LayGuy

The Gospel message Jesus left us behind to tell the world is a very powerful message.  Untouched and delivered faithfully, it can have an enormous impact on a person’s life.  It’s got nothing to do with the charisma or the story telling ability of the person sharing the Gospel – rather there is power behind the message.

Apostle Paul fully understood this power when he penned..

“For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes..” Rom 1:16a

Through the story of the Gospel, God’s power can break into a persons life and bring salvation into it.  However, if you were honest with yourself, the story of a man who lived more than 2000 years ago, did some miracles, was murdered, died for all our sins and was mysteriously resurrected and taken back into heaven seems a little far fetched to base your life on.

And according to the Bible, God loves the “foolishness” of the Gospel message to shatter the “wisdom” of man.  To the hard hearted human, the Gospel message seems like utter nonsense – verbal diarrhea – and a great way to ridicule those “simple minded people” who place their trust in such a story.

As Christian’s, we should take delight in the fact that God has purposely designed things to be this way.  He is in control and He uses the “folly” of the Gospel to separate those who will believe and those who won’t.  Have a read of this…

“For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” 1 Cor 1:18

There it is again, “the power of God.”  Embedded into the Gospel message is the power of God.  This invisible power has the ability to penetrate a persons heart and soul and bring about change no natural process can explain.  We’ve seen it time and time again where a person is confronted with this power – they are never the same again!

For this reason, we should never shrink back in our responsibility to share the Gospel.  If we do, we are holding back the power of God to impact a persons life.  Will all believe?  Nope – actually most will see it as complete nonsense.  But to those who God has already begun His work on, whose hearts have been been softened by the Spirit of God, the sharing of the Gospel will allow the power of God to come flooding through.

What an awesome privilege and responsibility God has left us with!  Our job is to simply pass the message along, step back and watch the result.  And it’s in this context that I share the following video as a great help.  Please feel free to pass it along to your friends and family.  The direct link can be found here.

As a human being, I struggle with the concept of war.  Fellow human beings obliterating other humans to the point of a brutal death.  What drives people to war is beyond me to understand.

However, a sobering thought that keeps crashing into my mind is the fact that earth is not the only place war is taking place.  It’s not just a human experience and confined to our time and space.

Sure we are all exposed to the Sci-Fi films almost glorifying war between inter galactic races and species.  It’s fun to watch – but it does belong to the realm of science fiction. 

But what gets to me is the war raging in heaven.  You may read this and not believe in the spiritual world and dismiss this as pure fiction.  But I believe that the material world you and I exist in is just a fraction of a true reality beyond our ability to understand.  To get an insight into this world, click here.

Our world is merely an echo of a reality far greater than we can understand – the ultimate “mini me experience”.  In fact, many scientists have concluded that the world we live in is like a holographic image placed within a much greater reality.  I don’t find this conclusion surprising as this is in line with a Biblical worldview.

But what gets to me is the fact that in the “greater” reality of the spiritual, there is a war going on.  Unlike us mere mortals on earth, the combatants in this spiritual war are eternal and a simple bullet to the head is a mere scratch.  Have a read of the following verse…

“Now war arose in heaven, Michael and his angels fighting against the dragon. And the dragon and his angels fought back, but he was defeated, and there was no longer any place for them in heaven.” Rev 12:7-8

Don’t let the familiarity of this verse make you miss the point – there is a war in heaven.  In the reality that is far greater then what we experience, eternal spiritual beings are at war with each other.  Death as we know it is not a reality to these beings – and yet there is a victor and a loser.

Death as we know it is not an option – instead the defeated are thrown out of the heaven and, other Scripture states, they are now in our reality.  So my point is this:  If the greater reality than the one we experience is in a status of war, who are we to think that we should escape the reality of war on earth? 

War.  As humans we inherited this reality as a result of what’s going on in heaven.  As ugly and putrid it is in our eyes, it is simply a by-product of a reality greater than ours.  We have the defeated of heaven in our reality “inspiring” humans to carry on their agenda – rebellion against the will of God.

When Jesus talked about the “end times” – He made specific mention to “wars and rumours of wars” – this is simply the extension of what happened in heaven at some point in eternity (the mind boggles on this point) in our time.  We have a defeated enemy hell bent on continuing his agenda against the will of God.  But instead of a heavenly battle, it’s us humans who are on centre stage.  And this has played out on human history as some of the most horrific wars we can ever imagine.

Below is a video clip with the music to “Sunday Bloody Sunday” by U2 and performed by Pillar showing but a glimpse of this cosmic horror played out in our existence..

But the nail in the coffin, so to speak, about the eternal nature of war is the description of Jesus as He returns to earth.  Instead of being the pussy little being the modern church has made Him look to be, have a read of what Scripture actually describes Him doing when He returns..

“Then I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse! The one sitting on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he judges and makes war.” Rev 19:11

He is coming to finish off His adversary once and for all.  And how will He accomplish this?  By war.  Until He does this, you better get used to the concept of war.  It will rage until after Jesus puts to death His enemy once and for all.

Only then, will He boldly step up and receive the receive the crown, “The Prince Of Peace” – and war will be no more.

More than 2000 years ago, God, in the Person of Jesus, was on planet earth – walking, breathing and feeling life like you and me do.

He was born into a time and culture we have little understanding of.  Think rural, primitive and, compared to our huge metro cities, tiny.

Compared to the lives people live in the Western world in 2009, the period of time Jesus entered into humanity is massively different to what we experience day in, day out.  If we are dumb enough to demand that Jesus should have lived His life in our day in order for His message to be more “relevant”, then the following passage should put that thought to death..

“But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son” – Gal 4:4a

God saw it fit to unleash Jesus onto earth 2000 years ago as, in His understanding, it was the “fullness of time”.  Now I know that this passage is steeped in prophetic fulfilment and it was in fact time for Jesus to enter into humanity.  The Law and the Prophets had been screaming for this for hundreds of years and finally God said, “OK – we’ve reached that place where Jesus – You need to go!”

Jesus left the culture of Heaven where He shared unity and fellowship within the Trinity and the adoration of heaven as He sat enthroned as King and found Himself on our dusty ball as a mere human – born into a poor family in Israel.  As He grew and took in this new experience, He was exposed to a predominantly rural and primitive culture.

He grew up as a carpenter and probably noticed the other main trades of agriculture and fishing in His upbringing.  When He started His ministry, it was His experience in this culture which helped shape His teaching and parables. As a result, many of His teachings have this “slant” and “flavour”.

And this is where I begin to wonder.  Imagine if Jesus’ first visit to earth was in our day.  As a 30 year old, He begins His ministry raised in a western culture.  A product of society as you and me are – yet perfect and fully divine. 

I wonder how different His slant and flavour would be compared to what is recorded in Scripture.  I wonder what His parables would be like?  I wonder what kind of job He would have held before starting His ministry?

I wonder what His travels would be like?  I wonder how He would have dealt with the massive media attention a person like Him would generate.  I wonder if He would have an “online presence” to supplement His ministry.

I wonder if He would blog, or tweet or have a Facebook account (OK I admit the last few are a bit far fetched – although the vast majority of you reading this are doing exactly the same).

And what about how He would die to pay for our sins?  Crucifixion is a thing of the past.  What false trial and capital punishment would He endure in our day? 

In a nutshell I wonder what His ministry would have looked like if He did it in 3.5 years in the “naughties” that we find ourselves in.

The one thing I am certain of is that no matter which point of history Jesus entered onto the scene, the crux of His message would still be the same and He would still only convey what the Father asked Him to convey.

Perhaps it was the “fullness of time” – even if we simply look at it from a chronological perspective.  The culture Jesus found Himself in still has aspects in our day.  Agriculture and trades are still things people can relate to.

In our technological age, where fads come and go so quickly, establishing parables based on contemporary culture would seem “so yesterday” in a few short years. And yet, I still sit here and wonder how Jesus would have interacted in my culture and society as I strive to find answers in my day and age.

Flyleaf’s new album, Memento Mori, is now out.  Suffice to say, I’m very happy!  This band is awesome and this album has been described as more of “them” and less of the record company.

This can only be seen as a good thing as it allows them to express themselves without having to bow down to the demands of their record label.

Having said this, Flyleaf is faithful to their own style and this is exemplified in the following video, “Beautiful Bride”.  I had a good chuckle at some of the comments left on their YouTube page on this song.  Comments like, “this is a scary clip” were all over the place.

But I really, really like this song and the lyrics are simply awesome.  Have a watch of the clip and then watch it while reading the lyrics.  You’ll simply love it…

Lyrics to the song…

beautified diversity
functioning as one body
every part encouraged by the other
no one independent of another
you're irreplaceable, indispensable
you're incredible, incredible

beautiful bride
body of Christ
one flesh abiding
strong and unifying
fighting ends in forgiveness
unite and fight all division
beautiful bride

strengthen your arms now
train your fingers for battle
urgencys here now
train your fingers for battle
fighting this violence
with your feet wrapped in peace
sad tears and silence
now screams of joy
victory

beautiful bride
body of christ
one flesh abiding
strong and unifying
fighting ends in forgiveness
unite and fight all division
beautiful bride

beautiful bride
body of Christ
one flesh abiding
strong and unifying

we're not gonna fall and forget
how far you went to pick us up
if one parts hurt the whole body's sick
if one part mourns we all mourn with him
rejoice, well sing with you
hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah

beautiful bride
body of Christ
one flesh abiding
strong and unifying
fighting ends in forgiveness
unite and fight all division
beautiful bride

beautiful bride
body of Christ
one flesh abiding
strong and unifying
fighting ends in forgiveness
unite and fight all division
beautiful bride

One of my favourite bands these days is Fireflight.  These guys simply pump out unbelievable songs and lyrics I totally relate to.

It’s like they capture the heart cry of an honest human being and verbalise it in their lyrics and cloak it with awesome music.

The net effect is a listening experience that simply propels you to worship – a totally unique experience, especially when you consider the fact that they are a hard rock band.

My current stand out song is, “Forever” – an honest heart cry to a Creator to show His love towards us despite the circumstances we find ourselves in.

Instead of sugar coating their lyrics with typical – but pathetic Christian cliché – this song cries out;

“Oh, tell me You’re here.  That You will watch over me.  Forever.  Oh take hold of my heart.  Show me you’ll love me.  Forever.  Oh tell me You’re here, that you will watch over me.  Forever.”

It reminds me of the story Jesus told about the sinner and the Pharisee while they prayed.  The Pharisee leaned on what he did to justify himself before a holy God.  The sinner knew how broken and pathetic he was and just pleaded with God for His grace and mercy.  And it was the sinner who walked away after prayer who was justified before His creator.

There is no official video for the song “Forever” – so I’ll just have to share a lyric video instead.  I hope you enjoy…

To get to know the band, below is a video of their song, “Unbreakable” – again an awesome song.  Hope you enjoy their music and their talent.