Tag Archives: A.W. Tozer quote

When Jesus Takes Over Your Temple

17 Thursday Oct 2013

Posted by in Luke, Our Spiritual Process

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old cross - new cross

 

Jesus spent the last week of His life on earth occupying the Temple. He kicked out the money changers and set up shop. Everyday He would teach in the Temple and spend the night at the Mount of Olives. Like the Passover Lamb, the people of Jerusalem could examine Jesus for faults.  The religious leaders tried unsuccessfully to entrap Him with trick questions.

During those days of examination, the religious leaders wanted to know, “Tell us by what authority You are doing these things, or who is the one who gave You this authority?” (Luke 20:2) By the way, things haven’t changed much in two thousand years. People still ask this same question, except they state it this way… “Who gives you the right to tell me how to act and live.”

How did Jesus answer this type of question? The easy answer would have been… “I am God and what I say goes.” He would have been justified for doing so… but He didn’t choose this avenue. Instead, He brought up John the Baptist’s ministry. At first glance this makes no sense. Why bring up John? He was beheaded by Herod. Jesus did so because it was a question about authority. These leaders were rejecting Jesus’ authority for the same reason they didn’t believe in John’s authority.

Here is the point – If we cannot discern God’s movements in the most basic of ways, what makes us believe we are ready for deeper revelations. The truth is that no one can give another person a revelation beyond what the Lord has already provided. This is why it is impossible to grow, hear, or discern deeper truths without first growing up in simple truths. This issue of authority was something everyone appeared to discern from Jesus’ ministry. All the Gospels recorded how the people marveled at Jesus’ authority. “He spoke as one having authority.” Discerning authority or sensing it….should be an easy task, even for a beginner. When the chief priests and religious leaders continued to challenge Jesus’ authority, He resorted to communicating truths via parables.

I hear these types of statements all the time…”The Bible is too difficult to understand! Why doesn’t God just speak plainly? Why does God use parables?” If our current revelations and truths from God appear to be foggy, it could be we haven’t obeyed His last words to us. This is what Jesus was trying to communicate to the religious leaders. Had they believed in John’s message, they would have believed Jesus’ message. Since they rejected John’s word, He couldn’t help them understand His authority. Jesus told another parable and they shouted at the end….”May it never be!” (Luke 20:16)

When we reject God’s word for us, we enter into a cycle of never being able to understand God’s word. The religious of Jesus’ day actually believed God existed for the sake of Israel, not Israel for God. How do you view the Lord?

  • Does God exist to keep the Baptists going or do Baptists exist for God?
  • Does God exist to keep the Methodists going or do Methodists exist for God?
  • Does God exist to keep the Catholics going or do Catholics exist for God?

Plug your particular denomination in here….. Over 90 percent of Americans claim to believe in God, but what kind of God do they actually trust and know?

For each of us, the day must arrive when Jesus enters our temple and takes over. When we allow Him to do so, everything will change. If you are struggling to get there… reflect upon the Lord’s last words. It could be your obedience is lacking. The Lord can’t deepen His word until you become obedient. Don’t make the mistake of questioning His authority. We are His temple. The Lord doesn’t exist for us, we exist for Him.

 

Blessings – From God’s Incubator,

Pastor

 

 

Why Hanky Faith Will Not Work

08 Tuesday Oct 2013

Posted by in Luke, Our Spiritual Process

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Unworthy Conception of God

 

A certain nobleman went into a far country to receive for himself a kingdom and to return. So he called ten of his servants, delivered to them ten minas, and said to them, ‘Do business till I come.'” Luke 19:12-13

 

It was Jesus who instituted the first “Occupy Movement“. Except He didn’t instruct His followers to sit around and stink until someone paid them to leave. No, the Lord gave each an allotment of wages, talents, gifts, and abilities and told them to “occupy or do business until He returned.” The word here for “occupy” is pragmateuomai. It means to be practical or pragmatic with what the Lord gives. What the Lord gives each of us to use in this life varies from person to person. In the end, I believe we all have something of value to give back to our generation. In other words, if our faith and beliefs do not have any practical application to our life and to the life of other people… then what use is it. If you don’t use it, you will lose it.

The interesting thing about this story is that time did pass. The Master did eventually return and want a return on His investment. Two of the three individuals did invest what the Lord gave them. The third man didn’t lose his investment. He simply hid it in a handkerchief. I call this “hanky faith”. It is a do nothing type of faith. It is the false belief that if you do nothing relatively wrong, then you are doing right. Listen to the third man’s words…

“Sir, here is your mina (investment); I have kept it laid away in a piece of cloth. I was afraid of you, because you are a hard man. You take out what you did not put in and reap what you did not sow.” Luke 19:20-21

 

This man is in serious trouble. He makes matters worse by opening his mouth. Not only has he failed to make an investment with the Master’s money, he insults and blames the Master for his personal failures. He accuses the Master/King of being a “hard man“. Yet, the Master just richly rewarded the two previous individuals for making wise investments. He further attacks the King’s character! He claims the King had so intimidated him that he was afraid to act… so he just hid his investment.

 

Hanky Faith Does Not Impress God

There are many today who believe that if they simply do nothing wrong, they will gain entrance into the kingdom of God. This parable of Jesus corrects this type of thinking… according to the Lord, doing nothing means gaining nothing. If you think that you are going to impress God in the end by telling Him about all the things you did not do….you are in for a surprise. God will not be asking about what you did not do, He will be asking about what you did with your life. The Lord desires a return on His investment in your life.

Someone once said, “The Christian life is not to be lived in the negative column of the ledger; it is to be lived on the plus side… the positive side of life.” There are a lot of people who feel very superior to other people because they do not do what other people do… while at the same time they have never thought about getting busy doing something good for the Lord. They sit at home with a pious posture and folded hands criticizing others. Their lives never register positively on the world in any way. If you ask these folks what they believe… they will start off by telling you what they don’t do and what they don’t believe.

Hey listen…. Being critical is not a spiritual gift. If you are not doing anything, don’t stand back and criticize someone who is doing something, even if it isn’t perfect in your eyes. Critical people never attempt to serve God by helping someone else. It never occurs to them to get up off their “blessed assurance” and go out to visit someone who is lonely or help someone financially. But they sure feel called to be critical of people who look, act, or talk differently… and call it religion and faith. It never dawns on them to love, help, and pray for others outside of their doors.

Unfortunately, we define the Christian life in negative terms. Christianity cannot be defined by recounting what it is not. Believers are called to believe. We sometimes hear people remark, “He is a Christian man. He does not smoke, drink, curse or chew and neither does he run around with girls who do.”  But Christianity is not a matter of what we do not do, it is a matter of what we do. If the only way people can tell that you are a Christian is by the things you do not do, then you need to take a second look at your life.

When Jesus Christ returns as King and you stand before him, He will not say, “Well avoided, good and faithful servant.” He will say, “Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness!” (Matthew 25:21).

 

 It is a Matter of Trust

You are not going to be rewarded by God for avoiding sin and doing nothing. His rewards only come to those who faithfully work at using their God-given abilities to make a difference in this world. Please notice the Master displayed great trust in His servants. God is a Sower! He gave them His own resources — He did not keep checking on them. He did not stand over them and watch their every move. He didn’t even leave instructions on how they were to invest. Here is the rub with God – He trusts us enough to not interfere. Wow! If we need further instructions… we can ask!

As Rick Joyner echoes…. “It is the best and worst thing about God. The best thing about God is that he gives us freedom. It is also the worst thing about God…. He leaves us to our own devises. We can live life any way we choose, but we also know that there is a day coming when we will have to give an account of what we have done with our lives.”

How have we used what God has given us? God’s trust is God’s test. He gives us complete freedom and then watches what we do with it. He guides us but never forces us. That means we are responsible for the choices we make.

 

Blessings – From God’s Incubator,

Pastor

Three Components of Every Spiritual Battle (Part 3) War Over Our Worship of God

17 Friday Aug 2012

Posted by in Times of Testing

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5 And he led Him up and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. 6 And the devil said to Him, “I will give You all this domain and its glory; for it has been handed over to me, and I give it to whomever I wish. 7 Therefore if You worship before me, it shall all be Yours.” 8 Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘ You shall worship the Lord your God and serve Him only.’” Luke 4:5-8

 

You might imagine this issue would occupy a major portion of the battle for good and evil. The first four commandments deal with this issue of worship. Satan came blatantly at Jesus, showing Him all the world’s kingdoms, and their glory… offering them for His worship. Satan probably will not approach you so blatantly. The devil comes at us for the same purpose but often in a more subtle fashion.

There was once a poor country pastor who was livid when he discovered his wife had purchased a $250 dress. “How could you do this!” he exclaimed.
“I don’t know,” she wailed, “I was standing in the store looking at the dress. Then I found myself trying it on. It was like the Devil was whispering to me, “‘You look great in that dress. You should buy it.'”
“Well,” the pastor persisted, “You know how to deal with him! Just tell him, “Get behind me, Satan!”
“I did,” replied his wife, “but then he said ‘It looks great from back here, too.'”

Satan never said to me, “Fall down and worship me.” But he has tried to get me to deviate from God’s plan for my life. He has gotten me so off track it almost ruined my commitment to God. Satan has tried to fill my life with so many other things and other people so they would occupy the Lord’s time and ministry. Many times we can find ourselves withdrawing from the physical act of worship for various reasons. The number one way Satan accomplishes this is by getting believers preoccupied and focused on other things.

He begins to attack us by making the “things of this world” so appealing and luring. He continues to lull us to sleep, getting us to focus on the wrong goals, the wrong areas, and the wrong people. He gets us to trade the best for something better, then we trade the better for something good, then we trade the good for something bad.

Jesus wasn’t even remotely fooled by Satan’s attractions. He quickly stood up and said, “I’m not getting distracted. It is written, ’You shall worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shall you serve!’” Note how passionate Jesus was when he rebuked Satan over the issue of worship. Nothing was going to diminish the intensity of His love for God, and the passion with which He expressed it.

The same should be true for every believer. Our worship should always be guarded. We would all stay out of trouble if we would quickly and passionately defend our worship of God. In a Catholic church a sign was hanging over a shrine which said, “This Shrine is out-of-order. Do not worship here.” This is a little parable of what sin does to the Christian. It makes us spiritually out-of-order. Satan knows this truth and attempts to keep us out-of-order so that real worship isn’t important as it once was.

I read recently in Hebrew the word for faith (emunah) is the same word for stability. They are linked to each another. The Lord knew long ago the only way for His followers to survive the spiritual onslaught of the devil was to remain in faith. Faith creates stability. Worship feeds my soul like no other spiritual vehicle. I can be a physical, mental, and spiritual wreck. But… when I worship my Creator all the planets, sun, moon, and stars become aligned. Everything makes sense. Satan knows he will never be able to defeat the worshiping believer. There is a war going on in and around you today for your worship. How are you doing?

 

Blessings,

 

Pastor

 

Recovering From a Spiritual Dry Spell

26 Thursday Apr 2012

Posted by in Abraham: Life of Faith

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One of the reasons I identify with Abraham and Sarah is because their spiritual walk was not perfect.  They both made plenty of mistakes, but didn’t stay in that condition.  Eventually, they got things back on track with the Lord. Maybe, like Abraham, you have blown it spiritually.  You need a fresh encounter with God and a renewed vision.

Spiritually speaking, it is never too late to make a fresh start because we are never beyond God’s reach.  In Genesis 17, God challenges Abraham to move to a new level of trust and faith.  This was a time when Abraham probably thought his best years were behind him. Yet, God asked him to step up and believe. It is amazing to consider that when we think it is all over, God is thinking about new beginnings.

Now when Abram was ninety-nine years old, the LORD appeared to Abram and said to him, “I am God Almighty; Walk before Me, and be blameless. 2 “I will establish My covenant between Me and you, And I will multiply you exceedingly.” 3 Abram fell on his face, and God talked with him, saying…  (Genesis 17:1-3)

Abraham was now ninety-nine years old. Twenty-four years had passed since God’s initial call and he had left Ur. It had also been thirteen years since the events recorded in Genesis 16. So far as we can tell, God had not spoken since He and Hagar got together. Thirteen years of silence!   If we would be honest with ourselves, we too have experienced long periods of “dry spells” in which God’s revelations and appearances were few and far between. It didn’t really have to be this way. But because we held on to our sin and kept walking in disobedience, even after being confronted with the truth, God remained silent.

I remember on one occasion when I was upset with the Lord over His dealings with me.  I was sulking and throwing a spiritual pity party.  After a few days of this, I soon realized that no one was attending my pity party but me.  A few days later I was praying and heard these words from the Lord,  “I am not going to come and get you this time.”  In other words the Lord was telling me, “He wasn’t going to attend my selfish pity party either.”  I decided it would be better to repent and return to the Lord, rather than continue in my self-absorbed vanity.  I still didn’t understand the Lord’s dealings in my life. But at least I was on track again.  It was only months later that I understood what God was doing.  Sometimes it is better to repent first and ask questions later.

Here is the point: When we insist on “doing it our own way”, we will eventually eat the fruit of those seeds. Thirteen years earlier Abraham had taken a wrong turn (he and Sarah birthed an Ishmael). For thirteen years there had been only silence from heaven.  These were years of unhappiness and unrest in the household of Abraham. Yes, the old couple had a child… but it wasn’t the “child of promise.”  By their own hands, they produced unwanted/ungodly interference to God’s plan. It wouldn’t have been so difficult had not the promise of God still been lingering in the air.   The presence of Ishmael in the home created contempt, bitterness, envy, and strife.  Yes,  they had problems before this, but they were always ultimately victorious.  I don’t believe these were necessarily lost years.  God used these thirteen years to teach Abraham the cost of acting presumptuously on his own.

One of the most frightening things in life is when you insist on having things your own way. God may let you have your way for a season. You may be sorry you asked for it.  But ultimately for those who are hot hearted for God, the hunger for the promises of God draw you back.

Blessings,

Pastor