Tag: death

So that His fear…

On By rcannata7In God's Word, Walk of obedienceLeave a comment

“And Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid. God has come to test you so that his fear will be before you so that you do not sin.” And the people stood at a distance, and Moses approached the very thick cloud where God was.” (Exodus 20:20–21, LEB)

Do we today truly fear God? Do we stand in awe and wonder at His amazing works? Do we tremble at His majesty and power? Do we fear the one who can destroy both soul and body in hell?

I have heard sermons and read articles where both ideas are given weight over the other but the one that has the most weight depends on the position of your heart.

When the Hebrew people get to the mountain of God, He tells them to prepare for 3 days and before He descends upon the mountain to speak to them directly. God was going to test His people to see the position of their hearts. He needed to drive out the world they had known and replace it with a desire to live a life pleasing to God. A life that moves away from sin and toward their savior. The day comes and God descends upon the mountain…

Now when all the people saw the thunder and the flashes of lightning and the sound of the trumpet and the mountain smoking, the people were afraid and trembled, and they stood far off and said to Moses, “You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, lest we die.”” (Exodus 20:18–19, ESV)

The people trembled and were fearful of death. A people still struggling with sin, now stand before a Holy and merciful God, hearing His words and experiencing His presence. They did not yet have the full word of God to guide them into a proper relationship with Him yet. So, the people cry out for Moses to mediate between them and God. This was the fear of the one who could destroy both soul and body in hell.

But God did not leave them there. His desire was to dwell amongst His people. So, he provided instruction on how to live and love the God of their salvation and how to love one another. But it was not the words alone that would change them, but the position of their hearts towards those words.

The people still struggled, but God had a plan and descended again and took the form of a man. The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. He was crucified, died, and was buried. Then on the third day, He rose in fulfillment of the Scriptures and thus provided a permanent solution to sin and death. Paul would later pen these words….

“But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.” (Ephesians 2:4–7, ESV)

Through Jesus we have life, and in that life, the fear of God has been transformed. We do not have to fear the one who can destroy both body and soul in hell, but that through Him our fear is transformed….

“““So the church throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria had peace and was being built up. And walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, it multiplied.” (Acts 9:31, ESV)

Through Jesus, the salvation of God, our fear is transformed from being afraid and trembling into awe and wonder.  Soloman, a man who wrote many wise things said it well…

“My son, if you receive my words and treasure up my commandments with you, making your ear attentive to wisdom and inclining your heart to understanding; yes, if you call out for insight and raise your voice for understanding, if you seek it like silver and search for it as for hidden treasures, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. For the Lord gives wisdom; from his mouth come knowledge and understanding; he stores up sound wisdom for the upright; he is a shield to those who walk in integrity, guarding the paths of justice and watching over the way of his saints. Then you will understand righteousness and justice and equity, every good path; for wisdom will come into your heart, and knowledge will be pleasant to your soul;” (Proverbs 2:1–10, ESV)

To me, this drives it all home. Receive His words, treasure them up within us, be attentive to the wisdom that God provides, turning your heart towards understanding, calling out to God for insight and understanding, seeking out all the God has given us like seeking hidden treasure “For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side, he has made him known.” (John 1:16–18, ESV)

Jesus is the wisdom of God, and it is through Him that fear is transformed!

Not everyone who says…Part 2

On By rcannata7In God's Word, Walk of obedienceLeave a comment

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter into the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and expel demons in your name, and perform many miracles in your name?’ And then I will say to them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Depart from me, you who practice lawlessness!’” (Matthew 7:21–23, LEB)

As I mentioned in part 1, this verse comes near the end of the sermon on the mount and is really tied together nicely with Matthew 7:24-27. These words Jesus is teaching are important to understand if we want to get at the heart of this verse.

Jesus opens the teaching on the mount with 9 statements that begin with the Greek word Makarios. This word has the idea of being happy and blessed. I really like how Stanley Hauerwas understood this section…

Too often those characteristics [of the Beatitudes] … are turned into ideals we must strive to attain. As ideals, they can become formulas for power rather than descriptions of the kind of people characteristic of the new age brought by Christ…. Thus Jesus does not tell us that we should try to become poor in spirit, or meek, or peacemakers. He simply says that many who are called into the kingdom will find themselves so constituted. 1

Skye Jethani comments on these words with his own synopsis…

Jesus is not prescribing how to be blessed, but rather describing who is blessed. While the world says the strong, powerful, and happy are “well off,” Jesus turns our expectations upside down by saying it’s the weak, sad, and overlooked who are well off in God’s kingdom. 2

As he continues to teach His disciples, Jesus tells them that they are to be salt and light to the world around them, for the simple reason that as the world sees your good works it will give glory to the Father in heaven.

Jesus then tells them that he has come not to abolish the Law and the Prophets but to bring them to fullness and completion.

So, with that foundation, he turns their eyes towards the Law and prophets and begins to unpack the true heart of God in this. He tackles anger, lust, divorce, oaths, retaliation, love of your enemies, giving, praying, fasting, where your treasures are, what concerns you each day, and judgment of others.

As he unpacks these things, he is not driving home that you must walk in perfect obedience to these things, but rather it is more about the condition of their hearts. Why is this so important to Jesus, and to the Father?

Back in Deuteronomy 30:15-18 Moses was telling the people about repentance and forgiveness and of the Lord’s circumcision of the heart. In the midst of this speech to the people, Moses says these words…

““See, I am setting before you today life and prosperity and death and disaster; what I am commanding you today is to love Yahweh your God by going in his ways and by keeping his commandments and his statutes and his regulations, and then you will live, and you will become numerous, and Yahweh your God will bless you in the land where you are going. However, if your heart turns aside and you do not listen and you are lured away and you bow down to other gods and you serve them, I declare to you today that you will certainly perish; you will not extend your time on the land that you are crossing the Jordan to go there to take possession of it.” (Deuteronomy 30:15–18, LEB)

What is God’s concern? If their hearts turn aside and they refuse to listen. Moses even before he dies warns them again…

“then he said to them, “Take to heart all the words that I am admonishing against you today concerning which you should instruct them with respect to your children so that they will observe diligently all the words of this law, for it is not a trifling matter among you, but it is your life, and through this word you will live long in the land that you are about to cross the Jordan to get there to take possession of it.”” (Deuteronomy 32:46–47, LEB)

Did you get that! The words of God are not a trifling matter, but life! But, God’s chosen people who literally had God’s presence in their midst have a repeating problem, a problem that God through the prophets warns the people of their condition…

“Put to your lips the trumpet like a vulture over the house of Yahweh, because they have broken my covenant and rebelled against my law. They cry out to me, “My God! We, Israel, know you!” Israel has spurned the good; the enemy will pursue him. They appointed kings, but not through me; they made officials, but without my knowledge. With their silver and gold they made idols for themselves for their own destruction…(Hosea 8:1–6, LEB)

They were doing lots of things, but they were not doing it through God. Later in Matthew Jesus would quote Isaiah while talking to the Pharisees…

…and you make void the word of God for the sake of your tradition. Hypocrites! Isaiah correctly prophesied about you saying, ‘This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far, far away from me, and they worship me in vain, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ ”” (Matthew 15:6–9, LEB)

 Looking at all these things, Jesus is driving home how important God’s words are, but not as rules and regulations, not as religious things to do, but where our hearts are. In it is a stern warning for us not to repeat again what God’s people have done in the past.

  1. (Stanley Hauerwas, Hannah’s Child: A Theologian’s Memoir (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010), 38–39. Found in: Jethani, Skye. What If Jesus Was Serious? (p. 183). Moody Publishers. Kindle Edition.)
  2. .(Jethani, Skye. What If Jesus Was Serious? (p. 17). Moody Publishers. Kindle Edition.)