Friday, March 29, 2013
Revelation Videos: "Philadelphia: Weak Church; Strong Witness"
Do you ever feel like your church is weak and will never amount to much? Here is Jesus' answer, and it is full of encouragement.
Pastoral Pings ~ An Empathetic Feeling of Injustice
This morning I
was overwhelmed with the painful consciousness of injustice. I know that the
world stumbles over the belief that God allows injustice to prevail. I know
that many people struggle through life with a need to see guilty people
punished because they have longstanding childhood trauma that continues to fit
the description of utter injustice against the innocent.
I know that
the pain of injustice affects women as well as men, for the stories are all
around us of abusers “getting away” with things they have done wrong. I also
know what it feels like to be a man who has to bear with his wife and children
hurting over the consequences of another person’s sinful actions that never
seem to be brought to justice.
With all these
feelings churning within me, I brought my heart to God and followed his
invitation to: “Arise, cry out in the
night, at the beginning of the night watches! Pour out your heart like water
before the presence of the Lord! Lift your hands to him for the lives of your
children, who faint for hunger at the head of every street.”[1]
Let’s just say that the Lord heard me pour out a lot of grief for the
injustices against my children.
Then there is
the further invitation: “My
eyes will flow without ceasing, without respite, until the Lord from heaven looks down and sees; my eyes cause me grief
at the fate of all the daughters of my city.[2] Since my wife is one of the “daughters”
of my world, a world that has treated her with much injustice, I found it
healing to let my heavenly Father know how I felt about all this.
The
point is simply that it is God himself who calls people in general, and men in particular,
to cry out to him about the injustice that grievously wounds them and their
loved ones. However, there is a way that people can present these things to God
so that it fuels their bitterness and leaves them angry and distant from the
Father in heaven. But, there is also a way that people with faith in Jesus Christ
present these heartaches to their Father so that it results in healing to their
own souls, and soothing comfort to offer to those who suffer in this way.
It
is very fitting that God would teach me this lesson on this particular day. It
is the day we call “Good Friday”. It commemorates the Friday that Jesus was
crucified. It is “good” because Jesus’ death was for the sins of others, and
all the “others” who receive his gift, his payment for their sins, have their
sins washed away[3] so they can know God’s love for them without any fear of punishment
at all.[4]
So,
what does a heart-wrenching journey into all kinds of feelings of injustice
have to do with Jesus laying down his life for the sins of the world? Answer: it
brought me to have some feeling of what it was like for Jesus to suffer for the
sins of others.
After
all, is that not what our struggle with injustice is all about? Isn’t it that
we are hurt, and upset, and angry that we have to suffer because of another
person’s sins? Isn’t that what we keep complaining to God about, that he would
dare to allow us so much pain in our lives because someone else did something
sinful to us, and then seems to be free to carry on through life as if nothing
ever happened?
Isn’t
that exactly what Jesus endured? Isn’t it true that, “He himself bore our
sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin
and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed”?[5] Do you see that? Do you see the injustice of Jesus bearing “our” sins on “his” body?
But, do you
see the utter love that would bear that willingly, would create man from dust
knowing that one day he would die for that man’s sin? Do you see the love of Jesus,
“who for the joy that
was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the
right hand of the throne of God”?[6]
And,
would you share with me this wonder that God would pick the day people
commemorate the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ to open the flood gates of
pain to my own feelings of injustice, all so that I could feel the wonder, the
awe, the reverence for my Savior who would bear such feelings WILLINGLY?!
All
week I have been preparing for my Easter Sunday message which includes this
verse: “…that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share
his sufferings…”[7] This morning God gave me a feel of what I will be sharing with others. If we
truly want to know Jesus, and we most definitely want to know the power of his
resurrection, then we must also know what it feels like to share in his
sufferings.
I testify
that, this morning, God very graciously let me feel an extremely personal
experience of the pain of injustice, so that he could lovingly and graciously
take me into his arms, and hold me close to his heart,[8]where
I could hear the heartbeat of this love that knows the feeling of injustice far
more than I could ever experience. He died for MY sins.[9]
His experience of injustice now makes God just[10] to
pick me up and hold me close without any fear that he will ever judge me as my
sins deserve. [11]
I am thankful
that Jesus let me “lose myself” in laying my complaint before him.[12]
It got me ready for something very special. I felt the wonder of his willing
submission to injustice. Who but Jesus would
think of such a thing? And, who but my Father would think of teaching me this
today.
From my heart,
Monte
Tuesday, March 26, 2013
Pastoral Pings ~ The Fullness of the Fullest Joy
What
does it mean to “rejoice in the Lord”?[1] Here is one way of answering that question. Jesus said, “These things I have spoken to you, that my
joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.”[2] Jesus is full of joy, he wants his joy to be in those who receive
his words, and his joy in us would result in our joy being full.
The
calling to “rejoice in the Lord”
would not then be a burdensome rule to keep with wearisome effort, but an
invitation, a joyful reminder, to look at where we are, and whom we are in, and
let our hearts rejoice in him.
This
is in contrast to the other options. If we look at ourselves for reasons to
rejoice, either we admit that we have none, or we fall into prideful,
self-centered ideas that give pseudo-pleasures that simply do not last. If we
look at the world around us for reasons to rejoice, either we see that there
are none, or we fabricate mirages of joy that disappear as quickly as we
approach them. If we look at people to give us joy, we discover that they are
so lacking joy that they want us to make them happy as much as our emptiness of
joy makes us wish they could make us happy.
And
then we meet Jesus and hear him telling us that the experience of his words
will full us up with his fullness of joy so that our joy is filled to the max.
What is that really like?
Have
you ever been in a setting where someone is so overjoyed at something to do
with Jesus that his or her joy is literally contagious? Now, picture yourself
inside perfect, infinite, eternal joy. Imagine yourself inside of Jesus and his
joy, as though his very joy was the breath you breathed, the pressure of the
air around you that keeps you who you are in him.
Now
listen to Jesus speaking to you from his word while you are in his joy. What
would his word sound like? What would happen to you if you heard him speaking
to you from his joy, for your joy? What would happen to your desire to meet
with him before the day begins, or at the end of a busy day, if you knew that
you were entering the one who in his “presence there is fullness of joy”, and
at his “right hand are pleasures
forevermore”?[3]
Add to this
that it is Jesus who initiates your experience of joy, working to convince you
that you could be as joyful as he is. He initiated speaking to his disciples,
knowing that from his words they would come to have faith,[4] and
from their experience of faith in him and his words they would come to have
joy, and, when they knew his joy, their own joy would be brought up to the
fullness he designed into us by making us in his own image and likeness in the
first place.[5]
Back in my
younger years, it was common to hear people say that God just wants people to
be unhappy, or that following Jesus is a joy-killer. Those who receive Jesus’
words know that it is quite the opposite, that he is actually the Joyful One
who brings our joy to fullness in him.
Now, let’s try
this again: “Rejoice in the Lord always; again
I will say, rejoice.”[6]
From my heart,
Monte
© 2013 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517,
Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8 ~ in2freedom@gmail.com
Unless otherwise noted,
Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English
Standard Version Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good
News Publishers.)
Bible Memorization ~ John 15:11
Many people would like to be able to memorize Scripture, God's words to us in the Bible. Here is a tool designed to help us fulfill this desire. As this is my first attempt, suggestions for tweaking are quite welcome.
Monday, March 25, 2013
Pastoral Pings ~ When Not to Swallow the Fudge
One of the
reasons I hold to my belief in Jesus Christ as revealed in the Christian Bible
is because of how it measures up to every other belief about life. One of the
tests of all the different beliefs in the world is to analyze which conflicting
viewpoint has to “fudge” information to continue holding to their conclusions.
I hold to
biblical Christianity rather than one of the cults because the cults have to
fudge the translation and interpretation of the Bible to hold to their set of
beliefs. I hold to biblical Creationism rather than evolution (theistic or
otherwise), because proponents of evolution have to fudge-it on so many pieces of
evidence that I could never believe such a speculation with any degree of
confidence at all. I hold to biblical Christianity over other religions because
only faith in the Bible enables me to live a fudge-free life.
Over the
decades of considering conflicting viewpoints about everything under the sun,
the Christian Bible has stood out as the most complex, consistent, message
about life that has not required me to fudge anything to hold to all that it
reveals.
I suspect that
this would sound quite surprising to some. Over the years, I have had many
people tell me that they cannot believe the Bible because it is so full of
contradictions. However, in checking out the supposed problem passages, I have
found quite the opposite to be true.
Perhaps I
could make sense of this by explaining that my exploration of these things has
led me to look at contradictions as one would look at light through a prism. On
one side of the prism, we see the light that we tend to think of as white (although
we aren’t really seeing the light itself, but what it does to things it shines
upon). On the other side of the prism, we see the colors of the spectrum of
light as the prism refracts each color at a slightly different angle.
Those who see
contradictions in the Bible hold to such a belief in the way that someone might
suggest that believing that light is green, and believing that light is red, is
a contradiction. Those who understand light (and God is Light[1]),
do not see any contradiction at all, since we are really talking about different
expressions of the attributes and activity of the same infinite and eternal
God.
In a sense,
the Bible allows me to believe that God is Light, and that God is every color
of the spectrum of Light, all at the same time, no fudging required. The Bible
also allows me to believe everything it teaches about everything without having
to fudge the Bible to match some real, verifiable evidence of history,
archeology, science or any other category of discoveries we can think of.
There are so
many books, and blogs, and videos out there that would help anyone explore
these things for themselves. My purpose in this post is to give a brief
testimony to my own lifetime of having to test everything that people suggest
are contradictory beliefs or worldviews. I can sincerely say that, I can hold
to a sincere, biblical, faith-in-Jesus-Christ worldview, without having to
fudge anything at all.
I encourage
anyone who has given up hope in trusting the real Bible that it is not belief
in the Bible that is doing all the fudging that is going on out there. Even the
Bible’s declaration that falsehood and deception will be chosen by the
majority, and truth and faith will be followed by the few, is precisely what we
see around us all the time.[2]
God is still
seeking those who will delight[3] in
him “in spirit and in truth”.[4]
Jesus continues to invite each of us to be one of these children[5],
no fudging required.
© 2013 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517,
Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8 ~ in2freedom@gmail.com
Unless otherwise noted,
Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English
Standard Version Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good
News Publishers.)
Saturday, March 23, 2013
Pastoral Pings: Faith in God who Opens and Shuts
A year ago,
God shut the door to a ministry that I had enjoyed for over twelve years. With
tomorrow as the one year anniversary of that finale, it is no accident that our
journey through the book of Revelation “just happens” to bring me to consider Jesus'
words to the church in Philadelphia (in what is nowTurkey, not Pennsylvania).[1] To
that church Jesus declared, “The words of
the holy one, the true one, who has the key of David, who opens and no one will
shut, who shuts and no one opens”.[2]
Jesus then
elaborates on what this church was going through by describing their primary
opposition as coming from a “synagogue of
Satan who say that they are Jews and are not, but lie”.[3] People
can appear to be good, religious folk who are really serving Satan, and are
lying about Jesus’ church. What matters is that Jesus describes his church in
this way: “I know that you have but little
power, and yet you have kept my word and have not denied my name”.[4] On
one side we have false religious people who are lying, and seem to be stronger
than the church. On the other side, we have a weak church that has kept Jesus’
word and not denied his name.
Putting these
two things together, opponents to those Jesus considers faithful may appear to
shut doors, but Jesus is ruling sovereign over those doors. If he shuts a door
to one town, or one group of people, or one church because they are not receiving
his work, he can open a door to another town, or group of people, or church,
where people will receive the same thing that was rejected elsewhere.
The apostle Paul
faced this many times. One of the most obvious was when he went to the city of Thessalonica
and was soundly rejected,[5]
but arrived at Berea with the same invitation to the good news in Jesus Christ
and was wonderfully received.[6] Jesus
himself could not do many “mighty works”
in his home town because of the people’s unbelief, or lack of faith,[7] but
he marveled at the faith of a Gentile woman who would not stop pressing him
until she received her daughter’s healing.[8]
The point is
simple. All seven of the letters to the churches end with the phrase, “He who has an ear, let him hear what the
Spirit says to the churches.”[9]
Ultimately, it does not matter what people say about us, or our churches; it
only matters how we measure up to Jesus as he speaks to us through his word and
by his Spirit.
If we seek Jesus
daily, he will teach us what we need to learn, reprove us for what we are doing
wrong, correct us into how to do things right, and train us in the
righteousness that is by faith.[10]
If we repent when he convicts,[11]
and strengthen our devotion when he commends,[12]
it won’t matter whether people support us in our sin, or disown us in our
righteousness, we will be doing Jesus’ will,[13]
and keeping in step with his Spirit.[14]
Every day I
give praise to Jesus because of something specific he teaches me from his word.
Sometimes I give praise to Jesus because that something specific he teaches me
from his word so obviously touches on something specific that has happened to
me. This deliberate application of the word of God to a unique circumstance I
am facing is like a wonderfully soothing balm that heals the wounds that seem
to come too often, and last too long. The more I know the sovereign Savior who
is the only one who truly opens and closes doors, and leads me through both my wounding
and my healing, the more I can rest in his words of victory that wait for me
each morning.
From my heart,
Monte
© 2013 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517,
Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8 ~ in2freedom@gmail.com
Unless otherwise noted,
Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English
Standard Version Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good
News Publishers.)
[1]
Revelation 3:7-13
[2]
Revelation 3:7
[3]
Revelation 3:9
[4]
Revelation 3:8
[5]
Acts 17:1-9
[6]
Acts 17:10-15
[7]
Matthew 13:53-58
[8]
Matthew 15:21-28
[9]
Revelation 3:13
[10]
II Timothy 3:16-17
[11]
Revelation 2:5, 16,21,22; 3:3,19
[12]
Revelation 2:2-3, 6; 2:9; 2:13; 2:19; 3:4; 3:8
[13]
Romans 12:1-2
[14]
Galatians 5:25
Friday, March 22, 2013
Revelation Videos: Resurrecting a Dead Church
It is a difficult thing when a church thinks it is alive and Jesus says it is dead. Here we look at what this means, and how to come to Jesus in the repentance and faith that can raise churches from the dead.
Considerations: The Bad and the Good of Who I Am
I have lived much of my lifetime trying to prove to people I’m
not as bad as they say I am. That’s the down-side of the valley. I’m starting
up the up-side of the valley where I am discovering how good I am to the one
who knows, more than anyone, how bad I am.
This is one facet of the wonder-filled blessing of the gospel
of Jesus Christ, that the one we have been baddest with, who has the power and
authority to give us the longest and most painful time-out we could ever imagine,
receives me to himself as if I was just as good as his Son, Jesus Christ.
And then, as we grow in this wonder-filled relationship with Jesus
Christ, actually becoming like him along the path of God’s unfailing work of
salvation, we discover that Jesus himself was treated as one who was as bad as
people believed him to be, and yet he never once defended himself. He didn’t
have to. He and the Father both knew who he was.
The more I come to know who I am the way my heavenly Father
knows who I am, the less I need to give any thought to proving that I’m not
what people say I am. Jesus promises to answer them in his time. It is time for
me to listen to him instead.
From my heart,
Monte
© 2013 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517,
Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8 ~ in2freedom@gmail.com
Unless otherwise noted,
Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English
Standard Version Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good
News Publishers.)
Wednesday, March 20, 2013
Revelation Video: "Thyatira: Good Works, Bad Tolerance"
The church in Thyatira (Revelation 2:18-28) was commended for their walk with God, but they had one glaring deficiency: they were allowing a "Jezebel" to poison their church with false teaching and sinful conduct. In this study we consider what Jesus taught this church, and teaches us through this church.
Considerations: A Disapproving Way to Be Like Jesus
Jesus
told his disciples that they would be treated the same way as he was treated. I
have seen this in many ways, from my own experiences in churches, hearing the
war-stories of others, and following the accounts of the persecuted church from
around the world.
Today I was drawn to one more facet of this
life. In the same way as people judged that Jesus was “stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted” (Is 53:4), many will
think that the hardships Jesus’ brothers go through are afflictions from God,
or proof that these people are under God’s disapproval.
Jesus’ enemies mocked him while he was on
the cross, saying, “let God deliver him
now, if he desires him” (Mt 27:43). In their minds, the proof of God’s
approval would be Jesus’ deliverance from execution. They did not know that God
would bring the greatest victory of all through Jesus’ death, and that Jesus was
dying for the sins of others.
Now that these others come into the
salvation Jesus’ purchased on the cross, they face the same mocking and jeering
from the world that believes that the world’s approval is God’s approval, and
their disapproval must surely also be God’s disapproval. Many who know that
they suffer unfairly can take great comfort from that fact that this is what Jesus
experienced to bring us into such a great salvation.
And, God not only told us, seven hundred
years before it took place, that this is what would happen to Jesus; he also
tells us that “those who suffer according to God's
will (should) entrust their
souls to a faithful Creator while doing good” (I Peter
4:19). The world will continue mocking and mistreating God’s children, no doubt
about that; but let there also be no doubt that we will continue living the
life that pleases Jesus Christ our Savior, the most unfairly treated person in
all of history.
From my heart,
Monte
Tuesday, March 19, 2013
A Trio of Helps for the Spirit-led Life
A few months
back I was listening to a message focusing on the difference between handling
troubling situations in the sark (the flesh), or in the Spirit.[1]
The sark-life means we are depending on ourselves to figure out how to handle
problems, while the Spirit-led life means we are depending on God to lead us in
his will through whatever problem-situations we are facing.
The application
of this message came down to three things we can do that will keep us in the
Spirit-led life, rather than falling into the trap of the sark-led life. The
first is to “witness” to God about what people have done or said. The second is
to “leave” the whole situation to God to work out according to his perfect
will. And, the third is to “join” God in whatever he is doing with “us”,
without giving any further time imagining what he should do with “them”.
As there seems
to be no end of problems enticing our sarks to take over, here are some
thoughts of encouragement to show how working through these three steps as
often as needed will, at the very least, encourage us in the direction of the
Spirit-led life.
1. Witnessing to
God
In both the
Old and the New Testaments, God requires that his people deal with conflicts,
accusations and sin by establishing everything with two or three witnesses.[2]
Under both covenants, no one can be declared guilty just on the say-so of one
person.[3]
Every matter must be established by multiple witnesses.[4]
The emphasis
on witnessing to God is that we stay within the bounds of a witness. We do not
talk to God as an accuser who knows all that another person is guilty of doing (because
we don’t). The red dragon does enough accusing of God’s children that we don’t
need to join his work. We do not talk to God as a judge, as though we know
exactly what a person has done and how they should be sentenced (only God can
do that). We do not present our opinions of what people have done, our
suspicions, our concerns, our worries, or, what our home church affectionately
calls our “column 3” perceptions.
The only thing
we can present to God as a witness is the facts of what happened, and the
effect it is having on us. We witness to God about what we saw the person do,
with no reference to why we think he or she did it. We present the objective
facts to God as real things that have happened, and we tell God all that it has
done to us.
A favorite
expression from the Scriptures in this regard is, “With my voice I cry out to the Lord; with my voice I plead for mercy to the Lord. I pour out my complaint before him; I tell my trouble before him.”[5] This is the description of witnessing to God, to present the
specific complaint we have about what someone has done to us, and put the
trouble the person has caused “before
him”.
2. Leaving
it With God
The
second step is to “leave” it with God. I often hear people say that they tried
to leave something with God but, before they knew it, they had picked it right
back up again. One reason for this pattern is that we have not finished witnessing
to God about what people did to us. In other words, we try leaving a problem
with God before we have even talked to him about the problem. It isn’t really
that we want to carry the problem, it’s that we don’t know God well enough to fully
lay our complaints before him until we have that feeling of, “it was sure good
to get that off my chest.” If we do the first step first, and to completion, we
will find it easier to persevere in the second step as well.
Leaving
things with God is based on the reality of who God is and what he is like. He
is good, he is loving, he is all-wise, he has all-knowledge, he has all-power,
he is perfect in justice as well as in mercy. In other words, we leave things
with God because he is the only one who can possibly know how to figure out how
to do the right thing with so many people, problems, hidden sins, levels of
maturity, and all the surrounding plans and purposes of God that are always
working towards their fulfillment in Christ.
Paul
explains this for us in reference to a common longing to inflict vengeance on
people who have wronged us. He wrote, “Beloved,
never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written,
‘Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.’”[6] We can “leave” all wrong-doing against us to “the wrath of God” because he alone can
express wrath against sin without it being contaminated by sarkiness. At the
same time, we must understand the difference between ourselves and God when he
says, “Vengeance is mine”. That means it is not mine, or yours, or anyone
else’s. Only God has the right and authority to distribute vengeance as his
perfect wisdom has so decided.
Within
this picture there is also a promise that tells us, “I will repay, says the Lord”. Our ability to leave things with God
rests on our faith in his justice. If we tell God our troubles, and lay our
complaint before him for what people have done to us, we can only leave it with
him if we believe that he will repay.
God’s
promise to repay is just that, a promise. However, part of leaving things to
God is trusting that he will either “repay” the person for their sins if they
never turn to Jesus Christ for forgiveness; or he has already exacted payment
for that sin from Christ because that person has received Christ by repentance
and faith. Since we do not have the knowledge, wisdom, love, justice, or mercy
to know which of these to apply, we leave it to God.
3. Joining
God’s work in us
One
of the best cures to constantly advising God on what he should be doing to
others is to focus on what he is doing with us. For example, if we were injured
in a car accident, the doctor would be interested in the history of what
happened only so far as it would tell him what condition we were in. Once he
had heard enough, he would expect us to let him do his work of helping us get
better.
In
the same way, when we have told God all about what people did to us, and we
have chosen to trust him with whatever he deems best to do to them (or for
them), we can then put all our focus on what God is doing with us. He may have
things to heal, he may have insights to give, he may have maturity-work to do
to help us grow up, he may have sins to forgive. Whatever our condition because
of what people have done to us, God has plans for making us better.
One
way to join God in his work in our lives is to spend time in the word every
day, listening to whatever the Holy Spirit is working to teach us. As we
recognize the things God is teaching us in his word, and if we seek to put
those things into practice in all that we do, we will find all kinds of
applications of his word to things we are going through, as well as to the
relationships he brings together among his people.
God’s
word shows us both the individual and corporate aspects of his work, and so we
must consider how God is working in us individually, but also how this fits in
with what he is doing with his church. Many times I have witnessed a group of
people receive great encouragement as each person simply shared what they were
learning in the word of God that week, and realized that God was tying it all
together in a theme that showed he was working to get us all focused on the
same thing, heading in the same direction.
Since the
three activities of witnessing, leaving, and joining have come together in my
mind, I have found it easier to remember what it is I am witnessing to God
about, what it is I am leaving with him, and what it is I am to focus on as I
move forward from any bad experiences. The more I take my thoughts captive in
this way,[7]the
more peace I feel.[8]
I trust that you will find the same for yourself.
From my heart,
Monte
© 2013 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517,
Merritt, BC, V1K 1B8 ~ in2freedom@gmail.com
Unless otherwise noted,
Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English
Standard Version Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good
News Publishers.)
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