me from being baptized? ” [37 And Philip said, “If you believe with all your hear you may".  Some manuscripts have chosen to omit this verse. However, I believe it belongs there, simply because God spoke a similar word in the book of Jeremiah.

   Some have debated what it means to be a true Christian. They ask “are you a Christian because you said a prayer, particularly one called the Sinner’s Prayer, one time in your life?  I’d say “yes”, if you prayed it with all your heart.   A true Christian is one who has believed in Jesus with all his heart.  Now, some may ask “what constitutes believing with all the heart?” I think the answer is different for different people. We can’t prescribe an exact definition or criteria. However we can generally conclude  it means if you’re prayed with all your heart, you’ve made a commitment. You have counted the cost and have decided to accept the message of the gospel. You may not perfectly understand all that entails( I didn't)———You may not grasp the degree of what you must give to God, but you do grasp that you must surrender:  Afterall, you have believed in yourself, you have trusted in your own abilities, you have tried to direct the course of your  life and have failed. When you've gotten sick of the failure, or even if you want to experience real Life, you decide to believe in Jesus with your whole heart.   You may not know exactly what Christianity is (I didn’t)  but you do know that you can’t stay where you are. To believe with all your heart is to say “I want what Jesus gives. Today I will receive it.”  It means  when you hear the gospel, you understand that when you come to God, there is no holding back. There is no half -hearted surrender. You give God all of you and you receive all of him.


 But we are weak

You may not have the ability to surrender but even if you want to,  it still counts as believing with all your heart.  Like another person did, we can exclaim "I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!" (Mark 9:24) Of course, you may also stumble in following God.  There will be moments you try to take back your life or parts of your life. This back-pedaling is inevitable, for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God (our imperfection is why we need Jesus in the first place). However, all it takes is one surrender to permanently belong to God.  Though you  may stray to unfaithfulness , he will ultimately keep his promise to to give you all of him. Thus to seek God with all the heart is a position of humility and determination. It means you understand your own weakness before God and you long for the One who can truly satisfy your heart’s desire for a full life. In surrendering to God, your heart turns from ice to fire because the very consuming fire of God comes to live inside of you. When you believe with all your heart, you are no longer content  to warm pews, to merely sit in Christianity without commitment. No, when you believe with all your heart, you set the very world aflame with your passion for God .

A Word for the Weary

 Lately I've been buckling under the load of unbearable weight. The stresses of life have deadened my limbs, work has wearied my back, delayed promises from God have slown my feet; and I 'm tired. Week after week I've been weak. As an introvert I tire easily,  and have a job where I'm constantly around people, some who demand much from me.

On top of this all , I haven't been taking care of myself, getting little rest and eating unhealthily. The sorrow  of the world sags upon me. Everything has piled up and suddenly I'm crashing. In the midst of all this, I've heard Jesus speak

" I know you have little strength"

This sentence has replayed in my mind throughout the weeks of my stress. Although I knew it came from the book of Revelation, I paid little attention to it. Until today.  This morning I decided to look up the verse in it's entirety and am shocked at what I've found.

All you need is Love

Jesus said these exact words in a letter to the church of Philadelphia.  Here's some background information about the letter: Over the course of 2 chapters, Jesus addresses 7 churches. (Some Bible scholars believe each church represents the actual 2000 history of Christianity ) Jesus praises 6 of the churches and rebukes 6. Out of all the churches, Philadelphia is the only one Jesus  doesn't rebuke. Why is this?  In terms of church history, Philadelphia represents the modern evangelical church; Philadelphia is home to those who are born again and genuinely believe. (Though the other churches have genuine believers within them, only Philadelphia represents the church in it's purest form) Because the Philadelphians believe in Christ, God does not see their sin. Moreover, the name Philadelphia also means "city of  brotherly love", perhaps because the believer's genuinely love with Christ's love . Thus because love covers a multitude of sin, Jesus does not mention the sin of the church(1 Peter 4:8).

The church of Philadelphia was suffering great persecution. yet they patiently endured thier trial. I have also felt tried these past few years and especially past few months. I look around and see that I'm not alone. The world groans beneath the oppression of sin and it seems we've all been relentlessly hit with tales of tragedy, violence and hate. But to those who belong to Jesus, he says:

See, I have placed before you an open door that no one can shut. I know that you have little strength, yet you have kept my word and have not denied my name. 9I will make those who are of the synagogue of Satan, who claim to be Jews though they are not, but are liars—I will make them come and fall down at your feet and acknowledge that I have loved you. 10Since you have kept my command to endure patiently, I will also keep you from the hour of trial that is going to come on the whole world to test the inhabitants of the earth.11I am coming soon. Hold on to what you have, so that no one will take your crown.

A Word 

This is a word for the hour. I realize that my struggles aren't always about me alone. Sometimes I suffer for the sake of others...sometimes the Church suffers together as a Body so that we may comfort others who hurt.  All of Revelation 3:9-11 is for me,  and for the whole Bride of Christ. I believe the Lord says the time for vindication and reward has come. What has been lost, the Lord is about to restore. Even your enemies, betrayers, and persecutors are about to see you exalted. They will fall at your feet and acknowledge that God has loved you. Bride ,you have had little strength but your Bridegroom is coming. Because you have honored him and have clung to his name despite attacks, God will reward you.

 The signs of the times say Jesus is coming soon (Matthew 24). The hour of trial known as the the 7 year tribulation will spring upon the earth(Daniel 9:24-27, Matthew 24:21; ) but the Church will not be a part of it because we aren't appointed to suffer God's wrath (1 Thessalonians 5:9)[1]. Soon Jesus will come to take us where he is, as well as fix our earthly problems now. He has good plans for each of us. Yes, he will open doors to your dreams, as well as doors to heaven. On the earth, what you have longed for, God will soon give you.  Get ready Church----the Lord comes. He comes to bless you, restore you, increase you and give you favor now, and in heaven. He will come into every dry area of your life and water it afresh. This will all happen soon, says the Lord. 

[1] For more information about the tribulation, see this excellent resource:
https://gracethrufaith.com/end-times-prophecy/seven-things-you-have-to-know-to-understand-end-times-prophecy-part-1/

2016, The Year of Success

My new favorite word  is Tsalach (t-saw-lakh) I first heard it over five years ago while listening to the gospel singer Eddie James' song of the same name. I liked it then but forgot about it until now. I  didn’t listen to the song again until recently. What prompted me to listen to it again was probably God. While reading a topical bible on prosperity, I stumbled across tsalach. Spurred, I listened to Eddie's song again, which further led me to study the definition. I’m glad I looked it up.   God has given me a beautiful prophetic word based on Tsalach.


    Tsalach has two primary meanings: to be sent and to advance. Strong’s concordance states “to push forward, in various senses ...-- break out, come (mightily), go over, be good, be meet, be profitable, (cause to, effect, make to, send) prosper....”


     The first definition refers specifically to the Holy Spirit being sent , and coming upon someone suddenly. The second definition, which we'll focus on,  means a successful journey, to advance, to move forward. Joshua 1:8 is a good example: " This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success."


   Tsalach is the Hebrew word most translated to prosperity in the Old Testament. Another word, which you may be more familiar with is shalom and it means wholeness and peace, needing nothing.  It is likely what most people think of when they hear the word prosperity. Many have focused on the financial or health benefits of prosperity. These are all good things but they are not the highest definition. If Tsalach means to advance or progress, then true prosperity is to be successful and make headway in God's purpose for your life.


   Tsalach essentially embodies the apostolic, a word that means to send , a word that means to advance the Kingdom of God.  Hearing Tsalach excites me because I"m ready to advance  in God's plan for my life:  I'm ready to break through to my destiny. God's word tells me how:


   For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." (Eph 2:10)


  As we walk in God's ordained path for our lives, we will progress. Walking in any other path will cause us  to circle through the wilderness, treading the same ground and seeing the same things; we will not advance in life if we don't walk with God.  If we  commit our way to him, even the path that leads through the desert will ultimately take us to the promised land.

  We're on our way to the promised land but first we must make it through this desolate land. We can be sure of this:God will make a way in the desert. Streams of life and refreshment will pulse through us. Lush fruit and vegetation will spring up. Through dry and difficult times, God  will push us , carrying us in the river of his grace. With the concept of Tsalach we will find ourselves brimming, bursting forth into our land of promise like water breaching a dam. God has so many exciting things for us, just waiting to be discovered. He is doing a new thing in 2016! Seek him to find that new thing in your own life. Won't you press through and see it? Won't you ride the waves of his incredible life and grace? It is time to advance. It is time to make progress in God's plan for you. Time to break forth. 2016 is a year of entering the promised land. Tsalach-----let's move forward.