Designed To Walk With God

God didn't save us to add us to His collection. We are not projects or notches on His belt. He loves us and clearly wants to be with us and live with us.

"And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, 'Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away.' " - Revelation 21:3-4 ESV

"And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden. But the LORD God called to the man and said to him, 'Where are you?' " - Genesis 3:8-9 ESV

God called out to Adam but it was far from an indictment. God wanted to walk with Adam. The text implies that they had done this before. This was God's desire and God does not change.

"So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed." - John 8:36 ESV

We know God saved us to set us free but what then? Once we are free what do we do? How do we live? Where do we go.

Sin was structured. It had demands that became clear after the illusion of status and pleasure wore off. Lies needed to be maintained. Reputations needed to be upheld. But, Freedom... true freedom... what do you do with it?

Freedom allows for the pursuit of happiness but true joy is found when the creation finally realizes it's design and functions in that design. Mankind was designed to walk with God. It isn't something we have to do. Once it becomes mandatory it losses it's intimacy.

Grace. Grace fits us. It doesn't force us. Once received no rule is necessary. We are who we were always meant to be. We go with the One we were always meant to go with.

"For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all, which is the testimony given at the proper time." - 1 Timothy 2:5-6 ESV

Jesus. Forever God Himself became a man and walked with His Father to a cross. It was not strange for Him. It was hard... the hardest thing anyone has ever done... but not strange. It was right. It was needed. It was as right as it was for Adam to walk with God in the cool of the day. Jesus never disappeared into the bushes. Jesus drank the bitter cup so that we could be restored back to our design and then given more.

Adam walked naked in the garden and He was good with that. It was perfectly right.

"As I looked, thrones were placed, and the Ancient of Days took his seat; his clothing was white as snow, and the hair of his head like pure wool; his throne was fiery flames; its wheels were burning fire." - Daniel 7:9 ESV

"Come now, let us reason together, says the LORD: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool." - Isaiah 1:18 ESV

God gives us clothes like His.

No we are not projects to Him... We are sons and daughters and something wonderful awaits us every morning. A fellowship. Clothed in like manner we walk together.

"But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness. I am speaking in human terms, because of your natural limitations. For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification. For when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. But what fruit were you getting at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death. But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." - Romans 6:17-23 ESV

"But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires." - Romans 13:14 ESV

We put on the righteousness of Christ like we would put on a coat and then enter our day that way.

How are we slaves of righteousness? What do we do with our freedom?

Now we know what we were made for and have tasted what it's like to walk with God nothing else will ever satisfy us. In a sense we are slaves to that reality.

It lacks the structure of sin. We have no one to blame anymore. God isn't like the things we served before. Being with Him is right... not always easy but right.

God puts before us life and death and says, 'Choose life.'

Let's walk with Him He wants to walk with us and talk with us. To be kind to us and give us insight into what comes next. He is our king, our friend and our God and He just wants to be with us.

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Identity Loss

Oppression causes identity loss.

"I had said in my alarm, 'I am cut off from your sight.' But you heard the voice of my pleas for mercy when I cried to you for help. Love the LORD, all you his saints! The LORD preserves the faithful but abundantly repays the one who acts in pride. Be strong, and let your heart take courage, all you who wait for the LORD!" - Psalms 31:22-24 ESV

Like a person caught inside a city under lock-down people can get cut off from the supply.

Under the oppression of Egypt Israel lost their identity as children of promise. There was so much to do all the time and grave consequences if it didn't get done (see Exodus 1).

The prodigal son forgot he was a son and thought he would return as servant (see Luke 15:11f).

We live in a pressurized world and it is easy to forget things. Stress makes us occupied with details and we can forget what is important... like who we are and why we do what we do.

"But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like. But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing. If anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his heart, this person's religion is worthless. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world." - James 1:22-27 ESV

We are on the planet to glorify and worship God. The word serves as a mirror reflecting back to us who we really are. If Christ has made us free we are free indeed. Free to live in grace and receive mercy as children of God. Free to do all we do 'as unto the Lord'.

If the city we live in is under siege our supply lines are still open if we remember to look towards Heaven. We gaze into the Gospel of Grace and remember who we were and what God has made us to be.

There are orphans to visit and widows who are afflicted. Only someone who knows who they are can have a real provision for those folks.

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Pride's Struggle Against God

Some people reject salvation because they refuse to side with a God who will not endorse their chosen Identity. How shortsighted and sad.

"I cried to him with my mouth, and high praise was on my tongue. If I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not have listened. But truly God has listened; he has attended to the voice of my prayer. Blessed be God, because he has not rejected my prayer or removed his steadfast love from me!" - Psalms 66:17-20 ESV

Pride cherishes it's independent ways. Our flesh will always love to sin. It isn't going to change. But, That is not the issue. Thank God, It is not the issue.

Iniquity is emotional rebellion. None of us have a perfect emotional life. The questions is, 'Do we nurture our negative emotions or do we discover a new identity that can feel righteously because it is born from above?'

"Speak to Aaron, saying, None of your offspring throughout their generations who has a blemish may approach to offer the bread of his God. For no one who has a blemish shall draw near, a man blind or lame, or one who has a mutilated face or a limb too long, or a man who has an injured foot or an injured hand, or a hunchback or a dwarf or a man with a defect in his sight or an itching disease or scabs or crushed testicles. No man of the offspring of Aaron the priest who has a blemish shall come near to offer the LORD's food offerings; since he has a blemish, he shall not come near to offer the bread of his God. He may eat the bread of his God, both of the most holy and of the holy things, but he shall not go through the veil or approach the altar, because he has a blemish, that he may not profane my sanctuaries, for I am the LORD who sanctifies them." - Leviticus 21:17-23 ESV

"Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God. All things are lawful unto me, but all things are not expedient: all things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any." - 1 Corinthians 6:9-12 KJV

"From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come." - 2 Corinthians 5:16-17 ESV

God wants perfection and He has provided it in His Son. The old lame, broken and imperfect identity with it's impulses and desires can not serve as a priest. Only the new nature can.

Pride chooses to nurture in a person's self life that which God has rejected.

We can cherish our iniquity because our old man remains unaccepted or we can worship a God who has given us a new nature born in the humility of His Son's sacrifice.

Once we believe what disqualified us before no longer does. All things become new. God won't see us after what we seem to lack. He will only see us as perfectly hidden in the life of His perfect Son. We become winners seated in the victory of our triumphant Messiah.

Fight if you feel you must. Fight until you are exhausted. God gave you the right to choose. He will be the same. His patience has no end. His holiness will remain uncompromised. He is willing to love you... You just need to let Him love you and He will. His love will change your citizenship and your eternal identity. That is why Jesus died... to save stubborn people just like you and just like me.

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The Freshness Of Childlike Faith

"And calling to him a child, he put him in the midst of them and said, "Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven." - Matthew 18:2-4 ESV

This morning I was thinking about the faith of little children and the boredom of adulthood. God was so wise to have generation follow generation. Just as we become adults people start having children and then those children become adults and have more children. Those children are waves of refreshment to older generations.

Ah, But then there is the boredom of adulthood. Boredom is a form of anger really. Life isn't interesting enough. We are not interesting enough. Responsibilities can bog us down. Creativity gets stifled. Our inquisitive nature gets tired.

"For rebellion is as the sin of divination, and presumption is as iniquity and idolatry." - 1 Samuel 15:23a ESV

"Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God." - Hebrews 3:12 KJV

Boredom causes us to justify sinful habits and the sin that has been paid for kills us. Yes, We as justified ones die one inch at a time because our expectation is hidden from us.

Adulthood in the flesh is death. I never want to grow up and grow hard and get serious. Mature. Yes. I want to put away childish naive thinking that is incomplete and partial but faith never grows up. It never gets bored.

"Where there is no prophetic vision the people cast off restraint, but blessed is he who keeps the law." - Proverbs 29:18 ESV

We must have a redemptive vision. Things don't need to go the way we plan them to go but we must live in faith like little children believing God in freshness.

Grace and mercy are always looking at a new frontier. God wants to get favor to people here and people over there. Jesus is moving from town to town to meet a woman at a distant well or a tax collector in a crowded street. His meat and drink is to do His Father's will.

I want to take my possessions and play with them like child plays sitting on the ground with a little friend they made ten minutes ago. Those things are not things to be grasped unto.

I want to meet Jesus in the marketplace and go eat in a stranger's house.

A faith vision leaves no room for boredom. We need a vision bigger than we are and it is there if we hear God's voice.

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Bountiful Dealings in Psalm 119

I love Psalm 119. It always hits home to me. The person who wrote it clearly dealt with great hardships. It was likely written by a person taken captive and deported in Nebuchadnezzar’s third and last removal of the Jewish people taken to Babylon.

"[Gimel]
Deal bountifully with your servant, that I may live and keep your word. Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law. I am a sojourner on the earth; hide not your commandments from me! My soul is consumed with longing for your rules at all times. You rebuke the insolent, accursed ones, who wander from your commandments. Take away from me scorn and contempt, for I have kept your testimonies. Even though princes sit plotting against me, your servant will meditate on your statutes. Your testimonies are my delight; they are my counselors." - Psalms 119:17-24 ESV

This Psalm has a portion for each letter of the Hebrew alphabet. This is the third portion. It would be 'C' if we compared it to our English letters 'C' of ABC... third. Aleph speaks of blessing, Bet of purity and now there is Gimel which involves 'dealings'.

Here is a person taken away captive but God's word is their focus.

Each line blesses me. Realigns me. God's gracious bountiful dealings... I need to see them. My eyes must be opened. Scorn and accusation must be removed from me. I settle into meditation and rehearse God's testimonies (accounts of past redemption in peoples and nations.) Then delight fills me.

We are sojourners in the Earth filled with Heaven's light.

Lord give us words that are born from meditation on truth. Let us speak of your bountiful dealings. Open our eyes and our mouths today.

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Just Present Yourself

"I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect." - Romans 12:1-2 ESV

Receiving grace removes any and all barriers that would prevent us from doing this.

Oh, How we need this today and everyday!

Children Of Light

I was studying the giving of light this morning but a got to 2 Corinthians chapter 4 and got 'stuck there.'

One passage was so so good.

"For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus' sake. For God, who said, 'Let light shine out of darkness,' has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us." - 2 Corinthians 4:5-7 ESV

Our personal salvation was like the first utterance of creation. That in these jars or clay we have a miracle.

"In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. And God said, 'Let there be light,' and there was light. And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day." - Genesis 1:1-5 ESV

God made light and then divided the light and dark times and gave creation contrast.

That is what He is doing with us. The light He gives provides contrast. Jesus is all the light we need. Nothing is brighter or purer than Him. One day He will be the only light we see by.

"And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb. By its light will the nations walk, and the kings of the earth will bring their glory into it, and its gates will never be shut by day--and there will be no night there. They will bring into it the glory and the honor of the nations. But nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who does what is detestable or false, but only those who are written in the Lamb's book of life." - Revelation 21:23-27 ESV

Light is divided for cycles or rest and growth. The rainbow is light divided. A promise of salvation and redemption when the colors are seen we so the many sided glory of of God.

Let's walk in the light of God... the light of truth... as we do we are given more light. We are children of this daylight. We are at home here.

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