Apocalypse 2012

Getting ready to ring in the new year...watching old videos from my oldest son's first french toast breakfast which was also his first surfing trip. Then I checked out a video from the 'Our Family is your Family' thanksgiving over at our first church, then as I reflected on Sebastian's baptism this year, I was taken back to the day he was born, his little lip shivering and the fear and excitement and beauty and messiness. Awesome. Bringing forth new life is always a messy ordeal though...ask any mother...and as this year gives birth to the next, I can't help but be filled with hope for what the Lord will do and how my household and my community gets to be a part of it all with Him.

In order to look forward, it’s often wise to first look back and see from where you've come. In 2011, there have been a lot of challenges. Many victories and many failures, and life has emerged victorious from the midst of all of it. I've prayed and cried,yelled and sobbed. I've had dreams and nightmares, visions and darkness, I've heard the Lord's voice and battled with the devil. I've been set on fire and filled to overflowing. I've rejoiced and I've lamented. I've struggled with men and with God, fallen and risen, died and come again to life. I do my best to give God glory through it all because I love my Father and I love my King, Jesus.

I’m still learning how to be a husband, a father and all the other things I’m to be…and to do it all while dying to myself, so that Messiah can live his life through me…I have struggled with what that means, what it looks like and how it manifests on earth as in heaven. Following Jesus, has not been easy for me. It wasn’t easy for him, so i don't expect it to be. I don’t believe he lived the life he did so we don’t have to, but so that we would have the hope, courage and power to follow Him in exactly that life. This means courage and humility, boldness and wisdom, strength and compassion, suffering and conquering and so much more…but in the end…faith, hope and love.

A few things I’ve learned more intimately over the past year for what it’s worth…

God is faithful.

My life has been somewhat formless and void over the last year, it lacked direction, function and order in many areas. I battled with confusion, doubt and demons I knew nothing about…but they were as real as me sitting here typing. One thing is a fact though, evil must be allowed to come out, do their worst and then be dealt with head on. There’s no use dilly-dallying around. You have to get past the surface rubbish… ‘peace, peace’ when there is no peace, stare the horsemen in the face and endure…that’s the Way.

The world is coming to an end…and it starts with us

The way we have done things in the past will not be the way they are done in the future. We are called to be good stewards of God’s good creation, to be image bearers and God has ordained it that he will work through his children to bring his glad, wise order into the world…filling it with Himself. Creation groans for this and we who have the first fruits find ourselves groaning within for the redemption of our bodies. In this hope we were saved. May this be a year where the sons of God are revealed. May we not only walk in the Spirit, but be driven by the Spirit. This past year, as I mentioned, I found there were many things that needed to be brought into order, and there is still more. He is faithful to do it if we are willing to stand in the light, as ugly as that might be at times, he can cleanse and renew centuries and even millennia of wounds by the blood of the Lamb and the power of the Holy Ghost. This is for our good, so that we will not lead lives that are to no effect, that we will not run in vain. This is what he wants for us. It pleases the Father to give us the Kingdom.

Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life

In all creation, there was only one who was worthy to open the truth to us, God’s plan for the redemption of the world. It’s ugly, it’s messy and it’s absolutely beautiful. Messiah Jesus, was the firstborn from the dead so that he might be first in all things. He leads the way. Everything is through him and for him. It is in him that God has summed up the whole cosmos. So if you want to know what God is doing and how he’s doing it, look to the Son. If you want to know what God is like, look to the Son. If you want to know what God wants to do through you, look at what he did through the firstborn of the brethren. Then realize that the same power that created the cosmos, that raised Jesus from the dead, that holds all all things together and sustains all things is at work in you to do it. This is what we were saved for. It will be ugly, it will be messy...nobody wants to hear Revelation 6-20 much less go through it, but 21 and 22 are worth it. There is Life after death.

Pray, listen and walk.

From: Christ-mas To: Easter : Luke 24v36-53

As they were saying this, Jesus himself stood in the midst of them, and said,'Peace be with you.' They were terrified and alarmed, and thought the were seeing a ghost.

'Why are you disturbed?' he said. 'Why do these questionings come up in your hearts? Look at my hands and feet; it really is me, myself. Touch me and see! Ghosts don't have flesh and bones like you see that I have.'

With these words, he showed them his hands and feet.

While they were still in disbelief and amazement from sheer joy, he said to them, 'Have you got something here to eat? They gave him a piece of baked fish, which he took and ate in front of them.

Then he said to them,'This is what I was talking to you about when I was still with you. Everything written about me in the law of Moses, and in the prophets and the psalms, had to be fulfilled.' Then he opened their minds to understand the Bible.

'This is what is written,' he said: 'the Messiah must suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, and in his name repentance, for the forgiveness of sins, must be announced to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are the witnesses for all this. Now, look: I'm sending upon you what my Father has promised. But stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.'

Then he took them out as far as Bethany, and lifted up his hands and blessed them. As he was blessing them, he was separated from them and carried into heaven.

They worshiped him, and went back to Jerusalem in great joy. They spent all their time in the Temple, praising God.

As we look to the final scene in the Gospel according to Luke, we have the realization of the hope of Israel and from Israel to all people and indeed, the whole cosmos. In Messiah Jesus, a new heaven and new earth, where justice is at home. God, we see, has taken Jesus' body and made something altogether new out of it. Able to step back and forth through the curtain that separates God's realm, heaven, and our realm, earth (Psalm 115v16). Jesus is perfectly comfortable on either side, in him, you see, the two have become one. This is very difficult for many to understand, Paul invests a good bit of time throwing light upon the subject in 1 Corinthians 15. He makes it very clear that the final state of resurrection is not just spiritual, but has a new physicality about it....flesh, bone, eating, drinking...this is not to deny an intermediate state, that of angels and spirits, where we are 'at rest' and 'with Messiah' (Philippians 1v23-24)...

At these words, an argument broke out between the Pharisees and Saducees, and they were split among themselves. (The Saducees deny that there is a resurrection, or any intermediate state of 'angel' or 'spirit', but the Pharisees affirm both.) Acts 23v7-8

It is a terrifying thing to have the curtain drawn back. Especially the first time. In the Apocalypse (which means unveiling/revelation), John falls down 'as a dead man' before the Lord. But our Lord, seems to always extend words and a touch of grace,'peace be with you' says the Lord...never the less it is an awe inspiring situation, one you wouldn't trade for anything!

And here is the revelation...the biblical Christian hope is for what we see fully and finally in Messiah Jesus right here in the scripture, a fully integrated heaven and earth, this is the 'home' that the born again believer belongs to. God has summed up the cosmos in Messiah Jesus, and this is why we feel so uncomfortable in the world as it is, where His will is not being fully done on earth as in heaven, and why when we have sin in our lives as believers, when we are not walking in the good works he has prepared for us to walk in, it grates on us until we identify it, call it what it is and repent, receiving the gracious forgiveness that is ever available to us through Jesus Christ, our great high priest, the Lamb of God. Then we are not walking in the 'world' or in the 'flesh', but in Messiah.

There is more to it though, Jesus wants us not to just wait round expecting it to all work itself out, but rather to wait, in worshipful prayer and praise, until we are empowered by the promise of the Father, the Holy Spirit...power from on high, and then to go out as redeemed redeemers, New Creation's who are sent into the old creation as agents and vessels through whom New Creation pours into the world until, the earth is full of the knowledge of YHWH as the waters cover the sea, or as Paul says...the time when 'God is all and in all.' This is where King Jesus is leading us. He is the way, the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father, but by him.

For all this, Paul can boldly encourage us, 'my dear family, be firmly fixed, unshakable, always full to overflowing with the Lord's work. In the Lord, as you know, the work you are doing will not be worthless!' 1 Corinthians 15v58

Merry Christmas! May the earth truly receive her King!

Let’s Turn This Thing Around - Luke 24v28-35

They drew near to the village where they were heading. Jesus gave the impression that he was going further, but they urged him not to.

‘Stay with us’ they said ‘it’s nearly evening; the day is almost gone.’ And he went in to stay with them. As he was sitting at table with them he took the bread and gave thanks. He broke it and gave it to them. Then the eyes of both of them were opened and they recognized him; and he vanished from their sight.

Then they said to each other, ‘Do you remember how our hearts were burning inside us as he talked to us on the road, as he opened up the Bible for us?

And they got up then and there and went back to Jerusalem. There they found the eleven, and the people with them, gathered together.

They were saying, ‘The Lord really was raised! He has shown himself to Simon!’ Then they told what had happened on the road. And he was known to them in the breaking of bread.

Often times when things don’t go as we think they should we, in our disappointment, confusion and feeling of defeat we start to change direction, break away and go back to doing our own thing. We have a tendency to withdraw from whatever it was the Lord had us engaged in and enter into some sort of pity party or other unhealthy, destructive way of dealing with the situation…could be depression, substance abuse, or any other form of dealing with the core issue. It's going to come out somehow.

Jesus is still walking with you. He may give the impression that he’s ready to move on and leave you like that in order to get you to call out to him ‘Stay with us’. And it is in that moment, the moment when you open the door and he comes in and you sup together, breaking bread and giving thanks, when you share in that meal with Jesus that your eyes will be opened and you will receive the gift of repentance. You will remember the words that he has spoken to you only they will be ‘opened’ to you. And what else is there to do but get back to Jerusalem, and give your personal testimony and remind the people of what the Lord has given us to do as a single body.

I have been studying quite a bit on spiritual warfare recently and the Lord has given us some mighty tools to combat darkness. He continues to work and to reveal and 'open' to us new ways of advancing the Kingdom through new ‘spiritual technology'. He said greater things we would do. And in a world where the ‘golden calf’ has been allowed to grow up into a ‘bull’ placed right in the middle of the city, where mammon and belial, and any number of other wicked spirits seem to be entrenched in daily life, we need faith, courage, weapons and the discipleship to know what we’re doing. It seems to me though that in order to do more than bind these disgusting things, but to get them out of our lives and churches and then to start taking ground from them in the world, we need some repentance. No more rusty swords!

We need to ask ourselves why we have allowed the enemy to divide us on the battering ram of the Eucharist (Holy Communion), the good gift, that mighty weapon that declares to the world Jesus is King! Proclaiming his death until he comes!

‘The warfare we’re engaged in, you see, isn’t against flesh and blood. It’s against the leaders, against the authorities, against the powers that rule the world in this dark age, against the wicked spiritual elements in the heavenly places.’ – Ephesians 6v12

Lets look at it again, together, with fresh eyes and see just how powerful and essential it is for everyone who declares with their lips ‘Jesus is Lord’ and believes in their heart that God raised him from the dead, come together worthily for this meal. Secondly, baptism, another essential drained of its power because of divisions based on logistics and semantics…a powerful weapon that sits on the shelf. Why?

Now, let’s get on with it, back into the city, not asking ourselves, ‘Do I really ‘have’ to do that to be saved?’ It’s not just about that, it’s not just about you! That comes from the evil one!

But so that all covenant faithfulness (righteousness) would be fulfilled. That’s what Jesus did and why, and if you have him, you will do the things he did, you will walk as he walked to the degree of faithfulness you’ve been given. That’s what love looks like. That’s your personal relationship with Jesus that leads unto the Father.

‘Fight the noble fight of the faith; get a firm grasp on the life of the coming age, the life you were called to when you made the noble public profession before many witnesses.’ – 1 Timothy 6v12

Who Was That Masked Man? Luke 24v13-27

That very day, two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, which lay about seven miles from Jerusalem. They were discussing with each other all the various things that had taken place. As they were discussing, and arguing with each other, Jesus himself approached and walked with them. Their eyes, though, were prevented from recognizing him.

'You're obviously having a very important discussion on your walk,' he said; 'What's it all about?'

They stood still, a picture of gloom. Then one of them, Cleopas by name, answered him.

'You must be the only person around Jerusalem,' he said,'who doesn't know what's been going on there the last few days.'

'What things?' he asked.

'To do with Jesus of Nazareth,' he said to him. 'He was a prophet. He acted with power and he spoke with power, before God and all the people. Our chief priests and rulers handed him over to be condemned to death, and they crucified him. But we were hoping that he was going to redeem Israel!

And now, what with all this, it's the third day since it happened. But some women from our group have astonished us. They went to his tomb very early this morning, and didn't find his body. They came back saying they'd seen a vision of angels, who said he was alive. Some of the folk with us went off to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but they didn't see him.'

'You are so senseless!' he said to them. 'So slow in your hearts to believe all the things the prophets said to you! Don't you see? This is what had to happen: the Messiah had to suffer, and come into his glory!'

So he began with Moses, and with all the prophets, and explained to them the things about himself throughout the whole Bible.

Life can have it's disappointments.

We don't get into the college we had been trying so hard to get into. We can't seem to land that job will provide that sense of meaningfulness we long for. Our favorite football team can't get out of this losing streak. Our country is ruled by people obsessed with money, power and this global economic empire...people gas our children and publicly humiliate and kill our freedom fighters, all the while our religious leaders are pressing for this elusive thing called holiness and revival, with the more powerful lobbying to implement it by legislating it, enforcing it through violence rather than doing the hard work of making disciples of Messiah, developing character and raising children up in the way they should go. Which equates to not lifting a finger to help the situation, but rather makes it worse.

And yet in the midst of that, we go on walking...having the conversation, arguing and mourning the way things have turned out...it's not supposed to be like this! Why don't they just do what it says in the Bible! The answer, Jesus says, is that they are doing what it says in the Bible...the question is what role are you walking in today? What role is your church playing as a body? The city your planted in? Your nation your planted in? One of faith or one of doubt? One of truth or one of lies? One of destruction or one of healing? One of violence or one of peace? One of darkness or one of light? One of death or one of Life?

Today that's what is set before us, death or Life? I urge you to confront the darkness in you and around you by choosing Life. Chose Life now...and chose it again tomorrow and the next day and for ever more.

Are you in Messiah? The one who prayerfully suffers for the sake of the world and thereby overcomes it? Who refuses to try to overcome evil with evil, but rather to overcome evil with good? Are you one with the only hope of the nations? Or are you walking in the role of the world?

Perhaps you're the young radical who's decided that physical violence or destructive rebellion is the only way to bring healing? Perhaps you're the Sadducee who is just trying to keep the peace, as long as your bank account is filled up and checkbook balanced? Perhaps you've been the Pharisee who knows the bible like the back of your hand, but can't stand the thought of having a beer with the landscape guys, the painter and the unemployed plumber down at the pub? Or maybe you've become like Pilate who just wants to keep all these backward thinking desert people in line and stop them from bringing their violence to your doorstep or worse to upset your boss and then you can forget about re-election?

Or maybe, just maybe...you've come to the foot of the cross...or perhaps you've experienced the cross, that place of death...and on the other side of it you're finding new life springing forth in ways you never could have imagined...perhaps you have found yourself to be a fulfillment of our Lord's prayer...you've been caught up in the love of the one true God and are becoming like the man from Galilee...now you are in the world, but, strangely, you know you are not from the world, your being kept from the evil one, here to boldly announce the King and bring forth the Kingdom, the sovereign reign of God, his glad, wise order. You are a part of a royal priesthood in Messiah, the one they called a prophet, mighty in word and deed...who turned out to be the Son of God.

Maybe...hopefully...you have turned your whole self to our Father, in Jesus' name, and that is exactly where you are at. Want to work out your own salvation with fear and trembling?

This is how it works out. Everything exists for the sake of God and because of him; and it was appropriate that, in bringing many children to glory, he should make perfect, through suffering, the one who leads the way to salvation. For the one who makes others holy, and the ones who are made holy, all belong to a single family.

This is why he isn't ashamed to call them his brothers and sisters, when he says,

I will announce your name to my brothers and sisters;
I will sing your praise in the middle of the assembly,

and again,

I will place my trust in him,

and again,

Look, here I am, with the children God has given me.- Hebrews 2v10-13

Resurrection Now: Luke 24v1-12

The women went to the tomb in the very early morning of the first day of the week, carrying the spices they had prepared. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, and when they went in they didn't find the body of the Lord Jesus.

As they were at a loss what to make of it all, suddenly two men in shining clothes stood beside them. The women were terrified, and bowed their faces towards the ground.

But the men said to them, 'Why look for the living with the dead? He isn't here - he's been raised! Don't you remember? While you were still in Galilee he told you that the son of man must be crucified, and rise again on the third day.'

And they remembered his words.

They went back, away from the tomb, and told all this to the eleven and all the others. It was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, and Mary the wife of James, and the others with them. They said this to the apostles; and this message seemed to them just stupid, useless talk, and they didn't believe them.

Peter, though, got up and ran to the tomb. He stooped down and saw only the grave-clothes. He went back home perplexed at what happened.

Have you ever been taken by complete surprise, only to reflect back on it later and realize, oh yeah, of course it had to be that way! Or perhaps you were in eager expectation over something you had well planned and thought out, only to realize, oops, I haven't gotten it all figured out and so your immediate astonishment turns into a hunger to seek more diligently what has actually just happened? It can be an emotional roller coaster learning to trust beyond all our preconceived notions. We often think that we trust more than we really do, it's not until control is removed that we really find out what our faith is made of. That is where the disciples are right now...

Jesus, however, had given up all control and simply said to Father,'not my will, but yours be done.' And in that absolute obedience he became the Lamb worthy to open the scroll of God's perfect will. God honored him by raising him from the dead with Power on, as Luke puts it, 'the first day of the week'. Drawing us ever so subtly back the the future, back to the Genesis creation poem, letting us know that New Creation, the New Heavens and New Earth where true covenant faithfulness dwells has been completed, fully and finally in Jesus the Messiah, our King. And what is true of the King will be true of his Kingdom(Matthew 28v18-20)so it is being worked out with fear and trembling. Right now, they are just wrestling and struggling with the fact that they expected the Messiah to come at the end of history to set all things to rights, rather than in the midst of it. What is going on? This isn't what it was supposed to look like...or was this exactly how it was supposed to be?

One thing I know, and this is a non-negotiable. Jesus must be received into heaven until the ultimate renewal of all things. Our King is seated at the right hand of the Father. The result of which is that the promised Holy Spirit is being poured out upon creation. Jesus is the Savior of all mankind, especially those who believe. As it's written...

'The Lord said to my Lord,
Sit at my right hand,
Until I place your enemies
underneath your feet.'

So let everyone 'know' this fact: Death has no mastery over Messiah Jesus, God raised him from the dead and made him to be Lord and Messiah, Jesus...the crucified one, who loves you and died a gruesome death in obedience to our Father. God is Agape and He will never give up on His beloved. He has promised and he will do it, 'the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD as the waters cover the sea.''For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.'

Father, may we profess the gospel boldly even as our own faith grows, keeping our minds set on heavenly things and not the circumstances of the day. Be glorified in our bodies, a prepared sanctuary for you to dwell by the Spirit. May we love as you love, with a vibrant humility and a strong compassion, that you may be honored and your will be done on earth as in heaven, even as we are sent out to bring about the obedience of faith by the power of your Spirit,in Jesus' name. AMEN