Getting a little further out there - Luke 4v31-44

Jesus went down to Capernaum, a town of Galilee. He used to teach them every Sabbath. They were astonished at his teaching, because his message was powerful and authoritative.

There was a man in the synagogue who had the spirit of an unclean demon.

'Hey you!' he yelled out at the top of his voice. 'What's going on with you and me, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are - you're God's Holy One!'

'Shut up!' Jesus rebuked him. 'Come out of him!'

The demon threw the man down right there in front of them, and came out without harming him. Fear came over them all. 'What's all this?' They started to say to one another. 'He's got power! He's got authority! He tells the unclean spirits what to do, and they come out!' Word about him went out to the whole surrounding region.

He left the synagogue and went to Simon's house. Simon's mother-in-law was sick with a high fever, and they asked him about her. He stood in front of her, rebuked the fever, and it left her. And straight away she got up and waited on them.

When the sun went down, everyone who had sick people-all kinds of sicknesses-brought them to him. He laid his hands on each one in turn, and healed them. Demons came out of many people, shouting out 'You are the son of God!' He sternly forbade them to speak, because they knew he was the Messiah.

When day dawned he left the town and went off to a deserted place. The crowds hunted for him, and when they caught up with him they begged him not to leave them.

'I must tell the good news of God's kingdom to the other towns,' he said. 'That's what I was sent for.' And he was announcing the message to the synagogues of Judea.

A lot of people, including a lot of Christians, do not believe that demons exist or that it is just another way of saying 'issues'. I know because I was one of them until recently. After I had some of the most intense experiences with God and I received the Holy Spirit after years of seeking out this Jesus, even teaching the scriptures ...a battle ensued that manifested itself spiritually, physically and took my mind on a ride to the edge of insanity and back again. I'll stop for a second and remind those reading of how much of a logical, straight edge person I am. If I were to be told this stuff, I would have me locked up. As I went through it, I actually did spend five days in a hospital because nobody knew how to handle it other than to pray and fast and even then nobody had dealt with anything like it before...so it was Jesus and me in this.

So what hands-down convinced me that demons are real and that Jesus is my King, my savior. Glazed over eyes, knowing things that just can't be known, seeing sin everywhere and in everyone, my whole body heating up, being thrown into convulsions while dry heaving, commanding them out of myself, Pastor Joe on the phone with my friend Todd praying over the situation, doing my best to speak the words 'bind them in Jesus name' as I would feel them leaving me...I didn't want those things loose in my house or around my wife and kids, as I lay sweating in my bed, my friend Todd was reading scriptures over me to cool me down, my wife praying, Todd later told me he was reading Colossians. My mind is blown at this point, all my transgressions and fears started flooding my mind. I was crying out to God to make it stop, to deliver me...and he did after about a month and a half of getting progressively stronger again after that initial battle. Finally I was back to my normal self after many more, albeit smaller, battles and a lot of prayer, only now on fire even more than ever, clean and victorious by the grace of God...meanwhile, absolutely stumping psychologists and psychiatrists alike, the Lord actually using the case to turn one back to his faith from his initial 'clinical ideas' upon first meeting me. All that being said, three things...1) demons are real, there is a real enemy 2)Make sure you confess your sins and deal with your wounds sooner rather than later...they use those for footholds in your mind and finally and most importantly 3)Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord, God Almighty...and worthy is His Lamb.

The point is that I did not know who I was in Christ until Christ showed me, I did not understand His authority or power until He came and grace flowed like a river. I taught about his kingdom coming, about it breaking in and transforming, but I had never experienced it...not like this anyway. My wife is still in shock from the situation, part of her is waiting for the next shoe to drop. I can't blame her it scared a lot of people. Just like the people in this scripture, 'What is this?' To all of them I say fear not the Lord is with us, turn to Him... As for me, I have never felt more free in my life...I am absolutely in awe of our King and His Kingdom. This was more than the casting out of a demon for me, this was a full-blown temple cleansing, baptism of the Holy Spirit...if I was on a horse, I've been knocked off it. This was a two and a half month ordeal and in my mind at one point it cost me everything and He restored everything and then some. I know the Lord let me go through it to teach me, prepare me, refine me...because we serve an AWESOME God who is reconciling all things, making all things new and that happens with power by the Holy Spirit. I won't even begin to get into all the stuff He showed me in the scriptures, but WOW...

In this scriptures we see both the casting out of demons and the healing of 'normal' illnesses. We also see Jesus concern that he not be identified as the Messiah, but that the message of God's Kingdom breaking in, of YHWY becoming King in a powerful, fresh and unexpected way be spread. The casting out of demons and healings was evidence, sign posts pointing to that reality, with the ultimate signpost being the resurrection of Jesus himself. Notice the way the healing and casting out of demons was done: not with magic tricks, candles, chicken or long prayers or fancy strategies...but with simple, authoritative commands, they just have to come out...not always without resistance...it says the demon threw the man on the ground, but ultimately left him unharmed. This all pointed to the fact that God's Kingdom was and is finally and truly breaking in to our fallen, depraved and sinful world...healing and restoring and making whole, bringing glory to God and our Lord Jesus Christ whose kingdom is everlasting. That Word can't just hang around, it has to go and do what it was sent to do.

ps Many thanks to all the faithful who were praying for us through all of it and to those who supported us in all the ways you were led to.

Jesus said...if I cast out demons by the finger of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.

Not what we expected to hear...Luke 4v14-30

Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit. Word about him went out throughout the whole district. He taught in their synagogues, and gained a great reputation all around.

He came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. On the Sabbath, as was his regular practice, he went to the synagogue and stood up to read. They gave him the scroll of the prophet Isaiah. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it is written:

'The Spirit of the Lord is upon me
Because He has anointed me
To tell the poor the good news.
He has sent me to announce release to the prisoners
And sight to the blind,
To set the wounded victims free,
To announce the year of God's special favor'

He rolled up the scroll, gave it to the attendant, and sat down. All eyes in the synagogue were fixed on him.

'Today', he began,'this scripture is fulfilled in your own hearing.'

Everyone remarked at him; they were astonished at the words coming out of his mouth - words of sheer grace.

'Isn't this Joseph's son?' they said.

'I know what you're going to say,' Jesus said,'You're going to tell me the old riddle: 'Heal yourself, doctor!''We heard of great happenings in Capernaum; do them here in your own country!'

'Let me tell you the truth,' he went on. 'Prophets never get accepted in their own country. This is the solemn truth: there were plenty of widows in Israel in the time of Elijah, when heaven was shut up for three years and six months, and there was a great famine over all the land. Elijah was sent to none of them, only to a widow in the Sidonian town of Zarephath.

And there were plenty of lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet, and none of them were healed - only Namaan, the Syrian.'

When they heard this, everyone in the synagogue flew into a rage. They got up and threw him out of town. They took him to the top of the mountain on which the town was built, meaning to fling him off. But he slipped through the middle of them and went away.

Once you've been cleansed and tested by everything the devil throws at you, it is like a wave of refreshment, a power move of awe and wonder fills you up, everything makes more sense, the time is now...you begin your ministry. God's grace and power have brought you through and you have remained faithful...you are filled with the Holy Spirit...here we go...uh, oh...it's not supposed to start off like that!

So imagine your sitting in church and there is a guest speaker, you've heard lots of amazing things about him and it turns out he actually grew up in the area. You are at church every Sunday, you nod your head and laugh at all the regular jokes, you buy the right CDs, wear the right t-shirts, abstain from the right things. God's promises , when they come definitely belong to you. All the sudden this mysterious figure takes the stage and out of his mouth pour the most refreshing things you've heard in years, you are filled with joy and all the sudden you start thinking who the heck is this guy? He's been around here, so-and-so knows his parents, they're broke just like the rest of us, nothing special, they don't have any 'power' to speak like that. He talks like he knows something.

Then all the sudden the speaker says,'But you know what, these glorious things probably aren't for you folks...as a matter of fact if God is gonna do this stuff and he sticks with his pattern...it's probably gonna be for the guy down at the bar crying in his whiskey...or the Afghan rebel leader whose never known God or His Word...or the lady you all cut off to make it here and get the best parking spot this morning. Yep, these things probably aren't for any of you.

Seems to me the speaker might not get assassinated, but he sure wouldn't be invited back again. Are we ready to challenge Jesus' words of grace? Or are we ready to follow him? Are we ready to try and quote scripture and prove his message of the Kingdom coming, of it being near to the poor and suffering, of God breaking in here and becoming King here, in Spirit and Truth... are we to say in our hearts, he's just that boy from those poor folks that had him out of wedlock. Are we to, God's chosen, to exchange the glory of the living God for our imaginations or will we rejoice with the lowly and despised who are exalted to their status of image bearers, who are healed and made whole... just as the high and lofty are brought back down to their, very human, levels. Maybe we wish he would have just done it the way the devil tempted him to...a few magic tricks, big neon signs that lifted Him, along with his ego up, a power-hungry takeover of the world, a call to ignorantly and haphazardly PROVE that we are God's chosen over everyone else...maybe we don't want God's suffering servant. Maybe we just assume throw him off a cliff and get on with being high and lofty in our own minds, complaining to God when we chased His answer to our prayers out the door with our wicked hearts...

We would never do that! We're not like them...we may say...we may need to be very careful with that...

And you say, 'If we had lived in the days of our forefathers, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.' So you testify against yourselves that you are the descendants of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up, then, the measure of the sin of your forefathers!

Temptation in the Wilderness (Luke 4v1-13)

Jesus returned from the Jordan, filled with the Spirit. The Spirit took him off into the wilderness for forty days, to be tested by the devil. He ate nothing during that time, and at the end of it he was hungry.

'If you are God's son,' said the devil, 'tell this stone to become a loaf of bread.'

'It is written,' replied Jesus, '"It takes more than bread to keep you alive."'

The devil then took him up and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time.

'I will give you authority over all of this,' said the devil,'and all the prestige that goes with it. It's been given to me, you see, and I give it to anyone I like. So it can all be yours...if you will just worship me.'

'It is written,' replied Jesus, '"The Lord your God is the one you must worship; he is the only one you must serve."'

Then the devil took him to Jerusalem, and stood him on a pinnacle of the Temple.

'If you are God's son,' he said,'throw yourself down from here; it's written that "He will give his angels a command about you, to look after you"; and "They will carry you in their hands, so that you won't hit your foot against a stone."'

'It has been said,' Jesus replied, '"You mustn't put your God to the test."'

When the devil had finished each temptation, he left him until another opportunity.

Jesus suffered in all the ways we do. This was extremely difficult for him. We have this image in our minds that Jesus just had all the answers and just kind of blew through his ministry without really having to think too much, pray too much or suffer too much...it was easy for him, after all he's the son of God. The scriptures speak directly against this sort of thinking. To do so would be to rob Jesus of the fullness of his humanity and of his identity 'in Adam'. Jesus, as Israel's king was to embody Israel, only for him it was to succeed where Israel had failed, to be the one faithful Israelite and at the same time to do and say the things that only YHWY did and said. We see Jesus come through the waters of baptism and then led forth by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tested. This is echoing the Exodus and Israel's coming out of slavery, through the Red Sea, forty years in the wilderness led by the pillar of fire, stumbling, testing God, tempted by all sorts of temples and their idols, desiring immediate gratification for the flesh. As a matter of fact all of Jesus' responses to the devil come from this period of Israel's history. Jesus will not only have the right words to speak he will have the right context and character to grasp onto them in his innermost being empowered by the Spirit that has come to rest upon Him, the Helper.

The devil is our adversary, but make no mistake he stands under God's authority. It is his desire and responsibility to sift us and when he does it is hell. Everything is rapid fire...accusations, fears, demons who don't want to give up any ground, evil is constantly in your ear..."if you are really a child of God..." fill in the blank. You see the sin and contrary spirits in everyone around you and worse you can't get away from yourself. When Jesus cleanses the temple it can be fierce battle. The devil's testing can be even more fierce. You don't just casually recite a couple verses...you hang on to His words as though your life depended on it. That is where Jesus is right now and this is spiritual warfare at it's most vivid...the prince of 'this world' and the King-to-be doing battle at the supra-personal level.

Here the devil appears not as a serpent but as a voice in Jesus' mind, taunting and prodding, echoing again the whispering lies in the garden only now in a wilderness. If he is to be Messiah, what kind of Messiah would he be, many have come and gone and been sifted out, shown to be nothing more than dust. These temptations make sense, they sound good, they almost fit the scriptures but they miss the character and nature of the servant who relies fully on God, the child who is faithful and righteous. The one by whose stripes we are to be healed. This is not about being true to the scriptures as much as it is about being true to the heart of God. The devil knows the scriptures, he has no heart.

First the devil tries to get Jesus to use His authority to do a cheap magic trick to feed his own immediate needs by turning a stone into bread, this echos the water from the rock and the manna from heaven. Jesus will eventually take bread and fish, that which God had already provided, and multiply God's blessing to feed many...here we see Jesus using his authority for its appropriate purpose unlike what the devil would have him use it for here.

Next the devil tries to lure Jesus into following his ways (worshiping) and serving his condemning and ultimately destructive purposes by promising him status and power. Jesus did not, however, come to be served but to serve and to serve God alone which is somehow directly linked to serving those around him ultimately to the point of death. Jesus would eventually make a public spectacle of the devil on the cross, tearing him apart and casting him down in the courts of the Most High and then Jesus would take his throne high above all kingdoms and authorities, having all authority on earth and in heaven given over to him by the Father.

Finally, the last temptation for Jesus was to put God himself to the test by intentionally putting his own life in jeopardy just to prove he was the son of God. Jesus will ultimately lay his life down in the pursuit of God's people as was His Father's will, but it is God himself who will vindicate him and Jesus knows and loves and fears His Father knowing that ultimately the scripture the devil quoted will be fulfilled in him, but not by manipulation and putting God to the test.

So how does this Messiah deliver his people from the tyranny of Rome and Herod and ultimately the devil himself? He starts by defeating the enemy on a personal level. Right here in the wilderness the stance has to be made and Jesus calls us to follow him just as the Word and the Pillar of Fire called to and led forth Israel...

Many came through the waters only to fall in the wilderness...perhaps they came along for the wrong reasons, perhaps the lack of instant gratification revealed a shallowness, maybe they felt freedom wasn't all it was cracked up to be...whatever the reason, like a refiners fire God allows us to be tested so that only the faithful and true, those who stand firmly in their trust and love of the Father and the King are saved...only those in whom rest His own Spirit, He can and will get us through...He's been there before and His grace is sufficient...it is our responsibility to keep the faith, to run the race, to fight the good fight.

So we too need to ask ourselves...What are we to do with the status that we have been given as children of God? Is it to be used so that our own needs met? Is it for power? To be seen and recognized as being something important? Is it for control over others? Is it to prove something about ourselves? Is it so we can feel certain emotions? Or perhaps so we don't have to feel certain emotions? These are the battles we must fight and decisions we need to wrestle with before we go out and begin colluding with the enemy thinking that we are going to be God's people...many have gone down that road and it is a wide road that leads to destruction. We need to be refined at the deepest most personal level...then we can get on with the mission we are all called to, to be a broken and poured out people for the world, a royal priesthood, the body of Christ...the victory implemented.

Luke 3v21-38

So it happened that, as all the people were being baptized, Jesus too was baptized, and was praying. The heaven was opened and the Holy Spirit descended in a bodily form, like a dove, upon him. There came a voice from heaven:'You are my son, my dear son! I'm delighted with you.'

Jesus was about thirty years old at the start of his work. He was, as people thought, the son of Joseph, from whom his ancestry proceeds back in the following line: Heli, Matthat, Levi, Melchi, Jannai, Joseph, Mattathias, Amos, Nahum, Hesli, Naggai,Maath, Mattathias, Semein, Josech, Joda,Joanan, Rhesa, Zerubbabel, Shealtiel, Neri, Melchi, Addi, Cosam, Elmadam, Er, Joshua, Eliezer, Jorim, Matthat, Levi, Simeon, Judah, Joseph, Jonam, Eliakim, Melea, Menna, Mattatha, Nathan, David, Jesse, Obed, Boaz, Salmon, Nahshon, Amminadab, Admin, Ram, Hezron, Perez, Judah, Jacob, Isaac, Abraham, Terah, Nahor, Serug, Reu, Peleg, Heber, Shelah, Cainan, Arphaxad, Shem, Noah, Lamech, Methuselah, Enoch, Jared, Mahalaleel, Cainan, Enosh, Seth, Adam and God.

I can't trace my family tree back very far...if I'm lucky maybe a couple generations but honestly I'm just not that interested in doing so anyway. Most people in our culture aren't. Family ties just aren't what they used to be for the Jewish people and in the New Creation genealogies don't count for much anyway because they distract from the primary focus (1 Timothy 1v3-5). So why does Luke take the time to lay this out for us and what does it have to do with Jesus' baptism?

Luke is presenting us with another contrast here; how one enters into the Kingdom by grace, by the new covenant and how one found themselves in the old covenant, by the flesh (national and racial heritage - bloodline). He is also showing how Jesus is the fulfillment of the long story of Israel, and indeed humanity, tying all of the Hebrew scriptures up and simultaneously breaking in with something new, initiating a new spiritual birth by the very Word of God coming from Heaven that will launch nothing short of New Creation in and through Messiah who would in himself contain God's very presence and nature, all this steers its way towards the Cross and the Resurrection and finally Pentecost and forward toward the final setting of all things to rights through the power that has come to rest upon Jesus, the son of God.

God declared from heaven that 'You are my son, my dear son! I'm delighted with you.' and He declares the same when Jesus baptizes us with the Holy Spirit and sends us off to begin our life of sacrificial love and service to the King and the Kingdom. This is comforting to know that YHWY remains with His children from conception to resurrection and beyond. I hear so much argument back and forth about what I don't have to do to be accepted by Father, the scriptures are clear that He has fulfilled the covenant and Jesus is crystal clear at multiple levels in his parable of the prodigal son. As a person who is absolutely confident that I am of God's elect, His child by His grace and sacrifice, I desire nothing more than for my Father to speak to me daily and teach me His ways, to guide me so WE can get on with it. I will never forget the day of visitation, the day Jesus baptized me in the Holy Spirit, I was scared out of my wits, trembling and at the same time so excited and in awe...to know the fear of our God who is an all consuming fire...I can't put it into words...but I knew immediately... I had to GO!...even if I didn't know what that looked like. Everything changed that night...but there was still something ahead of me and it would drive me to the brink of madness...it was comforting to know that my King had been there and He was with me to go through it too otherwise the wilderness is a frightening, lonely place and the enemy is vicious...relentlessly vile and constantly tormenting...madness is where I would have stayed if it were not for my King and His power, His words.

For we are God's fellow workers...We proclaim Him, admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom, so that we may present every man complete in Christ. For this purpose also I labor, striving according to His power, which mightily works within me.

Luke 3v10-20

"What should we do then?" the crowd asked.

John answered, "The man with two tunics should share with him who has none, and the one who has food should do the same."

Tax collectors also came to be baptized. "Teacher," they asked, "what should we do?"

"Don't collect any more than you are required to," he told them.

Then some soldiers asked him, "And what should we do?"
He replied, "Don't extort money and don't accuse people falsely—be content with your pay."

The people were waiting expectantly and were all wondering in their hearts if John might possibly be the Christ. John answered them all, "I baptize you with water. But one more powerful than I will come, the thongs of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire." And with many other words John exhorted the people and preached the good news to them.

But when John rebuked Herod the tetrarch because of Herodias, his brother's wife, and all the other evil things he had done, Herod added this to them all: He locked John up in prison.

When you turn toward God and hear the good news that His Kingdom is near...that the justice and peace you have longed for your whole life is coming, just round the corner... you have to "do" something. How does one respond to such great news! We automatically know we need to worship...to change something to express our gratitude...to celebrate and start living in that new reality right now!

We need to put in perspective how much the people of Israel desired to hear that YHWY was going to finally act on behalf of His people in the face of the oppression of Rome, the filth and corruption of Herod and the twisted Temple regime. We have known very little of real political and economic suffering in this country for quite some time, praise God...I'm talking about starving for justice, thirsting for things to truly be set right, being under the literal boot of evil day in and day out...militarily, economically, religiously and politically.

When you live under that kind of leadership you learn to behave like your leaders...you reflect their leadership...you consume more than you should, you take advantage of the weak and it's business as usual, you use your skills and authority to steal and its all ok because that is how the system works, you are sexually immoral and adulterous because money, sex and power are the things that we lust over and we can indulge. It's the way of the world.

John says to these people that if they want to express that they are part of the covenant renewal, part of the New Creation getting ready to burst forth into this one then they need to take the first step and come through the waters and out of slavery to the world that is passing away...then they will find themselves in the desert of Sin (see the Exodus) they are a redeemed people, but now they need to learn to be a new creature if they are to live in this New Creation...and that means reflecting the new leadership. YHWY is becoming King again and He will rescue His people in and through the coming Messiah, the Son of God.

John's baptism deals with the obvious stuff, the common sense right and wrong...and he knows it...but the baptism of the One who is coming will make them agents of New Creation...just as the pillar of fire lead the mixed people group after they left Egypt, so the Holy Spirit, God himself, will be upon them to lead them, dwelling in them, brooding over the chaotic, fallen creation and reshaping it with the trans-formative power of self-giving, self-sacrificing love...acting in the role humans were always intended to, bringing God's glad and wise order to creation...the Word made flesh.

This type of activity will set the Christian up in direct conflict with the powers of that old world...John as with all the prophets, Jesus himself, the Apostles, the Early Church Fathers and countless martyrs since then would find that this Christian life is a very dangerous vocation at present...We like to see Herod as this evil man and we would like to point the finger...the fact is he is just like so many of us when confronted with our own evils, who would use all our power to shut that voice up if we were not prepared by suffering and transformed by hope. If it were not for grace, we would lock that voice crying out in the wilderness away and so in our ignorance we could get on with our deathly existence.

Hebrews 13v17-25

Obey your leaders; submit to them. They are keeping watch over your lives, you see, as people who will have to give an account. Make sure they can do this with joy, not as a burden. That would be of no value to you.

Pray for us! Our conscience is clear; we are quite sure of it. We wish to act appropriately in everything. I beg you especially to do this, so that I may be quickly restored to you.

May the God of peace, who led up from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the eternal covenant, make you complete in every good work so that you may do his will. May he perform, in you, whatever will be pleasing in his sight, through Jesus the Messiah. Glory for ever and ever be his, Amen!

I beg you, my dear family, bear with this word of exhortation; I've written you briefly, after all. You should know that our brother Timothy has been released. If he comes soon, I will see you and him at the same time.

Greet all your leaders, and all God's people. Those from Italy send you greetings. Grace be with you all.

I used to absolutely refuse to teach Sunday School. I was asked to facilitate the class a few times by the Sunday School Director, but I had read that teachers are held to a higher account and not many should do it. That was a risk I was not taking, peoples lives hang in the balance...not to mention I know God doesn't need any more ammo to blast me with...He's got the goods as it is. Eventually, the lord prompted me to fill in in an emergency and then once or twice more. Even then it was a program that you just follow along with so I couldn't screw it up too bad I figured.

It wasn't until my senior pastor at my current church invited me to share a word with some guys at an addiction recovery project called "All The Way". This was a new program that was just busting out with great people that were discovering the new life our King offers and this was an opportunity to share the story with them and lead them to see where they fit in the plot. Besides who could turn down teaching the scriptures at a gathering called "Happy Hour". My co-laborer, Mike Rosa,and I started with the John's gospel. God thus started me on a journey of teaching and preaching the Word that would change my life and toss me overboard into the most passionate relationship with the Father and my brothers and sisters at ATW that I never imagined. I was out of the boat and it was great, because Jesus was right there. The fellowship was intimate, there was opportunity for discipleship for those who wanted to really dig in, accountability in the brotherhood was strong and people had and shared serious testimonies of dying and we got to see many rise again.

I never forgot the responsibility that this placed on my shoulders though. We are quite literally talking about peoples lives when we take on leadership roles in the ministry (particularly teaching), you can't just say time-out, oops...real people...real lives...real struggles...real wounds...real time. They needed the real Jesus and Mike and I were the witnesses God sent into the mix. Who deserves such an honor, to speak before so many of God's children? I still pray over those the Lord gave us to look after and minister to and serve and will continue to do so, they made it an absolute joy for me. I've rarely been around such a large group in one place of people genuinely hungering and thirsting for the justice and mercy and faithfulness that only Jesus offers...

Our time at ATW was short, but I pray many take seriously the Word we spoke...Jesus is Lord, turn to Him and you will find healing and refreshment until the day of the renewal of all things, there is rest in the arms of the King. In the meantime though, there is also a battle in front of us and there is an enemy who would have us harden our hearts, carry us off in all sorts of directions, lead us into confusion and try to break down the bonds that have been built in the Spirit. This is only exacerbated by our own sinful natures that we constantly must battle against. However, having had our eyes opened to King Jesus through this "short" exhortation carrying in it some of the sternest warnings in the new testament about falling from grace and staying the course side by side with some of the clearest exegetical encouragements and teachings in the history of theological literature. We have learned, I hope that scripture speaks into real situations to a specific time and specific place and specific people, but as we read them and join in the story we find the Holy Spirit reminding us of many things and making it our story, changing us forever...even as the walls are crumbling about us and within us, The Father's grace, the King and the Kingdom are unshaken.

I pray those who have been following along for Hebrews have been blessed and will now go and be a blessing with anything you've gleaned, giving all glory and honor and praise to our Father and Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen

All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work.

Hebrews 13v9-16

Don't let yourselves be carried off by strange teachings of whatever sort. The heart needs to be strengthened by grace , you see, not by rules about what to eat, which don't do any good to those who observe them.

We have an altar from which those who minister in the tabernacle are not allowed to eat. For the bodies of the animals whose blood is taken into the sanctuary by the high priest as a sin-offering are burned outside the camp. That's why Jesus too suffered outside the gate, so that he might make the people holy with his own blood. So, then, let's go out to him, outside the camp, bearing his shame. Here, you see, we have no city that lasts; we are looking for the one that is still to come.

Our part, then, is this: to bring, through him, a continual sacrifice of praise to God - that is, mouths that confess his name, and do so fruitfully. Don't neglect to do good, and to let 'fellowship' mean what it says. God really enjoys sacrifices of that kind!

I've built a lot of walls in my life. Sacred walls. They protect me from being hurt by my enemies and more so by those who I allow closer access, my wife, my family, my friends. I know how to build these walls in my sleep. It is a skill acquired during and after many battles, many years of oppression and wounds and scars have found themselves on my inner self.

The problem is that these walls, with their silly 'rules' and varying distances away from the 'real me' not only keep out the bad, they prevent close meaningful fellowship with people I care the most for. Better to be safe though right? Wrong, it may be a riskier way to live, but a life without walls is the life that is truly life. A holy life must have those walls taken down till not a stone is left unturned. It is a broken and a poured out life that Jesus invites us into. It is a wreckless and untameable love He calls us to. If He is to be Lord of all, then all those walls must come down. YHWY will not be placed in a box, the Father is a wild and untameable creator, the Spirit broads over chaos and brings righteous order by the power of the Word...there are no categories for Him. His name is above every name.

We continue to be speaking to this small community of Jewish Christians most likely living in or around Jerusalem. They are frightened, they are under enormous pressure from friends and family, they have their own internal struggle with the way they understand the world and this new Way that has caught them up in the love of God and away from everything they knew. The mention of the altar and the sacrifices is an almost direct command that they need to start seriously distancing themselves from the Temple. Jesus has not only condemned it due to its corruption and the part its regimes played in His execution, but because as long as it stands there is an idol that misrepresents, to the people of God and the world, the God revealed fully in and through the true temple, the body of Jesus Christ.

These are tense times and these walls must come down in order for something new to truly and fully break loose into the world. The vindication of Jesus, as with any prophet, is the coming to fruition of His prophecy. Whatever that looks like. In the Hebrew scriptures the coming of the prophet, in Jesus' case, the Son of Man was almost always on the backs of a foreign, and thus pagan army, many times followed by a period of exile. The means here would be the same, but they people of God were already in exile. They were taking part in a temple system that had whored itself with the oppressing foreign government in order for its leaders to have some sort of political and/or religious power (they didn't separate the two) over the people. Hoping that if YHWY did act or if they just waited it out that they would come out on top, their primary concern. They maintained this through compromises that were in their own best interests and not consistent with God's ways, nor were they concerned for the well-being of majority of people, much less the marginalized that Jesus spent most of his time with.

The author of Hebrew's not only set's up an alternative, but he dares say the altar that they eat from is 'better than' the temple altar. Picking up the continuing theme of the letter. He warns them against submitting to any of these strange food laws, derived of course from the Hebrew scriptures, but useless none-the-less. They have no power in regaining their image bearing status. Our sanctification in God's sight, is by progressive strengthening of our hearts to love and care for those everyone else, the world, would sideline. Those who have accepted Jesus' as the sovereign King are able to 'eat' from the true bread of presence, the Word of God delivered upon them by the Holy Spirit. The Aaronic and Levitical priesthood have no right to eat of this altar...yes...them's fightin' words right there!

Jesus suffered and died outside the gates of the Temple and is therefore completely independent of and superior to anything to do with the old, fallen system. It played it's part in the story, but has now run its course of usefulness in God's purposes. So now the author is imploring them again, having prepared them earlier in the letter for the reality of what it means to answer Jesus call, "Come, follow me." They will no doubt be spat upon, called traitors and despised by mainstream Judaism, Pharisees and/or Essenes as well as the more secular nationalist movements vaguely guising themselves as being religious for the political power it wielded over the masses, led of course by the Sadducees. This was not the 'city' they hoped for and therefore the ties can be cut and they can go out to where Jesus went and beyond in order to seek and find the 'city' that is to come once this one is brought to an end.

As we saw in chapters 11 and 12, we are already part of this 'new city'. The assembly's job then, is to not only seek this 'new city' this 'kingdom' outside the 'gates' of the old, but to start embodying it right away through true, meaningful worship and fellowship built on a membership that requires nothing more than a fruitful confession that Jesus is in fact now Lord over all things because He is reconciling Heaven and Earth in and through His body and blood and spirit poured into this world at the point of the cross...he starts this in the hearts of those who pour forth glad rejoicing and praise to his Lordship.



God is faithful, through whom you were called into fellowship with His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

I hear of your love and of the faith which you have toward the Lord Jesus and toward all the saints; and I pray that the fellowship of your faith may become effective through the knowledge of every good thing which is in you for Christ's sake.
For I have come to have much joy and comfort in your love, because the hearts of the saints have been refreshed through you.

May it be so...