Light and Spiritual Dyslexia

1 John 2:1-6
1 My dear children, I write this to you so that you will not sin. But if anybody does sin, we have one who speaks to the Father in our defense--Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. 2 He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world. 3 We know that we have come to know him if we obey his commands. 4 The man who says, "I know him," but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in him. 5 But if anyone obeys his word, God's love is truly made complete in him. This is how we know we are in him: 6 Whoever claims to live in him must walk as Jesus did.


Some of John's teachings in this very letter make it appear that a true Christian is incapable of committing sin (1Jo 3:8-9), but scriptures like this one show that can't be the point. This verse very clearly states this letter was written to believers, and it is also a very clear exhortation to them not to sin. That would be unnecessary if it was impossible for a Christian to sin.

When Christians do sin, we have an advocate, or intercessor, who argues our case with the Father. That advocate is Jesus. He continually stands on our behalf and offers His sacrifice for our sins as our defense.

The word "propitiation" means "to conciliate; appease." The Greek word from which it was translated means "atonement, i.e. (concr.) an expiator" (Strong's Concordance). Other translations translated this as "atoning sacrifice." So this is saying that Jesus is the atoning sacrifice for our sins that has forever appeased the wrath of God against us (Isa 54:9-10). Ro 3:25 explains that "propitiation" is putting Jesus' righteousness to our account.

Jesus is not only the "propitiation" for our sins (i.e., those who accept Him by faith), but also for the sins of the whole world. This means that even unbelievers' sins were paid for in the atonement of Christ (1Ti 4:10). What a radical truth. That means it's not our individual sins that will send a person to hell. Those sins have been paid for. It's the sin of rejecting Jesus that they will have to answer for.

Religion has so ground into our heads the lie that right standing with God is earned by our actions, scriptures like this are almost always interpreted as the opposite of what they are really saying. This verse is not saying that keeping God's commandments causes us to know Him; it's saying the exact opposite. Knowing God (not just intellectually but experientially) will cause us to keep His commandments. This is how we know if we are truly born of God (1Jo 3:10). If our actions aren't affected, then we don't have a genuine relationship with the Lord.

This is the same truth from the previous verse (1Jo 2:3). No one wants to be a liar, and we all want to know the Lord, so people take this verse to say that keeping God's commandments will accomplish this. But this is saying just the opposite. Knowing God will cause us to keep God's commandments. So, those who say they know God and are not keeping God's commandments are liars. That's not the way it works.

These verses are stressing that knowing God produces righteous living, and not the other way around. So, it is not by keeping the Word of God that we come into the love of God, but once we experience the love of God, that will cause us to keep God's instructions.

The point made here is an example of spiritual dyslexia. Dyslexia is a physical condition where a person sees things backwards. A dyslexic person sees the word "God" as "dog." There is a big difference between God and dog. Likewise, people with spiritual dyslexia see actions as the key to relationship with God when the truth is that godly actions are the result of relationship with God.

There should be no contest over this truth from any of us who are truly born again. As 1Jo 3:3 says, "Every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure." Jesus is our example, and all of us Christians (the word means "little Christ") should act just like Jesus as much as possible. We will never do that perfectly, but that should be the direction we are headed. We won't arrive in this life, but we can at least leave and head in that direction.

But the Lord Looks at the Heart

1 Sam 16:7
7 But the LORD said to Samuel, "Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The LORD does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart."

This is a tremendous piece of information about how the Lord deals with us. It's our heart's attitudes that are important to God. Most people see only the outward appearance, how skinny, or fat, how tall or how small, what kind of clothes, or even what color your skin is. Maybe because of how much education one has or not, or what kind of jobs that you have had, those are all outward appearances.

When most hear this, it strikes fear into some people. They feel they are better in their actions than they are in their hearts. But for the true believers in Jesus, we have been given new hearts that are perfect. Our born-again spirit is as righteous and holy as Jesus is (1Jo 4:17).

Therefore, this is a tremendous comfort to those who are true Christians. God sees us in Christ, in our born-again spirit, and what He sees is perfect, even though our actions aren't.

2Co 5:17 says, "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." Our spirits are the only part of us that is exactly like Jesus IN THIS WORLD. What a powerful truth. Since God is a Spirit (Joh 4:24), and we have to approach Him in spirit and in truth, then God can freely fellowship with us because our born-again spirits are just like Him. What a deal!

Don’t Let Your Heart be Troubled

John 14:1-4

Jesus made this statement to His disciples the night before His crucifixion. Even in circumstances like they would experience, Jesus was telling them not to let their hearts be troubled. That's amazing. And that reveals the authority we have over our emotions. The Lord would have been unjust to command His disciples to do something they were powerless to do. Therefore, we can control our emotions regardless of how things are going.

It's up to us to control our heart. It's God's power that makes that possible, but we have to make the choice and draw on God's ability. How do we do that? This verse goes on to say, "believe in God..." Faith is how we conquer our emotions.

The fact that Jesus mentions controlling our emotions first in this list of all the things we should do is also significant. If we let our emotions run away with us, then it's nearly impossible to reign them in. It's easier to hold them at bay than it is to stop them once we have let them go. Harnessing our emotions is the first thing to do in a crisis situation. Most battles are won or lost in the first few moments according to the way we allow our emotions to go.

Now Jesus begins to speak about heaven. What does heaven have to do with us keeping our hearts at peace? Well, even if everything in this life looks terrible, the Christian always has the promises of total victory in heaven. If every time we think we see light at the end of the tunnel but it turns out to be another train, then we can know that our great reward is heaven. That will keep our hearts from being troubled.

It only took the Lord seven days to create the heavens and the earth. He has been working on our mansions for 2,000 years. These mansions must be something great.

Jesus was saying these things about heaven to keep the disciples' hearts from being troubled as they were about to enter the darkest periods of their lives. Jesus was also revealing how He kept from being discouraged during the darkest period of His life. It all centered on thinking about eternity. He had His attention focused on the joy that was set before Him (Heb 12:2-3). It can only be done when we put things into their proper perspective in light of eternity.

This world is not all there is. There is eternity and the time we spend in eternity; the benefits we receive there will far outweigh all concerns that happen here on earth. If we only have hope in this world, then we would be the most miserable of all men (1Co 15:19) To have the positive faith that Jesus exhibited and which He is commanding us to have here, we have to be heavenly minded.

Selflessness

"Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross." - Philippians 2:5-8

This passage is so rich; we only have space to examine one jewel. It's the phrase, He "made himself nothing" (v.7a). Notice, Jesus "made Himself." He didn't get a memo. He wasn't pushed out of heaven. He was fully engaged in God's whole plan!

That phrase there, "made himself nothing," is actually the basis for a lot of false teaching. Some translations rightly put it, "He emptied Himself." Then the question becomes, emptied Himself of what? Some falsely suggest that Jesus emptied Himself of Deity and that He literally became a first-century Jewish man; that there was no God, just Jesus, the man. But the Bible teaches the Incarnation of Jesus, 100 percent God; 100 percent man, undiminished Deity dwelling in humanity.

You ask, "Well, what did He empty Himself of then?"

Answer, at least five things:

• He emptied Himself of glory. In John 17:5, Jesus prayed, "Glorify me...with the glory that I had with you before the world existed." He gave up the adoration of the saints and angels when He came into this world.

• He emptied Himself of independent authority. In John 5:30, Jesus said, "I can do nothing on My own." He brought Himself into a different relationship with the Father, where ALL of His activities and actions had to be cleared in that unusual way. Though equal with the Father, now uniquely submissive to Him.

• He released the voluntary exercise of His divine attributes. Compare John 1:43–51 with Matthew 24:36 to see how Jesus sometimes was omniscient and sometimes not.

• He gave up eternal riches. I just want you to try to imagine for a moment the treatment that the Son of God, the King of the universe, gets in heaven. Yet 2 Corinthians 8:9 says, "...though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich."

• He gave up His intimate relationship with the Father. Who can describe the fellowship that exists between the first and second Person of the Trinity? And to hear Jesus on the cross in Matthew 27:46 shouting, "My God, why have You forsaken Me?" He made Himself nothing—for you and me.

Grace Abounding

“God is able to make all grace abound to you.” 2 Corinthians 9:8

Maybe there has been times when things have been difficult. When there seemed to be no solution. Possibly you may be in one of those times now. You may of been surprised then by the peace and comfort that was yours in Christ? When people around you were going under, by some miracle God held you together.

I know where your strength came from: Grace—God’s favor for His own. Grace is what God gives to get us through. Doctors give prescriptions so we can get well, employers give paychecks so we can get current, teachers give lessons so we can get smart, and God gives grace so we can get through. If you don’t have the grace, you’re just not making it.

The New Testament has much to say about grace. Ephesians 2:8 says that we’re saved by grace. Titus 2:11 says that saving grace has appeared to all. God’s grace is enough for us, says 2 Corinthians 12:9. Second Corinthians 6:1 says that we shouldn’t even try to live apart from the grace He’s given us. Hebrews 12:15 warns that if we fall short of the grace of God—if, as we go through a hard time, we don’t draw down upon the grace of God—then bitterness will surface and defile us. First Corinthians 16:23, as well as many other New Testament closing passages, gives a final blast of encouragement by reminding us about “the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ that is with us all.”

No doubt about it, there is a sustaining, nourishing, feeding, get-you-through-the-thing-you’re-going-through grace that God would give to every person reading this.

You flat out can’t get through life without it. If you’re trying to get along on your own, you’ve got a big problem on your hands. Without God’s grace, we can’t be saved. Without His grace, we can’t grow. Without His grace, we won’t be sustained through the trials in life. Do you have the grace?

The grace of God is the source and storehouse of all that we need, not only to get through life, but to prosper in an ever-increasing fruitful, faithful walk with Christ. God’s supply is unlimited and available upon request. All you have to do is ask.

Indifference

Holocaust survivor Eliezer “Elie” Wiesel once said, “The opposite of love is not hate; it’s indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy; it’s indifference. The opposite of life is not death; it’s indifference.”

In Luke 10:25-37 is the wonderful story of the Good Samaritan. It is the story that is being played out time and time again in our society in the last few decades. In this passage Jesus tells a story to a lawyer who was trying to justify his own existence of indifference. This lawyer was trying to look important to those in his sphere of influence by trying to cozy up to the great teacher. He was debating, or better yet discussing his way by showing how good his knowledge of the word of God was. Of course Jesus saw right through it and went right to the heart of the issue of indifference.

On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. "Teacher," he asked, "what must I do to inherit eternal life?”"What is written in the Law?" he replied. "How do you read it?" He answered: "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind' ; and, 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'"You have answered correctly," Jesus replied. "Do this and you will live." But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?"

Jesus said this man had answered correctly. Indeed, he gave the exact answer that Jesus later gave in response to the same question (Mt 22:36-40). This was very unusual among the Jewish religious leaders and shows that this lawyer had some great truths revealed to him by God. However, Lu 10:29 shows that he did not yield himself to this revelation but sought to justify his own actions before God.

Just as with this lawyer, pride causes many people to resist the truth of justification by faith in the grace of God (Eph 2:8, Lu 10:29). This lawyer loved himself and the public recognition his "holy acts" gave him. He was not willing to love God first and his fellow man ahead of himself. This was not a sincere question on the lawyer's part but rather an evasive question seeking to shun responsibility. This man was seeking to be justified in the sight of God through his actions.

He knew he had not loved everyone as he loved himself, so he was trying to interpret the scripture (Le 19:18) in a way that would conform to his actions. He wanted to define "neighbor" as just his close friends whom he had treated well. Jesus, through this parable, however, defined a neighbor as any fellow human being that crosses our path and is in need of our assistance. It is always wrong to try to interpret God's Word in a way that will match our experiences. We should instead make our experiences match God's Word.

Jesus taught repentance and faith as the means of justification with God (Mt 4:17 with John 6:28-29, and Luke 18:9-14). This lawyer was seeking to be right with God on the basis of his own actions. Self-justification always produces excuses, while repentance and faith toward God produces obedience.

This question of "Who is my neighbor?" can be used by Satan to deceive us in more than one way. Not only can he deceive us into thinking we have fulfilled the command to "love thy neighbor as thyself" when we haven't, but he will also try to apply this command in a way that condemns those of us who are seeking to fulfill it by making us think we are not doing enough. We cannot meet the needs of every single person in the world. Jesus wasn't teaching that. This wounded man was directly in the path of these three men. The priest and the Levite had to walk around him. The priest and the Levite were indifferent to the needs of someone who they only saw. We see people and their needs all the time, but we see past them and do not really look. We become hard hearted because people don’t fit into the category of how we want to help. So we just pass on by seeing but not really seeing. Our hearts are closed off or just hard. Jesus was simply teaching that we should take advantage of the opportunities we have. The fact that we can't help everyone is no excuse not to help anyone. When we develop the excuse is when we are indifferent.

Indifference is the great sin of our time. In Revelation chapter three John the beloved apostle describes seven churches and the seventh one is the church of Laodicea, neither hot, nor cold, but lukewarm. Lukewarm is indifference. Jesus replies “You say, 'I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.' But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see. “

We need to see, indifference has blinded us to the needs of people around us. Indifference is the sign of the Laodicean church, the church of the last days.

You live by the sword, you die by the sword

As we look back in recent days to Tucson Arizona and the rhetoric that has been discussed, we all took a step backwards and contemplated what it all meant. Lives were taken, was there more than just one person to blame. Had it been the climate of discontent and the angry rhetoric that has been tossed about in the past few decades? Is all this a precursor to worse days ahead? We just celebrated Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. birthday and reread his Letter from the Birmingham Jail. This should be required reading by everyone once a year. It is rich with ideas of non-violence and using rhetoric that lifts up and not tears down. It is full of profound, inherent, and equal dignity of every human being as a creature fashioned in the very image of God, possessing inherent rights of equal dignity and life. Broadly speaking, non-violence has meant not relying on arms and weapons of struggle. It has meant direct participation of masses in protest, rather than reliance on indirect methods which frequently do not involve masses in action at all.

Violence as a way of achieving justice is impractical and immoral, but also mindful of the fact that violence often brings about momentary results. Our nation has frequently won their independence in battle. But in spite of temporary victories, violence never brings permanent peace. It solves no social problem: it merely creates new and more complicated ones. Violence is impractical because it is a descending spiral ending in destruction for all. It is immoral because it seeks to humiliate the opponent rather than win his understanding: it seeks to annihilate rather than convert. Violence is immoral because it thrives on hatred rather than love. It destroys community and makes brotherhood impossible. It leaves society in monologue rather than dialogue. Violence ends up defeating itself. It creates bitterness in the survivors and brutality in the destroyers. As Dr. King said “the ends don’t justify the means, for the means represents the seed and the ends represent the tree.”

Dr. King has been the moral guide of our time, if there was a prophet ever sent to our nation he was the man. But where did Dr. King learn this from, did he just snatch this out of thin air? Dr. King was also a Baptist Minister, he had studied, learned, and preached from the Bible. I believe it was his encounter with God that made him into what he eventually became. He felt after his release from the Birmingham jail that God had knocked on his door, which God was showing that non-violence and the direction that he was taking was a path that God wanted him to take. Dr. King describes this encounter in the book “A testament of hope: the essential writings and speeches of Martin Luther King Jr.”.

Even though the Bible does not directly say to not use violence, it does so indirectly. In the sermon on the mount in Matthew chapter five Jesus says “Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment: But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire. Contrary to many people's understanding, the Law wasn't given so that we could keep it and earn relationship with God.

The Law was given to show us that it was impossible to have relationship with God by our good acts. The Law showed us how sinful we were so that we would quit trying to earn God's favor and call out to Him for mercy.

In these verses, Jesus was simply amplifying the impact of the Law by going beyond actions to the thoughts and intents of the heart. The Old Testament law had said not to do these things. Here, Jesus was saying that if we have embraced them in our hearts, we are guilty of the same transgression as if we had done them. God looks on the heart and not just the actions. In Matthew chapter twelve Jesus further reveals for out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks. The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him. That is where we are with rhetoric, it starts in the heart and will eventually work its way to our actions. Our actions will follow our heart.

In Luke chapter nine Jesus directs His disciples to go out and preach the kingdom of God, heal the sick, and bless whatever home they stay in. Jesus told them not to take a staff, bag, bread, money, or extra coat. He was trying to show the disciples how to trust and rely on God and that He would take care of all their needs. In Luke chapter ten Jesus then appoints seventy two others to go out and do the same. He directed them the same way He told the twelve disciples. When the seventy two returned they announced how powerful that God worked through them that even evil fell like lightning from heaven.

If we depend on God, He will provide all that we need. In Second Corinthians chapter ten, the apostle Paul says “Though we walk in the flesh, we don’t war in the flesh for the weapons of our warfare are not carnal. But mighty through God.” In Ephesians chapter six Paul iterates “the war is not against flesh and blood”, if we are coming against the flesh it is the wrong war. Non-violence fits perfectly here.

Jesus continued to show the disciples in a very real manner all that He was trying to teach them, and in this way He showed them the path to non-violence. In Luke chapter twenty two it looks like Jesus was giving the disciples a contradiction in what He told them in chapter nine and ten of Luke. “Then Jesus asked them, "When I sent you without purse, bag or sandals, did you lack anything?" "Nothing," they answered. He said to them, "But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don't have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one. It is written: 'And he was numbered with the transgressors'; and I tell you that this must be fulfilled in me. Yes, what is written about me is reaching its fulfillment." The disciples said, "See, Lord, here are two swords." "That is enough," he replied.”

This was not a contradiction but Jesus showing the disciples in a very real manner that the consequences of following Jesus, depending upon Him, that all their needs were going to be taken care of. Using the world’s ways and using violence was going to cause more violence to come. In Matthew twenty six the guards, Judas, and a large crowd armed with swords and clubs, sent from the chief priests and the elders of the people had come for Jesus and violence was taken up. “With that, one of Jesus' companions reached for his sword, drew it out and struck the servant of the high priest, cutting off his ear”. "Put your sword back in its place," Jesus said to him, "for all who draw the sword will die by the sword.”

Jesus was teaching that violence begets violence. In contrast Jesus who used no violence, showed that depending upon Him that everything was going to be taken care of. All of this starts in our hearts. The vitriolic rhetoric that has been used the last few decades has invaded every aspect of our life here in these United States. This rhetoric has laid seeds that we are experiencing today and seeing the fruit of the tree in our government, schools, churches, and in all aspects of our lives. We need to quit planting those seeds, it starts in our hearts. Non-violence does not seek to humiliate or defeat but to win friendship and understanding. The aftermath of violence is bitterness, anger and in the end death, the aftermath of non-violence is reconciliation, peace and in the end redemption.