Posts Tagged ‘romans’

Passion

February 20th, 2010 No Comments

14 But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.

Romans 13:14

We are souls created for passion. We sing passionately, we eat with passion, we watch and talk about movies passionately, we love passionately, we passionately play our sports, and we even sleep passionately.

There is something about the human soul that God divinely created that has a drive and desire to do everything with a heartfelt passion.

That passion, unfortunately, is spent on vain and useless pursuits compared to the light of eternity. Instead of investing our passions in something worthwhile, we somehow manage to find an inane way to waste our time and talents on the created rather than the Creator.

These are the “provisions of the flesh”—we have human desires that we satisfy with human means, wasting our God-given passion on vain pursuits that, in the end, lead to death.

Every single day when you wake, what are you “putting on?” The natural tendency for us is to wake, shower, eat, and go about our lives, leaving the natural, selfish self on when we wake.

Yet, when we consciously surrender ourselves to God day by day, “putting on” the righteousness of Jesus in our time with Him, we want to make the choice to serve God instead of  ourselves.

Rally your focus on glorifying God. How do we do that? I love what theologian and pastor John Piper says,

“God is most glorified in me when I am most satisfied in Him.”

- John Piper

Be satisfied in God. That means asking God to make His presence more satisfying every day, and begging God to make you crave Him in every moment, allowing nothing else to satisfy that craving except the very soul-satisfying presence of God. Only God can truly satisfy that soul craving that every human has. Everything else in life only tickles the tongue, stirring a greater desire to experience the source of what we tasted. While God is the giver, we experience his gifts on a daily basis.

What if we desired the Giver over the gifts? What if we realized that the life God gives is great, but God himself is greater? What if our desires paradoxically shifted from the natural to the supernatural?

That’s passion.

4 Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.

Psalm 37:4

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Getting into debt

February 14th, 2010 No Comments

No one likes debt. It sucks. Getting into debt is an action much like shackling yourself to the will of someone else. Credit cards, IOU’s, favors…they are all some form of debt or debt-returning devices we use every day. Everyone knows they should stay out of debt—why do you think we have so many seminars, books, and get-out-of-debt-for-free websites in existence today?

But there is one debt that Christians owe continually, and should pay back over and over:

8 Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.

Romans 13:8

Even the apostle Paul knew that we need to stay out of debt. But there is a recurring debt—the debt of love. We don’t simply owe one person a little bit of love, as if only one person ever loved us. Instead, because of the enormity of God’s love for us, we are now compelled to pay that debt off in turn by loving everyone else.

Christ-followers are called to a life of love. What does real love look like? Check out 1 Corinthians 13. The entire chapter defines what love is.

4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful;6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

1 Corinthians 13:4-6

When I stack my life up against the model of genuine love found here, I fall so short. But this is the lifestyle of love that I owe to everyone in the world, people created in the very image of God himself. It’s something to strive for every day, only by the power of the Holy Spirit.

We can’t truly love in our own strength—only in His.

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The Christian’s Duty

February 4th, 2010 No Comments

As Christians, it is our duty to preach the gospel everywhere we go. Our actions and behaviors, the way we speak to people and treat them, and even our thoughts are a reflection of the truth of the gospel in us. Our very lives ought to preach that gospel. Our every action and thought should be a direct reflection of the character of God.

Whether you find yourself a free will or predestination person, here is where the Bible stands on the issue on salvation:

13 For t “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”

14 How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him u of whom they have never heard? [3] And how are they to hear v without someone preaching?15 And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, w “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!” 16 But x they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says,y “Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?” 17 So z faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.

Romans 10:13-17

These verses are linked by a simple logic here:

  1. People can call on Jesus to save them only if they believe he can do so.
  2. Belief in Christ can’t exist without knowledge about him.
  3. One hears about Christ only when someone proclaims the saving message.
  4. The message about Christ will not be proclaimed unless someone is sent by God to do so.

This is why the apostle Paul was so adamant and urgent about reaching everyone with the gospel—he believed that the only way to be saved was to hear and believe the gospel.

The weight falls on the Christian here…your friends and family that you love and care for so much will only come to know God by your proclaiming the gospel to them. They need to call on Jesus, but they need that knowledge and proclamation to come from you. If there’s someone in your life that doesn’t know Jesus, then YOU are the one called to proclaim the gospel to them!

So here’s the question…

Who in your life needs to hear the gospel by the way you speak and live?

It’s YOUR duty and obligation as a Christian to love them with God’s unreal love.

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