Posts Tagged ‘Jesus’

Bionic Christians

Posted in Bible Study, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on July 12, 2012| 1 Comment »

I recently participated in a discussion of Galatians 2. While the discussion narrowed in on 2:20, it was 2:18 that caught my eye.

15 We ourselves are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners; 16 yet we know that a person is not justified[b] by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified.17 But if, in our endeavor to be justified in Christ, we too were found to be sinners, is Christ then a servant of sin? Certainly not! 18 For if I rebuild what I tore down, I prove myself to be a transgressor. 19 For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God. 20 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. 21 I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness[c] were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose.  

This chapter cycles through some of Paul’s relationship with the other Apostles and the leadership of the Jerusalem church.  It begins with their acceptance of the Gospel message that God had commissioned Paul to deliver but then moves into a point of contention between Paul and Peter.  As I read through the chapter and came to verse 18 I was reminded of a TV show that I watched as a child, The Six Million Dollar Man.  The main character had been physically destroyed in a horrible accident, those of you who are old enough will remember the tag line, “We can rebuild him, we have the technology.”

Paul called Peter out for being a bionic Christian.  When we commit our lives to Christ our human nature, our sinful nature is destroyed.  In this process we hand over everything that we are, will be and hope to be over to God.  But our nature strongly opposes this process.  Just as the scientists were driven to use their technology to rebuild Steve Austin physically, we are tempted to rely on our own abilities to justify ourselves before God.  The corollary is that we often believe that we have arrived and need to hold others accountable to this standard also.  Instead of allowing the Holy Spirit to transform us into the likeness of Christ we rely on ourselves to rebuild us; hoping to achieve an improved model.  We become bionic Christians and so end up mired in sin so subtle that we believe we are headed in the right direction.  When we rely on our own understanding and abilities we negate the very core of the Gospel. We rebuild the very thing that separated humanity from God in the first place, our will over His.

 

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How Far Will You Go?

Posted in Bible Study, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 19, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Mark 4:35-20

There are many aspects worth looking at in this wonderful story of just one of Jesus’ “goings” during His three years of ministry but I want to focus in on a couple of points that really jumped out at me.  Take a minute to read the whole story and then we are going to pull just a couple of things out for today.

Being engaged in full-time ministry (especially here in the United States) tempts one to play the numbers game.  We want to maximize our resources and time and reach as many people as we can given that time and resource.  We commission broad studies and do detailed demographic surveys to find receptive populations and to direct our attention to them.  Here in Mark God reminds us that it is not all about the multitude.

“Now when they had left the multitude.”  (Mark 4:36a)

Not an earth shattering passage of revelation, yet it speaks volumes about the missional life.  Jesus spoke to the multitudes often through his years of ministry but this is balanced (and perhaps the scales are tipped more in this direction) by His ministry to the few, or even the one as is recorded here in Mark.

“And when He had come out of the boat, immediately there met Him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit who had his dwelling among the tombs; and no one could bind him, not even with chains, because he had been bound with shackles and chains.  And the chains had been pulled apart by him, and the shackles broken in pieces; neither could anyone tame him.  And always, night and day, he was in the mountains and in the tombs, crying out and cutting himself with stones.”  (Mark 5:2-5)

Luke 8:27 tells us the man was naked and Matthew adds the story of the second man also living in the tombs but the principle is the same.  Jesus leaves the multitudes, crosses the sea (through a storm) and lands in a new place to minister to a crazy, naked man living in a graveyard (and his friend).  So that sets up my question.  “How far will you go to minister to the crazy naked man living in the graveyard?”  One might think that this crazy man was the sideshow to a great ministry of revival.  Surely Jesus had a nobler and greater purpose in this trip across the sea.  With this demonstration there must have been a great outpouring of God’s Kingdom in the countryside.  Of course you have already read the story and know that this is not true.  Jesus did not get a chance to teach a “multitude” in fact the “multitude” did come to him but Matthew puts it rather succinctly, “And behold, the whole city came out to meet Jesus.  And when they saw Him, they begged Him to depart from their region.  So He got into the boat, crossed over, and came to His own city.”  (Matthew 8:34-9:1)

I cannot even begin to anticipate my reaction if I woke up one morning with the whole city at the doorstep of the Lewis House begging us to pack up and leave.  I have to wonder if the disciples were not a little bit grumbly about this little trip and its result.  Had Jesus made a mistake crossing the sea?  Maybe he missed His Father’s voice this one time.  Or maybe Jesus was teaching them all a very special lesson about His love for the lost, the oppressed, the crazy, the one and how far He was willing to go.  It is a lesson that continued and found its climax on a hill called Golgotha. It is a lesson that would find its fulfillment with an empty tomb.

So how far are we willing to go?  The one is out there waiting for a touch from God.

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Meeting Julius

Posted in Life and Ministry, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 7, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Perhaps the next time that someone asks me about what we do at The Lewis House I will say, “We meet Julius where he is at.”  I first met Julius on the sidewalk in front of TLH.  He asked me for $10.00 and then moved on when I said that we could supply food and personal items but that we did not deal in cash.  Several days later he stopped out front and asked again for money but this time did not decline the offer of a meal.  Since then he has become a regular visitor to the house.

There are many ways and places to meet people.  As I read the Bible I see a recurring theme.  While it is true that some followed Jesus everywhere, they followed Jesus as he went to meet them where they were at.  Whether it was on the hills of Judea, up in a tree, coming to a well in the heat of the day, across the sea naked in a graveyard or up on a rocky crag named Golgotha, Jesus was ready to meet them exactly where they were at.  He came to feed them, to eat with them, to speak truth to them, to free them and ultimately to die and rise again for them.  Then when it was time for him to return to the Father he passed the torch on to the disciples,  “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.  And surely I will be with you always, to the very end of the age.”  (Matthew 28:19-20) while still assuring them (and us) that he would always be here to meet them where they are at.  Being missional is just about that, meeting people where they are at.  While God has placed us here in Toledo at TLH, He has also placed every person reading this blog somewhere that has people who need God’s love and a little truth in their lives.  Once we live God’s love and speak God’s truth then it is up to the Holy Spirit.

There has been no radical change, no epiphany for Julius, but his stories seem a little truer and he keeps coming back.  He listens a little longer and is just a little softer with each visit.  That brings me to the other important part of meeting them where they are at, prayer.  The Holy Spirit can meet Julius wherever he is at, at any time and won’t you join me in praying that He does?!

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Celebrating-Commemorating-Impacting-Forgetting

Posted in Life and Ministry, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 4, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Memorial Day just passed.  So many posts on Facebook of, “I will not forget”.  Yet as I think about our many holidays and the way that we celebrate them I wonder.  Chilly Chilton recently posted in a group that I belong to about Pentecost Sunday:

We have one Sunday each year that we call “Pentecost Sunday” … Question: what do we call (and live) the other 51 weeks??

The impact of any given holiday and the memory that it is intended to convey is not indicated by what we do on that day or in that season but by what we do in the “other 51 weeks”.

It would seem that as a race (the human race) we establish holidays more to forget an event than to remember it.  My first inclination was to see this as a recent phenomenon but as I consider the Old Testament and Israel I find that this is probably not the case.  Consider Amos 5:21

“I hate, I despise your religious feasts; I cannot stand your assemblies.”

These feasts and assemblies were ordained by God to commemorate his intervention in the history of Israel, but somewhere along the line Israel lost the meaning of  the feasts and followed only the senseless observance.  As the popular song puts it they missed “the heart of worship”.  The book of Amos is essentially a call to Israel by God to return to the heart of worship.  It is about what they do the other 51 weeks out of the year. “You who turn justice into bitterness and cast righteousness to the ground.”  (Amos 5:7). Yet Isaiah makes it clear that while injustice, bitterness and unrighteousness are the fruit, the core of the matter is in the heart, “These people come near to me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. Their worship of me is made up only of rules taught by men.”  Isaiah 29:13

Jesus boils it all down to two commands that seem so simple but for fallen humanity are only possible to follow through the ministry of the Holy Spirit.

 Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”  Matthew 22:37-40

I will take the liberty to expand Jesus’ words to include all the feasts and all the Holidays;  all the Sabbaths and all the forms of worship we may have.  If they do not point to and express our love for God and our love for our neighbors they are as Paul put it in the famous love chapter of 1 Corinthians 13, “a resounding gong or clanging cymbal”  If they do not impact what we do “the other 51 weeks of the year” to be obedient to the great commandments then they are worse than useless, they are despised by God.  The great truth in all of this is that it is really not about the form, the holiday, the season, the tradition…It is about the heart and our personal relationships with our Lord Jesus Christ being expressed in all that we do.

This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us. 1 John 4:9-12

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Point of Conflict

Posted in Bible Study, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 28, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Over time and through hundreds of conversations we came to recognize that change does not happen without conflict. As we reviewed the biblical patterns, every time-without exception-the people of God began to make adjustments to join God in his activity, conflict emerged. Blackaby and King (1990) call it “the crisis of belief.”

Jim Herrington;Mike Bonem;James H. Furr. Leading Congregational Change: A Practical Guide for the Transformational Journey (Jossey-Bass Leadership Network Series)

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the sons of God.”

Matt. 5:9

I think that too often we equate peace strictly with the absence of conflict.  The church is supposed to be a peaceful place, right?  The people of God are supposed to be a shining example of peace in the world.  As the quote above indicates this is not the biblical standard.  With all change comes conflict and change is one of the hallmark qualities of our relationship with Christ.  We are all on a pathway of change from the moment we accept Christ into our hearts.  We are all changing, individually into the mind of Christ and corporately into the body of Christ.  Consider the words of the Prince of Peace:

“Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.”

Matthew 10:34

“For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.”

Hebrews 4:12

Much of Scripture is born out of conflict.  Jesus taught out of his conflict with the Pharisees and Sadducees.  Paul addresses points of conflict in almost every one of his epistles.  The Old Testament is replete with conflict as Israel moves in and out of proper relationship with God.  So where is the peace?

Peace is not in the absence of conflict (this does not exist on earth).  Peace is in the resolution of conflict.  The Bible is a story of conflict resolution.  Adam and Eve brought conflict between man and God.  Jesus brings resolution, the only resolution.  That resolution is  both a process here on earth as we follow Him and an instantaneous reality.  This resolution process is a process of change and as the quote above notes, change brings conflict.  It brings internal conflict as God moves us repeatedly out of our comfort zones.  It brings external conflict as he calls the Body of Christ in its many manifestations to greater maturity.  “Rather speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ…” Ephesians 4:15

But praise the Lord he doesn’t wait for us.  The resolution is also an instantaneous reality.  “But now in Christ you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ.  For he himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility”  Ephesians 2:14-15

So here perhaps we find the crux of the matter.  Conflict is the result of change.  It can be healthy and in conflict we can have the peace promised by God.  Christ did not come to eliminate conflict.  Christ came to destroy hostility which extends not from change but from division.  When the dividing wall between man and God is destroyed, peace naturally occurs regardless of the level of conflict around us.  Romans 8:7 tells us that the sinful mind is hostile to God and the chapter goes on to tell us that the Holy Spirit by living in us transforms us from enemies of God into His children.  We become worthy to call him “Daddy”!  When we come to him as Daddy with our prayers, petitions, requests and thanksgiving then we are able to experience the peace of God which is already an eternal truth for His children.  William H. Willimon put it this way, “The issue becomes:  Which side are you on?  In doing so, we eliminate the human and personal side of a conflict, with all its modifying elements.”  (Leadership Handbook of Management & Administration)  When we abandon the godly purpose of the conflicts in our lives conflict moves into division (which side are you on?) and division moves into hostility.  This is ambrosia to Satan and the destroyer of churches.  More importantly it breaks the heart of God to see his people engaging in the very thing that Christ came  and destroyed.

So as the children of God we engage conflict and change with the guidance of Scripture and the empowerment of the Holy Spirit; knowing that our peace lies not in the shifting sands circumstance but on the solid rock of our God.  It is division, first between ourselves and God and then between each other that destroys our ability to grasp the peace that is already there.

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Loving the Haters

Posted in Life and Ministry, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on May 25, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Joe is one of the homeless guys that frequent TLH for a meal and a place to sit for a few minutes.  He is perhaps one of the most difficult of the people in our community to deal with and he just might be the most honest.  From the title you might think that Joe has been hateful, rude or mean to me or even destructive to TLH.  This could not be further from the truth.  Joe is appreciative of the meals we provide and the moments of rest and relaxation that he experiences in his otherwise very mobile day.  He has always been mostly polite, at least by his own standards (on occasion his colorful language and energetic demeanor has worried my immediate neighbors that he is being less than kind).  Even when he arrives less than sober he has always been respectful to me and the property.  So then why is Joe so difficult for me?  Joe hates God.

He clearly believes in God.  On more than one occasion he has acknowledged my relationship with God asking me to present to Him the long list of wrongs that plague Joe’s life.  He blames God for everything negative that has ever happened to him and sees only a cruel being who refuses to intervene in any kind of positive way in his life.  While this type of external locus of control is not unusual in today’s society, I have not run into too many people who so squarely place their animosity on God.

So then what do I do with this man?  What would I do with someone who hated my wife with a deep-seated passionate hatred?  This man literally hates the purpose of my entire life.  He hates the Spirit that indwells me and the savior to whom I owe everything.  It would perhaps be easier if my wife or myself or even my children were the object of his animosity.

“You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’  But I tell you:  Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven.  He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.  If you love those who love you, what reward will you get?  Are not even the tax collectors doing that?  And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others?  Do not even pagans do that?  Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”  Matthew 5:43-48

I have often heard that last phrase pulled out of context and misused.  Jesus is specifically referring to love.  He is establishing a concept that John would later develop as a major theme of all his writings.  God is love.  The Greek word here for perfect is τελειος which carries the idea of completeness.  God’s love is complete, without gaps, without limitations and without exceptions and more importantly we are called to love in the same way.

So as Joe walked away and yelled @#$%% you God, even as my heart cringed and my pride bristled at this man’s arrogance  I was quietly corrected by the Holy Spirit, “Sam, forgive him, he does not know what he is doing.”  My pride deflated and my heart melted as the heart of God for this man flooded me.  “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

Thank you Lord for continuing to teach me, for continuing to bear with me.  Give me your love for all the “Joe’s” out there.  Develop in me Your heart and Your perfection at Loving the Haters.

If you can, add Joe to your daily prayer list.  He has a hard life and maybe it needs to get harder before he can see the truth.  Pray that his heart is softened and that whether it is through TLH or another godly place he receives the truth that will penetrate the fog of deception that he is surrounded by.

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They Sure Look Pretty!

Posted in Bible Study, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on April 30, 2012| Leave a Comment »

TLH Steps and Walkway

They sure look pretty!

I hope many of you have had a chance to see the new steps put in by Bill H. and Stevenson Building and Supply.  We are so very grateful for them.  Of course I have had more than just an opportunity to look at them.  I have walked up and down on them.  I have sat on them.  I have even dropped things on them and I can tell you that they are solid.

However the pretty white color that makes them look so new and beautiful is deceiving.  While it is great to spray the new concrete with this beautiful sealer, it is not the sealer that gives the stairs their strength and makes them sturdy and safe.  If the concrete under the white sealer is bad, the stairs are going to crumble.  It is the quality of the concrete that determines whether the steps and walkways will endure the tests of time, weather and abuse that is sure to come.

Our Christian lives are like those steps.  We can apply all of the sealer that we want but if it is not being applied over the solid rock of faith in Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior then eventually our lives will crumble because the sealer will not be enough to hold us together.  We can attend every church service there is, serve our community and behave in every way like the ideal christian man or woman but without the rock of Jesus and power of the Holy Spirit underpinning all of those “do’s” it is like a foolish man building his house on a pile of sand (Matthew 7:24-29).  Matthew ends Jesus’  illustration with this statement:

When Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were amazed at his teaching, because he taught as one who had authority, and not as their teachers of the law. (Matthew 7:28-29)

It is Jesus that gives our Christian lives authority.  This is the authority that gives substance to all the things that we do.  Without it all the doings collapse under the weight of eternity just as our steps and walkways would collapse if the concrete was faulty, or if say we tried to build the steps from sand or clay.

However there is a reason that Bill sprayed a 5 gallon bucket of concrete sealer on his work.  I don’t want you to think that all the things that we are called to do as followers of Christ are meaningless.  If we do not take care to seal our relationship with Christ, over time we will be worn down.  This is perhaps more insidious and destructive than the collapse of poorly constructed steps. It begins with the best intentions and then is slowly worn away because we accepted Christ into our lives and made him the base of our steps but then we don’t follow his guidance.  We do not apply the sealing works of His Word, of prayer, of fellowship with other believers, of love, of discipline.  Without these we will soon succumb to the lies of the enemy and he will destroy our effectiveness as children of God.

Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.  Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.  For our struggle is not against flesh and blood but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything to stand.  (Galatians 6:10-13)

If we lay steps of the Solid Rock and then apply the seals of the Word, prayer and obedience then I am confident “that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 1:6)

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A Year in the Life

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , on April 25, 2012| Leave a Comment »

It is hard to believe that it has been a year since we moved into The Lewis House and began our lives as full-time urban missionaries. This span of 365+ days has been at once nothing like I had imagined it to be and more than I had ever thought it would be.

As I sit here at my computer and type this out I know without a doubt that the man who left the restaurant business three years ago could not have stood through the last year.  God has brought through an amazing process to bring me here to The Lewis House.  It would be redundant to take you on that journey with me again.  You would be better served reading my lovely wife’s article “The Journey to the Mission”.  I re-blogged it last month.

Even one year ago my financial expectations were that God would provide sufficient funds to cover all of our needs and provide for a nice little salary and we would live the “American Dream” as missionaries to Toledo.  I understand the naiveté of that now (someone much wiser than myself made the gentle effort to cushion what could have been grand disappointment), but even though the mechanism of God’s provision has not  been what I expected it to be the efficacy of that provision has been so far above what I could have dreamed of. Though by the world’s standards we live below the poverty line (a fact which

More important than the earthly provision is the spiritual transformation that I have experienced.

“But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away.  Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.  And we , who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord’s gory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.”  2 Corinthians 3:17

This transformation is not dependent on our earthly circumstances but I can see how our earthly circumstances impact our ability to recognize that transformation.  Paul said:

“I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty.  I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.  I can do everything through him who gives me strength.”  (Philippians 4:12-13)

Without the times of want Paul might not have recognized the transformation that he had undergone.  Without the times of plenty he could not have appreciated the Spiritual transformation that engaged his contentment in the times of wanting.

We should not assume that this transformation was completed miraculously on the road to Damascus.  It was a process that passed Paul through the Arabian wilderness, the narrow streets and prickly political paths of Jerusalem, the urbane halls of Asia Minor and the intellectual collections of Greece.  It was a transformation that continued until he was called home on a fateful day in Rome.  It is a process that we all undergo and one that includes times of plenty and times of want.  It includes times of great joy and times of crushing grief.

Each of us has a path to follow and every path is a little different but it is all about one Spirit and that is our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  It is into his wonderful likeness that we are being changed.  Like Paul I am so thankful to all of you who have come along side of us and answered God’s call to support us in our ministry. (Philippians 4:10) We have been so blessed by the generosity of God’s people.  Even as you develop in your lives “ever increasing glory” you enable us to do the things that God has called us to do and to continue our transformation spreading the light of His Glory to our neighbors.

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Jesus Loves The Little Children

Posted in Life and Ministry, tagged , , , , , on June 26, 2011| 1 Comment »

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….of Toledo!

God is moving in Toledo! What an incredible Saturday we had.  God blessed us with awesome weather and the largest group of kids we have seen for this event.  It was great to seem them smile and laugh during the crafts and game time and such a blessing to see them sit quietly and listen to the Gospel message that will truly change Five Points!

This week we are hosting a missions team from New Life Church. We are excited to work with teenagers who have a heart for missions. We are looking forward to seeing Jesus in action this week in Five Points!

We have room this summer for more missions teams.  If you would be interested in bringing a group of adults, teens or your family out for a missions experience closer to home (or far away depending on where you are) send me an email or message me on Facebook!

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I Proclaim Liberty

Posted in Bible Study, tagged , , , , , , , , on June 5, 2011| Leave a Comment »

I Proclaim Liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants

8 “‘Count off seven sabbaths of years—seven times seven years—so that the seven sabbaths of years amount to a period of forty-nine years. 9 Then have the trumpet sounded everywhere on the tenth day of the seventh month; on the Day of Atonement sound the trumpet throughout your land. 10 Consecrate the fiftieth year and proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants. It shall be a jubilee for you; each one of you is to return to his family property and each to his own clan. 11 The fiftieth year shall be a jubilee for you; do not sow and do not reap what grows of itself or harvest the untended vines. 12 For it is a jubilee and is to be holy for you; eat only what is taken directly from the fields.  

Leviticus 25:8-12

In this the Sabbath year of Sabbath years of Sabbath days I proclaim to you the Lord of Lords, the King of Kings, the Son of the Living God Jesus Christ.

34 Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. 35 Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. 36 So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.

John 8:34

 

We live in the year of Jubilee.  The Son of God has come and declared freedom for all the inhabitants of the the land.

18The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised,

 19To preach the acceptable year of the Lord.

Luke 4:18-19

 

We have all been captives.  We have all been oppressed.  Some of us still are trapped in a false sense of freedom, trapped in the lie that sin is liberating.  This captivity, this oppression knows no ethnic, national, economic or social boundaries.  It chains the rich and poor alike.  It causes destruction and oppression in the halls of power and the boardrooms of the world.  It brings death and hopelessness to the streets of poverty. It spreads darkness and despair in the homes of the middle class. It mocks us, declaring hope and escape in money, power, pleasure and self-seeking lives.  In the end it brings death to ALL those in its grasp.

    I Proclaim Liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants

With Peter we must cry out our soberness and sanity before men as we proclaim the great work of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ:

 

“Fellow Jews and all of you who live in Jerusalem, let me explain this to you; listen carefully to what I say. 15 These men are not drunk, as you suppose. It’s only nine in the morning! 16 No, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel:

17 “‘In the last days, God says,
I will pour out my Spirit on all people.
Your sons and daughters will prophesy,
your young men will see visions,
your old men will dream dreams.
18 Even on my servants, both men and women,
I will pour out my Spirit in those days,
and they will prophesy.
19 I will show wonders in the heaven above
and signs on the earth below,
blood and fire and billows of smoke.
20 The sun will be turned to darkness
and the moon to blood
before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord.
21 And everyone who calls
on the name of the Lord will be saved.’[c]

22 “Men of Israel, listen to this: Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know. 23 This man was handed over to you by God’s set purpose and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men,[d] put him to death by nailing him to the cross. 24 But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him.

Acts 2:14-24

Call on the name of the Lord and be saved.  Call on the name of the Lord and experience the pouring out of His Spirit!

I Proclaim Liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants

 

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