Love, grace - and demands?

But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you. - Matthew 6:33

How does this work out, combining God's grace, love and his commandments and demands?

Let's try and have a look at it. What do people strive for? Fame, wealth, family... I think everyone is searching for happiness in the end, only trying to achieve it through different ways.

So now people say that God created us for the sake of spending time with him, to have someone who loves him back. Which would mean that God is needy – which he isn't. So that can't be it. Why did God create us? I think it was to glorify him.

The whole creation is made to glorify God. Now this doesn't really sound like something I'd want to be striving for – glorifying someone else.

But let's dig a little deeper. 

People often say “live for yourself” or “don't waste your life living for someone else”. Yet, we tend to live for others – for our children, for wealth, for our friends, family... bluntly said: for what we love. It makes us happy to see them happy. While living for yourself will satisfy your own desires for a while, it will never give you back what sharing your life with other people gives you. Still, it doesn't fill you up completely. There is still something lacking – and that is God.

Initially we were designed to live for God, to love him. This is why we yearn for something, this is why a lot often isn't enough. But it's our free decision to love God or not. 

 

So God has given us a set of rules, or rather: God showed us what he deems good and bad. He himself is completely good, there is no evil in him. God is holy. And because he is holy he despises sin, the things he finds bad. In fact, he thinks of sin as terrible as that anyone committing a sin has to die.

But now we have a problem – people sin. We cannot fulfill God's commandments through our own will. Just look at history, many people have tried it. And failed.

So God thought of a plan of how to make a possibility that not everyone of those people, that he loves after all, would get lost forever.

John 3:16: God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him will not die but will have eternal life.

So what counts for God is believing in him. “The righteous shall live by faith.” (Galatians 3:11/Romans 1:17)

Now what happened at the cross was this:

God himself fulfilled the law. He took on flesh, our flesh, he witnessed the same temptations as we do on daily basis; yet never sinned. He endured persecution. And in the end he took our sins upon himself and died in our stead.

But why did he do that?

So we could have a way to come to him? Because he loves us so much? He did it for his glory. 

Because now, through his mercy, we have this possibility to die in Jesus, to become one in him. As Jesus prayed – the son glorifies the father and the father glorifies the son. Why do they glorify each other? Because of their love.

We believe in a triune God – father, son and Holy Spirit. It is a mystery that I cannot explain. It goes as deep as eternity but becomes more and more natural the more time you spend with God. So when it says “God is love”, there is love in himself. He doesn't need us to love him. But he wants to love us. And when I love someone, I'd like them to love me back. That's natural. And it hurts me deeply when the other rejects me.

I believe it's just the same with God. Why else would he go this far as to lower himself from God to a human?

But back to bringing God's demands and love together.

Through Jesus' death and resurrection, the ones who believe in him as their savior have died and been given a new life in him. Which means we are dead for the sin. But we still live in our flesh and the “flesh” is full of problems against God. Our spirit is new but our body and soul are the “old self”.

Everyone who tried it can confirm: I cannot change myself for real through my own willpower. I will fail at one time or another. So we are stuck with our old flesh.

It's not like God wouldn't know this. And he doesn't want us to change ourselves through our own power. But he also doesn't want us to continue living a sinful life – he wants us holy as he is. So how should this be possible?

This is the point where many Christians struggle.

“Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit,’ says the Lord Almighty.” (Zechariah 4:6)

We are not supposed to change ourselves. We are supposed to let God do the changing. Our only part is to allow him to work inside us, even in the parts we'd like to hide, even in the parts that might hurt. He doesn't go against our will, so the only thing we have to do is to decide and give him our whole life. The rest is his responsibility.

 

So God loves us, told us what is okay for him and what not and gave us the opportunity to live a holy life for and through him – which leads to us glorifying him. 

It's a deep topic and glorifying is really about love. Just think about a special person, celebrities, how people glorify them because of their admiration and love for them. Just that with God it is that he loved us first.

Now let's assume I'm living a life for God, I love him and live for his glory – what good does it bring for me?

Well, besides eternal life and love? It will fulfill me. It will bring me to places I had never dared to dream of. It will give me joy, happiness and peace. Even in hard times.

Put the kingdom first and everything else will be given to you.

It's true. Love God and your inner desire will be stilled. 

The gate to my heart

The eye is the lamp of the body. So, if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light, but if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light in you is darkness, how great is the darkness! - Matthew 6:22-23

They say your eyes are the mirror of your soul. If you ever looked into several people's eyes for real, you could find that there is truth in this saying. Yet, your eyes aren't only a reflection of your insides. They're more like windows – things you see get inside, too.

When Jesus says

If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell. - Matthew 5:29-30

that's a pretty clear statement.

Better tear out or cut off what causes you to sin instead of going to hell with it. The eye or hand or foot in itself isn't evil or sinful, but it can cause you to sin. That is why it is so important to take care of what we do, say, hear or see.

For example – I know that I'm easily fascinated by fantasy stuff, which, I believe, in itself isn't sinful. But there are many stories and elements that do not show the evil side as evil as it is or even portrait it as the good side. That's not only fantasy related but basically can be found everywhere. So when I continue watching, reading or listening to stories that subtly tell me occult things are okay or that witchcraft is good, (which is bluntly going against what the bible says) I start believing those things and maybe even doubting god's word. And that can lead to sinful thoughts and actions. It may not happen after the first or second time, but the more I spend time with it, the more it will affect me. 

Another example – sex. Living today isn't easy for people who want to live their sexual life by god's standards. It's common to have sex before marriage, even somewhat normal to have sex after dating so and so often. It's normal to split up, it's normal to see a lot of skin and arousing pictures on TV, in movies, adverts, printed media.

I have found that those images or sounds have a pretty big impact on me that brings me into quite an inner fight. There is a lot of discussion about masturbation and I don't want to hop on the bandwagon now, but I found that for me it is sin. I simply feel dirty and awful after it. So I try my best to avoid movies or music or talks that contain these threats. Even if that means I can't watch a certain series that everyone watches. Once I find it's getting too much, I stop, even though I usually don't stop in the middle of a movie and never pick it up again. It's not easy. But it's worth it. 

 

Find out what causes you to sin.

“And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.”

Where we know that we're prone to temptation we shouldn't willingly go, as hard as it might be for us. Ask God for help and he will help you. You might fall the first times but keep going, it's worth it. And God doesn't judge you – repent and he helps you, step by step.

So let us “cut off” and “tear out” what causes us to sin – be careful with what you see and hear – and let God do the miracle of turning us more and more into his holy image. 

Tired of trying to fulfill God's will?

‘Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit,’ says the Lord Almighty. - Zechariah 4:6

Now this topic is quite an important one. Scripture says we cannot be redeemed by our own deeds but only through what Jesus did at the cross – he died for us, for our sins, because we by ourselves cannot redeem us by doing good deeds to weigh up for our bad ones.

When we look at the commandments God has given us, everything that is written in the Torah, we soon realize – even if we tried really really hard, we won't be able to fulfill every single thing. We will always succumb to the things we shall not do, be it out of rebellion, out of curiosity, out of lust or not knowing better. So, we sin. Even as Christians.

But shouldn't we, as Christians especially, try to live by God's word? Yes. And so we try our hardest to fulfill what Jesus told us to, asking and praying for strength and God's help where we realize we can't do it ourselves.

At least I did.

Now the bible says “Where the spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.” (2. Corinthians 3:17)

Honestly, I don't really feel free when trying my hardest to fulfill God's demands. So what do I do wrong? Because since I'm a born again Christian, the Holy Spirit lives inside me and hence I should be free, right?

If you're feeling the same and, like me, grow tired of waking up every morning, praying that God would give you strength to survive this day and act according to his will – there's something I need to share with you.

Indeed, God wants us to live in freedom. That's part of why Jesus died for us.

I listened to a teaching on Romans 6-8 today and God, am I glad I decided to listen to this one instead of continuing the one I had started with a while ago. That tiny gentle feeling you sometimes get – it proved right again. One of the ways the Holy Spirit can lead me and you.

Here is my revelation for today:

Romans 7:1-6

Or do you not know, brothers—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law is binding on a person only as long as he lives?

For a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage. Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law, and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress.

Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God. For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code.

Now read it again and bear in mind that “the law” is God's commandments.

Before you jump to conclusions like “so I don't have to follow God's commandments anymore!” - nope. That's not the point of it. Let me explain.

See Verse 4 – You have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to Jesus, in order to bear fruit for God.

As Christians, when we made our decision to follow Jesus, to lay our life down and surrender to him, we have died. Because we gave our life to Christ and so take part in his death and resurrection. We have died. The law doesn't apply to the dead.

But what does apply is that we belong to Jesus and so we cannot simply ignore what our owner wants either.

So what? It's following the law nevertheless? No, not in the same way.

Let's take the image of a king and a peasant child. There are laws everyone has to abide by. Anyone who doesn't follow them will be punished. The problem is that those laws are hard to keep and almost everyone fails in constantly obeying them.

Now the king rides through the country and sees a peasant child. He has mercy and invites the child to become part of his royal family. The child happily follows.

For a while they live in joy and peace until the child remembers all those laws it has to keep. Instead of a loving and merciful father, the child starts seeing the king as just and strict man whose demands it needs to meet. The father-child relationship from before starts to turn into a Lord-servant one. The freedom of a beloved child is gone.

But not because the king had changed – the king is still the same, having mercy on his child. But the child set the focus on the wrong thing. It doesn't look to its father anymore but only at his commandments.

It's the same with us and God. God didn't change. He wants us to be free. Of course his will is still the same and his laws are valid BUT as Christians we do not have to fulfill them by our own strength. It is God in us. Jesus in us is the power who justifies us.

Instead of waking up every morning, groaning under the weight of another day to live by the law, we should be looking at God's mercy and thank him. We should shift our focus away from what (we think) we have to do to what God has done and does and will do for us. He is the one who fulfills the law. We are dead to the law. We belong to Jesus. We can trust HIM that HE provides for us, that HE loves through us, that HE speaks through us. It isn't us doing all the good stuff. Instead, when we try to do good deeds out of our own strength will be often end up as Romans 7:15 says - “I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.“

So relax. Lean back. Look at what God did, does and will do for you. Trust him. Remember that you're his beloved child. That he is your father. He cares for you, he provides for you. He knows your struggle and trouble and wants to help you.

Rely on his strength and power, not on your own. Let him live through you, rejoice in the freedom that belonging to Jesus brings:

You are dead to the sin. And you are dead to the law. Jesus lives. And through him, everything is done.

Keep reminding yourself – it isn't you who is supposed to do all this. It is God who will do it.

I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. - Galatians 2:20